Tracey Winbigler's 2009 Trail West Journal

 

22 May, Council Bluffs, IA

A horse is looking at me right now. So is Larry England, the man responsible for MormonTrails.com, a website that serves the people that travel the historic route the Exodus took in 1846. In Feb. that year Brigham Young crossed the ice at  Nauvoo and headed into Iowa looking for a place for all the people. I’m sitting at a small picnic table in an open-sided barn with the rafter lights on. For some reason two of the seven horses tied to the steel fence panels are staring at me; maybe it’s the laptop. Maybe they sense the excitement all around us in the campground at Westfair in Pottawattomee County. Long Horse trailers and trucks are parked around the barn, with the occasional wagon. I’ve led horses, hauled hose, looked around for a thrown shoe a rough paddock, rode in the back of a flatbed truck down to the ‘good’ shower house, put up a tent and met my horse, Poncho.

There’s a lot of work that goes into these wagon trails. The trail master doesn’t have time to sleep. I’m getting up at 5  am. Nighty night. ps there are Mormons here.

 

23 May, Morning

We just convoyed more than ten predominantly white rigs, semi trucks pulling horse and living trailers from last night’s campground at Council Bluffs, Westfair Park to tonight’s campground. I drove my car at the end of the line, just in front of the shuttle van, which we’re all in now, wind blowing in the open windows blowing the sound of congenial talk between the principles: from WV, KY, UT, IA, IL, men and women in some authentic long dresses and chaps, lots of smiles, reminiscences and good will. Today is the first day of our trail ride from council bluffs to winter quarters I’ll be riding a paint named Poncho the trail master saddled this morning. When I woke up and crawled out of my tent, I saw that Poncho was already saddled.

 

Danny, the TM, was still up lining up tack when I went to sleep. He gets 4 hours sleep. The wind is cooling the sweat in my hair.

 

24 May, Yesterday’s 22 miles

Hard rock, hard streets and road, and hard weather, hot steamy and sunny. From 9:45 until five thirty the Van Fleet wagon Trails West journeyed together, down city streets, interstates and a long gravel road. As we set out from camp, the first road we took was a four lane into Council Bluffs. A police car drove ahead with his lights flashing, but our leader was Danny, ponying two other horses, wearing that hat—a white broad brim--that distinguishes him from the others. He rode out to the left side of our string of wagons and riders in the far right lane. In this part of the country, there are often highway signs where there’s an extra lane going up hills that read Slower Traffic Right Lane, and that was definitely where we belonged. Cars passed us carrying children staring in open-jawed wonder, people who didn’t miss a moment on the cell phone, and adults who shouted, asking if they could ride our horses or where we were going.

 

Utah! Answered Horn, Dennis Brouse’s wrangler, ponying a lovely saddled buckskin. I smiled at the sound of that and looked up into the trees to find the source of the question. I couldn’t see who asked for the leaves. Like Zacheias in the Sunday School story, someone had climbed a tree to watch us pass. We out riders close enough to hear the voice joked it sounded like the ghost of Brigham Young or Joseph Smith, or God. Well, not the ghost of God, just God. Whenever I could, I steered Poncho up off the street and onto the grass, saying Step so he’d lift his feet high enough to keep from stumbling over the curb. Riding in the city felt precarious, because of the slick cement in combination with the horse’s shoes. A couple three times his rear hooves slid out from under him, and that wouldn’t be pretty. Poncho’s back, at 15 hands 2 inches, felt high. That’s tall when you’re sitting above a street, or trotting through a red light with beaucoup traffic lined up in each direction, waiting for you to get through the intersection. Nobody honks, thank goodness.

I spent most of my time at the rear of the train. Every once in a while I’d get to a place next to a wagon, which seems the right place for an outrider to be, since my function historically would have been to help the teamster with the front of the team so he wouldn’t have to stop the wagon and climb down to do it himself; or if the wagon ran away (heaven forbid) I could catch the team and stop them.

The story of this day, out of twenty possibles, is that Charlie’s heavy horses were so in step with their jog trot going over the railroad yard bridge at Avenue G over to 25th, the sound of their rhythm resembled a war drum. Eerie was the word that kept coming up to describe it. Ranger, one of the lead mules pulling Red’s Rural Heritage wagon jumped a few times and wanted to rear. From where I sat, a train away, I could see Danny, the leader, turn around in his saddle, which is his habit, but instead of turning around and going on, the train stopped, and he was bending from his saddle toward the jumpy mule, then standing to hold one of the team.

