Sightseers and travels are ready to visit Alliance as Carhenge was named as one of the stops in the Nebraska Passport Program.
Madison Johnson, Passport Program Coordinator with the Nebraska Tourism Commission, explained that the program has seen many participants throughout the years. She expects this year to be no different.
“This is the 13th year of the program,” Johnson said. “So it has just continued to grow and grow in popularity. We had 1,322 people make it to all of the 70 stops in Nebraska last summer. It’s a wildly popular program. That number continues to grow.”
Johnson explained that the program is simple for people to engage with.
“The Nebraska Passport Program is a summer travel program that highlights 70 different places across the state each year,” said Johnson. “The stops change year to year. The way it works is you get yourself a passport booklet, or use our Nebraska Passport App, and get your booklet stamped while you’re traveling around the state. Then, you get prizes based on how many stops you go to.”
Among the locations that are stops on the program, there are several museums, restaurants and other attractions.
“Carhenge itself is a part of the tour,” Johnson said. “We separate our program into 10 different tours or themes each year. It started as an Instagramable tour, you know, things that are cool to take pictures at. We called it ‘Do it Yourselfie.’ It’s part of places we thought it would be cool for people to take pictures at.”
Johnson explained that the program emphasizes variety. The Passport Program will run from May 1 through Sept. 30. She noted that they have received a lot of positive feedback from the program over the years.
“I’ve had people who have been on the program call me in tears because they’ve been so thankful to be on the program,” said Johnson. “There’s been lots of really great stories from the stops themselves. Then, from the actual participants, it’s a wide variety of lots of fun stories as well.”
People may request a passport booklet through the Nebraska Tourism Commission website: VisitNebraska.com, or they may pick up a booklet at one of the stop locations starting on May 1.