Nebraska’s 300-mile Junk Jaunt returns this weekend

The Junk Jaunt, all the time held the final full weekend of September, provides collectibles, antiques, classic objects, dishes, furnishings, clothes, toys, instruments, farm gear, books and Christmas stockings. Sellers have discovered outdated bathtubs, outdated window shutters, rusty license plates and extra.

“You’re solely restricted by your creativeness and the legislation,” Dianne Wiberg, the overall coordinator of the Junk Jaunt since 2016, mentioned.

“We now have 515 distributors, which is fairly near 2021, and pre-orders of Shopper’s Guides have been nice, so hopefully that’s a sign the crowds will probably be nice as properly,” she mentioned.

Some distributors and church buildings alongside the route will supply sizzling soup, sizzling canine, cookies, desserts, lemonade and low, too.

One thing new has been added this 12 months: an opportunity to win gasoline playing cards. To enter, customers ought to ship a four-minute video of their Junk Jaunt expertise by Oct. 10 to the Junk Jaunt workplace, 1523 M Road, No. 104, Ord, 68862. Entrants should go to at the least 4 cities alongside the route. Ten winners will every get a gasoline card value $100.

The round route includes 35 cities in 9 counties alongside Nebraska 2, Nebraska 11 and Nebraska 91. The start line is Grand Island. Consumers can go any path they need.

The northern route stretches 150 miles west on Nebraska 11 by means of Cairo, Dannebrog, Ord and Elyria as much as Burwell, the place it goes west on Nebraska 91 to Brewster and southwest to Dunning.

From Dunning, the route follows Nebraska 2 again by means of Damaged Bow, Berwyn, Ansley, Mason Metropolis, Litchfield, Hazard and Ravenna and again into Grand Island.

The Junk Jaunt has 35 cities taking part in Blaine, Loup, Garfield, Wheeler, Greeley, Valley, Custer, Sherman and Howard counties, however tiny chips of Buffalo and Corridor counties take part, too. They embody Ravenna, situated on Nebraska 2 on the county’s north edge, and the portion of Corridor County that sits north of I-80, together with Grand Island, Alda and Wooden River.

The favored Shopper’s Information, which lists each sale website on the route, may be bought for $10 whereas provides final. Go to junkjaunt.com for a listing of places. The Consumers Information may be downloaded on-line for $10.

The Junk Jaunt was launched by the Loup River Scenic Byway Committee in 2004 as a solution to promote central Nebraska. That first 12 months, 1,000 customers visited 75 sale websites in 35 cities. The subsequent 12 months, the committee produced its first professionally printed Shopper’s Information. By its third 12 months, the Jaunt was off and working.

By 2014, the sale’s tenth 12 months, the Junk Jaunt had 700 registered distributors, and 720 distributors by 2017. Registered distributors have dropped a bit since then, particularly because of COVID-19, however many individuals alongside the route maintain gross sales however don’t register, which requires a $35 payment. Solely registered distributors are within the Consumers Information.

License plate surveys and visitor books have tallied 25,000 annual customers from 34 states, together with Hawaii, a number of Canadian provinces and some international international locations.