I heard this story this morning in the kitchen area, under an awning drinking coffee and mostly listening to the men talk. Raymond, Red’s mule skinner, and Red said that if Ranger could have taken ‘bout three steps ahead real quick, he’d a been all right, or if we’d a been able to drive him around instead of talking to the TV crew. But that sound on that bridge still would have gotten to him, that wouldn’t have made any difference.

Wagon train men talk about: sore butts and how to repair them (Ban Roll on); politics, small town and local event administration; grudges; women and marriage stories; kids moving back in; divorces; the trail; strategies about how to communicate their purpose to the public, and dog stories, with lots of ribbing laced throughout.

There’s more to this particular train than historical reenactment. Faith and endurance are central in the rewards and therefore, they seem to be motivating these teamsters, cooks and outriders. Most of them have made many rides, measured in weeks, with specific trail names such as Oregon, Gold Rush or like this one, Mormon, and when they get together talk is frequently about their rigs, their trailers and the modifications they’ve made on them. For instance, Danny’s got a flatbed trailer resembling a black metal mesh hayrack but longer, with horseshoes welded at fixed points along the side for tying and feeding horses on the trail.

Rich, the cook from Minnesota, modified one of his horse trailers into a shower that is de luxe, large enough for two, with hot, pressurized water and plenty of room to dry off and keep your change of clothes dry. We slip him a donation every once in a while to reimburse him for his hard work on our behalf. He’s also got a small roundish closed trailer with a front that folds out to provide counter and storage space. The postcards and photographs he and his wife Sue have tucked into the wall shelves make it seem as if they’ve brought part of their home with them.

Today (Sunday) I convinced Danny to carry a small digital recorder in his pocket all day so I wouldn’t miss anything he said. He’s the trail maker and its guide here. I hope you enjoy hearing him talk as much as I do.

 

26 May, Day three

Bennington to Freemont 26 miles cold and rain some of the time but I stayed there on that saddle. I did get down, or off, at lunchtime, at a large electrical plant at the side of the highway. After spending the morning on gravel country roads, hilly, stopping in the rare shady area for morning water break, and crossing a mildly busy highway, we’d done twelve miles. We could tie our horses through the poles of the fence; Danny ties my horse for me if he’s around, because I still haven’t learned how to do it right. There’s a trick to tying each horse with the right amount of slack, depending on who the horse is tied with and the horses’ personalities. My mount is one of Danny’s, and his big Walker Symbatol likes to be near other horses from the herd he knows, so I parked my ‘ride’ by his.

The air had been misty the whole morning, and after we’d all scarfed lunchmeat and cheese sandwiches and snack pack puddings out of the cooler in Charlie’s high wagon, it began to rain properly, but still not heavily enough for me to throw on my poncho. I asked for it on the trail later. Suzy, a nurse and teacher who gives away five-minute massages in the door prize giveaways Bee does after supper each night, was riding high on a covered wagon seat with our friend Gary, who was driving his team of Haflingers. I asked her to please get in my saddle bags in the grey box under Gary’s seat and find my rain poncho for me. The rain was steadily wetting my jeaned thighs. I pulled the blue vinyl out of the carrying bag, unfolded it, found the hood with the little bill, and undid the Velcro under the neck. On a walking horse, this is harder to do than usual.

When I had squeezed the sides around the neckline into two small bundles, I tipped the front of my hat up and let it fall onto my back, hanging from its stampede strings, (bought at John and Joanne Metz’s fine western store in Crescent) then took the next scary step: inserting my head into that hole where I wouldn’t be able to see for a split second, and hopefully, quickly emerging. I think it took longer than it should have to get that over my big head, but I was happy to have it on and my head out. Then wagon master saw what I was doing, and offered to help me, because my cowboy hat couldn’t be pulled through the tightly fitting collar, and I needed to take OFF the cowboy hat before I put on the poncho.
So I handed the hat to him and put the thing on again, all this time, still moving forward with the rest. That blue cape was full and long enough to cover my reigns in my hands, the saddle, and my thighs except the wind kept blowing and flapping the darn thing, which can spook horses, so I kept trying to gather it up and tuck it into the little hole under the saddle horn. Danny (DVF) trotted off up ahead to take his place again in the front, with Red and his team, and Raymond, Red’s mule man.

