May 23, 2017

  • In a Rut

    I could write a post about being stuck in a rut in life. Heck, I could write a dozen posts about that! But this post is about literally being in a real dirt and mud rut. I am still blogging about the geocaching road trip I took with my friend Maxine earlier this month.  We were on a lot rutted dirt roads like this one:

    5.8 The Old Corrals road

    They often led us to places with lovely views across the plains.

    5.8 The Old Corrals

    But my favorite ruts were on a much, much older road than that rutted dirt road above. We took a modern asphalt highway out into the prairie and pulled over at a gate that opened into a cow pasture.

    5.8 Santa Fe Trail

    There was a geocache hidden right beside the gate, and another one about a tenth of a mile beyond the gate. Max signed the log on the first cache while I was covering all of my exposed skin and spraying tick and mosquito repellent on my clothes and hat, and then we opened the gate and ventured into the pasture. We walked along a faint trail through the high grass with an almost reverent feeling. We knew we were walking in ruts, but we couldn't see them beneath the high spring grass.

    5.9 SFGT Ralph's Ruts

    We did see a snake - surprisingly, the only one we saw on the entire trip. The cache was hidden near those trees on the right of the photo above and if you look closely, you can see that it was being guarded.

    5.9 Ralph's Ruts

    Max carefully approached the cache while I was discreetly checking to see if any of those cows were bulls. They didn't seem to mind our presence too much, but they moved away from the trees as we approached and waited until we began walking away before moving back into the shade.

    We walked back toward the gate thinking about what it must have been like to walk in those ruts behind wagons and horses and oxen on the way from Independence, Missouri to Santa Fe, New Mexico. Those ruts were a remnant of the Santa Fe Trail, and while we couldn't see them under the grass, they are plainly visible in this aerial view from Bing Maps.

    5.9 Ralph's Ruts aerial

    I'm grateful to the friendly farmer who allows strangers into his cow pasture to experience a little bit of history and find a geocache. His name is Ralph, and the ruts are named in his honor. If you're ever in Kansas, there are many places where modern roads cross remnants of the Santa Fe Trail. Ralph's Ruts is where you can walk on the trail... as long as you don't bother the cows.

     

     

Comments (7)

  • Gosh that makes me homesick.

  • What a wonderful rut that takes you to all sorts of interesting geocache sites! This one looks a little wilder than some, and I would have been a bit worried about the cattle! No ticks, I hope!

  • Ralph's ruts. I like that you named them, and are the kind of person to be aware of and thank the farmer allowing people on his private property.

  • I wouldn't think of bothering the cows. Do you know what kind of a snake it was?

  • Cattle on an open range make me nervous when there are no trees to hide behind! :) Love those rutted roads.

  • Very unique historical location! Glad you only found one snake... I'm snake free but I may have contacted some sort of food allergy or possibly poison ivy. can't tell but it is pretty miserable. And I look like I may be on my way to zombie-ism.

  • Those are quite the ruts to maneuver!

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