Bonndocks or Blessing?

It was snowing at my house again.... it's April, who knows what the weather will be. But I was in no rush to return from Colorado so I wandered through Nebraska.

The plan was to see the great and grand migration of sandhill cranes.  As a child in Alaska, I remember stalking the cranes. Crawling on our bellies in hay stubble, over frozen ground to see how close we could get to these gangly but appealing birds. We just knew they were BIG and came each spring to feed on leftover grain in our fields.  Here's a nice visual of my childhood home with the birds.
http://www.solsticelight.com/aks/gallery/journal/alaska/0423/migratory_birds.htm

And in the spring flocks of these birds fly in from the south and stop for a grand feed in the Sandhills of Nebraska. The North Platte River has been hand dredged to keep it ankle deep on a three and a half foot crane. Farmers leave corn in the field.  Millions of cranes show up. Or so they say.  I saw a dozen. And couldn't get near the river.   So rather than making a sensible decision to drive another hour east to the Capital of the Crane World, Kearney, NE.; I drove north.  Look on a map- there's not much between North Platte (the town) and Valentine, Nebraska.  About halfway I said,"If You provide a hotel, I'll get off the road. It is way too dark and way to empty for me to be driving around late at night."  And He did. Thedford has a lovely Roadside Inn. With two phone books in my bedside stand.



These two phone books cover the same area- nineteen counties in northwestern Nebraska.  They are each about 1/2 inch thick.  This is a thinly populated part of the world!

So the next day I drove north and west toward South Dakota, through the heart of an area called the Sandhills.  These are giant sand dunes- not high, just flattened in rolls and humps and held together by a variety of grasses. I learned that 85% is "intact natural habitat"- it's never been farmed. Virgin territory.

We love virgin or old growth forests- they are cool and captivating with giant trees. Well, I'm captivated by big, open empty spaces.  I just follow my nose down open roads and feel small in a big world. It's lovely.

 A world where: Two lane highways turn into single lane blacktops, single lane blacktops turn into gravel, gravel turns into dirt trails, & dirt trails become cow trails. Oh, "The Good Life."

~Cherry County

https://www.facebook.com/pages/Nebraska-Sandhills-Lifestyle/230141917099855

Where does this road go?

 

It's nice not to be alone out here....

Tire tracks!  I'm not the only one.
This is a public road.
Really

Water-
revealed by cottonwood trees, captured by wind. 

There are some roads I don't follow.... a few.There's just not enough time!

Back to the main road.

See- here's the sign. 

And a sign of what's to come- a single yucca seed left behind from last fall. 

I left my car to check out....

This.......

When they cut a road in the hill, it shows it's true form.
Sand

A sign of life?
An egg, perhaps a potato?

No- rocks caught up in the sand,  tumbled into smooth organic forms.

And the every rolling land around me.
Empty?  I don't think so. 

The other wonder of wandering through the Sandhills is the trains. I'm becoming fascinated with trains and I found myself driving parallel to trains for several hours.

This is the old two lane road.
At some point in time, this was a very slow trip.

Why was it abandoned?
When?

But now, it's super highway!
Well, not really.
But it's a good reminder that someone did this trek really slow
....in a  Conestoga wagon. 

I will give some advice. Do not believe a map that shows twenty miles between lakes as a road with any straight sections. I maneuvered my car in large, lazy grand slalom course between shallows lakes covered with waterfowl.

And someone tried to plow up the land....
Now they carefully manage cattle and keep the surface intact.
Remember the Dustbowl. 

Beauty in the small details. 

I wandered into Chadron- pronounced Sha'dron and bought food at the first health food coop I'd seen since Colorado. And resisted the local library book sale.  Instead of turning north and going straight to Hot Springs, SD and home, I went the long, scenic route. Why not?

Nebraska has it's own Badlands! Who knew?

And railroad cars. 

Boxcars strung out like squared beads, gleam metallic against the curve, the throat of golden hills.
Double tracks twist through a valley.

Boxcars gleam gold against bronze interrupted by red, gold, red, red, gold as they click past in the afternoon sun.  Boxcars of coal meet me and race away; while I race with the empties. Another gulp of coal to move.

And engines trusting trestles. 

I cannot possibly take enough pictures to show how big and empty, yet fertile and life giving this place is. These are my thoughts as I wandered. Random yet connected.  Like the land. 

A solitary brown paper bag- trash? But also a graceful dance with the wind as the bag twirls like a ballerina. 

 Shallow ponds with ducks and geese pausing on their flights. 

Patches of white snow against golden grass.

Browned hills stand behind rows of cottonwoods. 

The prairie giants reveal the water flow beneath the surface, hidden but for the trees. 

Dead tress,

white limbs highlighted against blue sky.

Golden eagle glares at me from his perch, a sycamore branch jutting above my road.

Hawk soars motionless, waiting for movement below. 

Relentless wind erodes fence posts   

into driftwood soldiers, stalwart. 

Single swan floats on the surreal blue of a shallow pond, a glide of pure white. 

Hundreds of windmills silhouetted agains sky and hill. 

Cattle make the only breaks in the hills, paths  

as they abandon the windswept heights 

and retreat to water and shelter. 

 Rain follows the animal tracks, furrows dig deep into the pristine sides. 

Dips and turns of valley roads

Mailboxes, 

"Seven Miles to the Henn Ranch"

Do they care for one another well here or are you just expected to be tough?

Corrals with chutes, unused. 

How do they load cattle now?

Barns, nestled in valleys,

Red roofs. Why always red? 

Gray, warm- grandmother barns.

Cozy.

On the valley floor, 

coils of blue green netting enclose

 last year's hay into huge rolls, cut like a jelly roll. 

A prairie cinnamon roll, waiting for a smear of fresh butter. 

Rolls of hay rests, 

 nourishment for another winter. 

 Yucca spikes against the sky, 

betray lack of water,

Pods are open, empty,

Seeds are dropped and waiting for spring rains,

To start all over again. 

If you're still reading, I'm amazed.  I dictated much of those musings into my phone as I drove knowing if I stopped to capture each image, I'd still be out there.  All good things- and most blog posts do come to an end. And this is it.

Bless you. Slow down and see your world. It's far from empty.