Ah, I was instantly warmer in the slicker, and I enjoyed the sound of the wagons, harness, and hooves in the countryside. On this trail, you can talk to your fellow riders or the drivers and passengers, or you can silently ride along, looking up at the hills and down into broad bottoms, or up into prettiest places in the country, ranches and farms. Many of the places we pass have a horse or a small herd that responds to the sight of us with still watching or wild galloping. One house had a large white-fenced paddock in front of their house enclosing two mares and their foals. Those four horses trotted then galloped on way and then the other, as if they were having galloping practice, without paying too much attention to us. A precious overo pony pranced and twisted his body like a lively bronco pausing to watch us momentarily.

The afternoon seemed long, but changing from country road to highway, and then being able to see ‘civilization’ helped me to keep from complaining. There was always riding to attend to, if nothing else. I’m staying as alert as I can as we ride.

The silence of moving with the wagon train, with just the sounds of saddles and hooves, leads me to think about the pioneers making the same journey 159 years ago with much harder circumstances, leading to a meditation on how great I have it in this life. A gratitude wells up, and I hope to serve this train richly.

On the next to the last gravel road before town, still 6 miles from it, Gary’s harness needed repaired with some twine. The team was separated into two groups at least an eighth of a mile apart, but half of us were in the rear and a little more than half were making better time. We caught up eventually, with much slow trotting and almost a mile down the road, if not more.

When I was the last horse in the train, I decided to take off my rain poncho, I was trying to store it between me and the saddle, and I dropped a rein. Good thing Leon, shuttle driver and keeper of the water, and former Wagon master, was behind me, and without my asking, he stopped the van and got out to hand me the rein. When that happens it’s tricky; really, it’s impossible for the rider to reach a reign in that instance.

Coming into town was great. Between feeling cohesion between the people riding the trail and the sweet thrilled looks on children and adults’ faces, I felt welcomed in Freemont, riding high on the paint as part of this train. We stopped at red lights going down Military road sometimes halfway through the train, so the riders and drivers in the front part would wait for us just ahead. Whenever I needed to do so, I asked Poncho to climb up over the curb onto the nice grassy siding. From clip clap clop to no sound from Poncho’s hooves is another rich impression.

The man that joined us for the first time on this train likes his wagon driven on gravel. I heard he’s an excellent dancer. He had no cover on his wagon and so was wet, but he’s fun to watch because of his look, true to the old fashioned ways, some of the time taking the grassy ditch if it’s flat and driving standing up. I hear he was quite a dancer that night, so more to come on that.

At Christianson Field on the other side of Freemont, we came to a final stop. There were pens to put the horses in, and all the people’s homes on wheels were there. There was also a cowboy singer, who serenaded us with the songs of Waylon, Cash, and George Jones while we ate a cowboy supper and talked about the big day to a reporter from the local paper. The next day would be a rest day, so spirits were high even though energy was tapped out.

My kind new friends congratulated me on having the stuff to ride the whole day, since it was long, and I haven’t ridden regularly as an adult at all. What they don’t know is how connected I was my first decade to my family’s horses, especially Nibsey, my black and white hand-me-down pony. I guess it’s all coming back to me.

 

 

28 May, Thursday

Recorded Monday 25 May 2009

While the train’s gathering for breakfast, the wagon master previews the trail to Red and Raymond from FL: . . .There’s no road, so we gotta go around and come back south two miles and catch Dutch Hall road. (Bird Song) Then he says to Raymond, the mule skinner:

Oh I can’t get over what a skid lid can do for an old hillbilly from the south. Don’t get too close to Ranger now; he might be hungry enough to take a bite outta that.

Raymond asks a question, too quietly to make out. . .take a bite out that hat. (Birdsong in the background) . . .You know what? Since he put that lid on he could walk around naked and nobody’d notice, they’d be lookin at that hat.

Raymond: That’s all right. I ain’t gotta special order mine to get it to fit. . . .

I gotta saddle a horse. . . .(you can hear that he’s walking away from the bunch at breakfast, then the creak of metal hinge on trailer door opening) To one of his horses now: What’d you do with all your hay? I see what the problem is. (And then maybe to me, or maybe Mitch, from CA): See, this is what I run into—this mare’s tied almost too short to eat her hay. If they’re short a little they start pawin immediate.

