Nebraska has rich Western and prairie history, but the state can also be a gateway to exotic climates and new outdoor experiences.
Who else but Nebraskans could think up and create the world’s largest indoor rainforest? Located in Omaha’s Henry Doorly Zoo (402.733.8401; www.omahazoo.com), the Lied Jungle is a complete immersion into 1.5 acres of tropical landscape. Along the way, visitors experience three different types of rainforests: Asian, African and South American, including plants, animals and a 50-foot waterfall. The moist conditions are controlled electronically, allowing machine and nature to blend into an amazing exhibit. Unlike most jungles, however, this one has a restaurant attached: the Durham’s TreeTops restaurant, which can accommodate up to 300 attendees.
The zoo also features the world’s largest indoor desert in the Desert Dome, which also set a record as being the world’s largest glazed geodesic dome. The dome contains 84,000 square feet of exhibits, and visitors experience the Namib Desert of Africa, the Red Center of Australia and North America’s Sonoran Desert, complete with roadrunners, quails, prairie dogs and lizards. For those who want to stick around, the dome even has a meeting room on-site.
Covering 19,000 square miles, the sandhills of Nebraska are the largest set of sand dunes in the Western Hemisphere. Grand Island is known as the gateway to the sandhills area, a mix of sand, wetlands and beautiful scenery. One of the top activities is watching the sandhill crane migration, when 500,000 of these graceful birds swoop through the area in the spring; the experience is so profound, it’s listed in the popular book 1,000 Places to See Before You Die. The Crane Meadows Nature Center (308.382.1820; www.cranemeadows.org) is the most popular spot to watch the migration, and it also offers a 12,000-square-foot interpretive center with meeting space and a kitchen for groups.
Just a few miles outside Lincoln is the Spring Creek Prairie Audubon Center (402.797.2301; www.springcreekprairie.org), where the traditional Nebraska prairie is celebrated. This 808-acre reserve remains in pristine condition; visitors can even still see wagon ruts from the days of the Oregon Trail. The eco-friendly Education Building offers two different spaces for meetings and receptions, or planners can rent the entire building. Workshops, speakers and other programming is readily available as well.
