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That’s just how Harold Light of Cambridge remembers fighting in Korea -- on foot, cold, wet and covered in snow. When you needed to get somewhere, you rode in the back of a truck or you walked.

“It was twice as cold there as it is here,” Light said as he gazed at the memorial surrounded by his brothers in arms, the real life soldiers who inspired the squad of 19 larger-than-life, metal servicemen on patrol.

Meteorologists expected an inch of the white stuff in Washington Tuesday. But no small amount of snow would keep 460 Korean War veterans from Nebraska from seeing their memorial. If anything, it added to the realism.

With the latest Heartland Honor Flight, almost 2,100 veterans of World War II and Korea have visited the landmarks of our nation's capital thanks to $1.8 million in donations.

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They converged on Omaha from about 200 Nebraska towns.

For many, it was the second time that a letter mailed to their home had brought such a cross section of their generation together.

More than six decades ago, Arlon Bartels’ letter began: “Greetings and salutations,” he said. “You have been selected, by your friendly draft board.”

This time, the letter came from Omaha-based Patriotic Productions. It thanked him for his service during the Korean War and invited him to join the Heartland Honor Flight.

As each of the 460 veterans walked through the glass doors of the Ramada Plaza on Monday, middle school students from St. Mary’s School in Lincoln greeted them, shaking their hand and saying: “Thank you for your service. God bless.”

As they lined up for roll call and later during a banquet for 1,400, the thank-you's continued, from University of Nebraska Board of Regents member Hal Daub, Omaha Mayor Jean Stothert, World War II veteran Rev. Gil Hill, Gov. Dave Heineman, South Korean representative Lt. Col. Kang Moon Ho and Mandy Freitag, a young woman born in Korea and raised in America.

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Dietrick “Dee” Frye knew Earl Bridger would be at that dinner Monday night.

He had seen his old buddy’s name on the list of veterans of the Korean War scheduled to take part in Tuesday's day-trip to D.C.

As boys, they both attended Belmont School in Lincoln. Dee Frye was a year ahead of Bridger, who was in the same class as Frye’s brother, Tom.

Dee Frye enlisted in the Navy in 1948, straight out of high school. He was stationed in Kodiak Island, Alaska, in 1950 when President Truman ordered American forces to Korea.

Soon after, Tom Frye and Bridger got their draft letters and ended up serving as combat engineers. In 1951, Dee Frye’s ship, the USS Saint Paul, happened to pull into port in northern Japan at the same time his younger brother and Bridger were stationed there.

Dee Frye got 72 hours leave and the three hit the town.

“We might have tipped a few,” Dee Frye said.

That was the last time Dee Frye saw Bridger, until Monday night. After registering, he asked around about his friend. After so many years, they could have been standing next to each other and never known it.

Word got around, and Daub, the master of ceremonies for the night, made an announcement.

It took the old friends a couple minutes to get out of their seats and walk across the room, but as they met and their arms wrapped around the other, for a few moments the years seemed to drop away.

“I couldn’t believe it was him. I was just surprised and shocked. It made my day meeting him again after all these years,” Dee Frye said.

Both men live in Lincoln, but life hadn’t seen fit to cross their paths. Bridger is a former firefighter while Dee Frye worked at a printing press until computers made them obsolete, then he drove buses before retiring.

* * *

The trip took less than 24 hours.

Buses rolled out of the Ramada Plaza parking lot bound for Eppley Airfield at 3 a.m. packed with veterans sporting black hats, blue polo shirts and jackets courtesy of Mutual of Omaha with the words, “Korean War Honor Flight,” embroidered over their hearts.

There were few hitches, although one veteran fell in the bathroom Monday night and fractured a hip, preventing him from joining his fellows.

Organizers scheduled the non-stop flights to Dulles International Airport to be in the air before the sun was up, taking off at 5, 5:45 and 6:15. They wouldn't return until the sun had set. The jets -- a 737, 767 and MD-90 -- cost $360,000 to charter, eating up the lion’s share of the $500,000 raised for the event.

More than 100 volunteers, dubbed guardians, pushed wheelchairs and oxygen tanks through security screening points, onto the planes and kept the wheels of the tour rolling smoothly throughout the day.

At Dulles, a gauntlet of cheering family, volunteers and active duty soldiers welcomed the veterans to Washington and ushered them onto buses headed to the Korean War memorial, the Vietnam wall and Lincoln Memorial.

Veterans would also tour Arlington National Cemetery, the Iwo Jima Memorial and the World War II Memorial.

For a day, they were stars. Police escorted their buses. High school girls from Florida on spring break asked to pose for pictures. Members of Nebraska's congressional delegation dropped by to shake hands.

* * *

At the National World War II Memorial, a handful of guardians broke off from the main group and boarded a bus to Arlington National Cemetery -- Section 60 -- where more than 800 war dead from Iraq and Afghanistan are buried.

These guardians carry a second title -- Gold Star Parent -- as the mother or father of an American soldier killed serving their country.

“It’s an organization nobody wants to join,” said Bob Allgaier, whose son, Chief Warrant Officer Christopher Allgaier is buried at Arlington.

Chris Allgaier, 33, and four other soldiers died May 30, 2007, in Afghanistan when a rocket-propelled grenade hit their double-rotor Chinook helicopter. The Taliban took credit for the attack.

Noala Fritz brought a bag of rocks with her, each painted Husker red and marked with an “N”. She planned to leave one on the five white marble headstones marking the graves of Nebraskans in Section 60.

She walked between the rows, seeking names, leaving prints in virgin snow. Gun shots broke the silence. Three volleys.

Noala Fritz stopped, her back rigid. Then, faintly, came the mournful sound of taps. With those first few notes, she sagged, rested the fingertips of one hand on a headstone and wept.

The high school biology teacher from Falls City recalled her son, Army 1st Lt. Jacob Fritz, who was buried in 2007 near his hometown.

It’s gratitude to all veterans -- living and deceased -- that kept her going Tuesday on little to no sleep, pushing wheelchairs, checking names against lists and handing out boxed meals on packed buses.

“See every single grave here,” Fritz said. “That person gave their life so you could refuse to stand for the Pledge (of Allegiance), so you could complain about the government, you could have a belly that is full."