(creak of metal hinge on trailer door closing and being fastened)

Someone asks Danny, Which one ya gonna ride today? And Danny answers: I’m gonna ride the walkin horse today. —Ain’t been on him, but he’ll be all right. If I can get on him, it’ll be all right.

To Teri, from UT: Ya ready kiddo? You look like you’re all organized. What are you gonna do with your horse when we shuttle? Where ya gonna tie your horse when we shuttle?

I’ll get it. I’ll probably have you use the saddle on that rack there. You might carry it out here. He’s speaking to Mitch, 24 and a “good lookin’ cowboy”: Yeah that third one. Just set it back there outta the way. I need a bigger girt on this saddle. (Horse raspberry, paper rattling, long quiet with just sounds of work and birds singing, then something crunching, maybe the alfalfa cubes Danny feeds his horses) Who’s tearin up this stuff? Get outta there. Gaw dangit. (talking to a horse that keeps getting into the back of the trailer and eating whatever he can get his lips on.) Git on.

(Sounds of leather and heavy canvas cinch straps rubbing together as he saddles a horse) ’oh’. (very low, as in ‘whoa’ to still the horse.) You like that don’t cha. Whoa there. (again, the key here is how quiet and low Danny says this.) dogs barking somewhere. more sounds of saddling. Oh. Whoa there. Oh. Back up.

Well, we’d have a seven o’clock meeting and then go immediately, right then. Just a short meeting while we’re here. Have a prayer. We’ve been getting away from our prayers.

 

29 May, Friday

The men and women on this wagon train are spectacular people. Full of love, wisdom, humility, skill, courage, kindness, they’re proving Danny right when I signed up and he told me, You’re going to meet some of the nicest people in the United States. I know already I’m going to cry when I have to say goodbye.

I didn’t cry this morning though, when Ron took off to go home and take care of some things, because he’s coming back. Ron is a fine guy, rides a horse with class and looks fantastic in a cowboy hat. And when I made a mistake with my car and dented some chrome, he fixed it while I was asleep. Sweet. His horse is Leo, and Suzy, who has ridden since she was in diapers, and has ridden quite a few of the horses around here, preferred riding Leo. That says a lot. Ron, Suzy and everyone are accepting people, always giving people the benefit of second chances. They’re my kind of people.

Maybe cowboys understand about costume and fixing yourself up. Many a cowboy hat has hidden ho-hum scalps, or shaded the eyes to just add that bit of mystery that’s sexy. And then there’s chaps….what’s not to love about chaps.

But, to my point: on the way to the breakfast / chuckwagon circle this morning, Mitch, wise in the ways of the camp, saw me carrying a big red bag and asked Where ya going? I told him I was going to get dressed after breakfast in the shower trailer (Rich’s magnificently modified trailer that has hot water and pressure and foam mats for cushioning tired feet). He told me, You should get dressed BEFORE breakfast. And he was right, too.

Part of this wagon train is the way it looks—because of its historical nature, the boots, hats, tack, scarves and chaps have a larger effect than just serving their basic purpose. (Chaps are protection from brush and cuts.) The larger effect is making a fantasy reality. On the trail, as we move west together mounted or in wagons, we’re living history. I am in awe of the transformation within my mind as I look out over scrub land, that’s unplanted and just gone to the wild prairie grasses. Teri, a true cowgirl who leads trail rides in the mountains of UT, galloped a diagonal out to the right of the train this morning to take a picture. Imagine her multicolored Appy and her with her stampede strings flying out in that wild field. That’s the kind of thing I’m seeing ALL DAY LONG.

 

Raymond and Red, from FL	Niece in a wagon This batch of photos by Teri Price	Ron from behind looking down on us all the first day
Mitch from CA poses with other Mormons in Winter Quarters/Council Bluffs		Charlie Burns' team of Shires; Suzy, Teri and I from l. to r. in background on horseback

 

29 May continued

The wagon master hands out black hardbound journals that come with a nice pen to every trail rider that wants one, and most write in them what happens each day. Mine, though, isn’t as detailed and complete as I’d like, so here are some facts from yesterday’s ride, and just the facts, man.

