People whose only experience with Nebraska often complain about the boring flat landscape. That may be true when 99% of visitors to Nebraska form their opinion through the windows of their cars while travelling along I-80, the highway that connects Boston and San Francisco.

Northwest Nebraska has very rugged and extremely isolated country. The Sandhills region, bisected by US Highway 2, is a veritable sea of steep sand dunes covered with tallgrass prairie and over a million acres of National forest comprised mainly of Ponderosa Pine, cedar, and cottonwood.

The Nebraska National Forest in the heart of the sandhills near Halsey is a favorite destination of mine. Besides being a short 2-hour drive, I can rely upon isolation in any of dozens of locations. I usually camp near one of many windmills and, as was the case this trip, I saw no sign of humanity (no people, no vehicles, not even passenger jets flying over at 35,000 feet.

WIldlife is abundant and late at night the yips of coyotes calling to each other are the only sounds other than the wind in the pines and the creak of the windmills. These are not "campsites" since there are no "facilities", firepits, or even any indication that anyone has ever located their camp there.

If you value isolation and a true wild experience with the added advantage of driving to the site, then this may the place for you.