We shuttled the vehicles and trailers from North Bend to Schuyler at 7:20 AM. Our camp there near Lost Creek is long and narrow. At North Bend, after all were assembled (roughly) Danny said a prayer with his hat over his heart and his eyes closed, head bowed.

Leon’s van was down, so we rode back to camp packed into a horse trailer that has been doubling as a sleeping quarters for Gary, a great gracious man willing even to dance to Free’s All Right Now, and that’s saying a lot. Twelve or so people sat on tack and hay; I was lucky to get the cot, so I could lie back against blankets and pillows and put up my boots. It was comfy, with the sun and the wind blowing through the slats, but we were bumped and rattled a bit. No one complained. Complaining isn’t what moves us down the trail, and what we’re doing here is all geared toward our horses and our wagons.
Danny mounted, said, Wagons roll! and we took the trail, Larry wanted to take a picture of the whole train in one shot. He wanted us to go under the goal posts, since we had camped on a football field. But Danny didn’t want that in the picture, so we curved just to the west of it, and Larry photographed us. He’s going ahead of us as we move across NE, telling people we’re coming.

We took a gravel road soon after we left town, due west. Occasionally we have to take a connecting road going N. or S., or ride down a section of highway. I started the day riding with Bee behind her feisty mule Jeanie Lou. (Bee hangs a hand-written sign that says ‘Bites & kicks ‘ on her mule’s hot-tape fence to protect visitors.) Her conversation is immensely enjoyable and engaging, but at water break, I took over riding Poncho, because Jack ,a two-dayer, was uncomfortable in the roper’s saddle on his horse.

My upper legs didn’t quite fit either in that forward -leaning “twelve-second” saddle. Danny said that’s what the saddle was designed for: galloping after a calf for about twelve seconds and then jumping off. I lasted a couple hours, then climbed into Charlie’s covered wagon for the last part of the ride.

I’m getting a reputation for napping in the wagons. But I don’t sleep, I really don’t. But even if I did, justification could be made. This sentence is being written at an all-night gas station in Columbus NE at 10:55, and I woke before sunrise today.
But I’m not complaining. While I mucked around the horses’ trailer, John walked over with a coffee cup. He went to his trailer and poured a cup for me. During entertainment each night, John sings words he wrote to the tune of Wabash Cannonball that end in the refrain, The Van Fleet wagon train. Each time he finishes, I feel like saying Yeeeeeeeee Haw.

 

1 June 2009

Prayerful bits from the prayers we say before we leave each morning: “Father God,” or “Father in Heaven” or “Heavenly Father, Thank you for this wagon train and these people. Please keep our horses and mules calm today, no accidents, lift the pain in our group, protect the servicemen and women who are keeping our country a place where we can do this. May our Wagonmaster have peace of mind, strength and clarity of mind, help us to make this train an honor to the pioneers that made the tracks we are following, and bless the chuckwagon folks who keep us so well fed, In Jesus’ name, Amen.” For the first time, I was asked to say it, and I enjoyed leading prayer.

Around our only campfire, actual dialogue—
Welllllll. Tomorrow morning we’ll start over. (Laughing Bee.)
Did you see that guy on the two person bicycle? He was heading south. (Danny)
I need to take a nap in the wagon like some people. (Ron)
I did not sleep in that wagon; I was just restin’ my eyes. (me)
You were sound asleep when I saw you. (R.)
I couldn’t sleep; it was too bumpy. (me.) We’re talking about the first day I rode half a day and rode in a wagon the rest of the day. Gary’s wagon is one of the few with metal wheels, very loud and rattling on gravel. Plus, PBS was shooting us and the star, Dennis Brouse, rode and drove Gary’s wagon for a while I was in there, so there was not a chance of sleeping. How could I sleep with a television star in the same wagon? At one point, Ron on his horse poked a finger between canvas cover and wagon’s side at my head.

This afternoon I did something similar: I rode in Gary and Glen’s wagon instead of riding in the afternoon. Two kids from Columbus, NE rode in Charlie’s wagon all morning, and the sister was already on Boomerang for the afternoon, (Mitch, who had been riding the horse, actually walked and ran some of the afternoon trail, if you can believe that) so the younger brother rode my Poncho. The sister is good-natured, and the boy so baby-faced I greeted him as a girl this morning. Brother left his cowboy hat in the wagon, and smiled so delightedly when he put it on and trotted that tall Poncho, I had to take some pictures that I’ll show with their mother’s permission. At the age of eleven the boy is as tall as I am, so the stirrups didn’t have to be adjusted. The two kids were great friends. When the boy fell behind because he had the courage to keep asking Poncho to walk, his big sister fell behind with him, and since both were near the last wagon, with a couple other young riders and the beautiful Christensen family from UT (They’re here!), all was well. Rich, the head of chuck wagon crew inventor, told the kids they were the best teamsters he’d seen this trip.

 

I renamed Poncho Poochie today, because his walk is so slow it should be called a crawl. Since I wore a fluorescent shirt today I found a TSC, for the morning my job was to ride ahead as a traffic control. His walk made it necessary to trot every three minutes or so, because we needed to stay far enough from the front wagon to be able to step out of the way if necessary. Had a little deal with him today when I was riding out of a deep ditch and Poochie stumbled then fell to his knees. But thank God, he didn’t stay down or fall to his side, he stepped right up again onto his feet.

 

Around that same time this morning, we missed a turn in a rural area because I was leading and there was no shocking orange sign with VF on it to mark the way Danny had set the night before. Actually, he mapped the route before he came; he just goes out each night and places those small orange signs to guide us. He found out from some ladies that had stopped to take photos, that his sign had been road graded into the ditch and out of sight last night. When he discovered we’d failed to make a corner, the big wagons were able to turn into a field where there was a culverted entrance across the ditch and then turn around in the grass. The smaller carts and wagons could turn around in the road.

 

At one point this afternoon we were traveling down a dirt road. I was in Gary’s wagon with metal-rimmed tires, and that cushion quiets the rattle of those wheels. I was able to lie down with my raisins and rest comfortably. (I was up til 12:15 AM last night, writing this journal. That’s my story and I’m stickin’ to it.

 

Two families joined us yesterday (Sunday) from UT: the Clyde Bradfords and the Christiansons, as well as their friends, the LeFevers, wanted me to say hello to L-Y-N-N, her family, and the Dudleys. Wish you were here!

Hi Suzy, we miss you terribly. My email: twinbigler@gmail.com

 

2 June 2009 Genoa, NE

First, a correction. Rich, the head of the chuck wagon and his wife, are from Iowa, not Minnesota. Sorry about that, Rich and Sue. Just like horses and mules, we love the ones that feed us, and you too, and Diane, Darrell and Lefty, do so much more.

Today we had a short ride in cool weather from Monroe to Genoa on back roads. The ride was relaxing and the only thing wrong with it was its length. I really could have done that all day. Paul picked little purple flowers at break time for all the ladies. When he handed one to his wife, Jane, Mitch saw that he was holding more flowers and asked Paul if he’d give one to Teri for Mitch. Mitch is devoted to Teri, and she is good as a mother/big sister to him. Really, we all feel motherly toward Mitch, big, fun-loving and childlike. He’s the best dancer, if the dance be wild.

Tonight Genoa put on an ice cream social in one of the antique barns on our campsite, on another generous farm family’s land, but this place is the same site where the trail stayed twelve years ago, when our wagon master and the wagon train went from Nauvoo IL to Salt Lake in one trip. (This trip I’m on is spread between four summers, a month each year.) The campsite has pens for the horses and antique barns, with aged trees that might have been there when the first Mormons passed under them.

Genoa has a bustling main street that reminds me of the town where I grew up, Alexis IL. Now my little hometown has almost fallen silent, but in the sixties businesses thrived as they seem to be doing now here in Genoa. The old bank houses the Genoa Museum which, with clothing, tools, and camp wares, arrowheads and mastodon teeth, photos and framed letters tells the story of the wagon train and handcart trek that changed our wagon master’s life. The small back room of the museum showcases four large photos on the walls close to the ceiling of the 1996 happenings and places. A wall of rock with a velvet green floor of grass where Danny accepted the Mormon faith, a monumental shot of women pulling a handcart over rocky mountain ledges, and a wagon tip-over showing our own Glen, the mule skinner who drove a team of mules in the Salt Lake City Olympics opening ceremony. I saw on his black neck scarf today at lunch the five white rings and asked him about it. If Hollywood is looking for an archetypical mule skinner, he would be Glen: grizzled, smart, tough and charming, he’s easy to respect.

Glen and his friend Gary made their drives more comfortable by leaving one of their wagons and teams behind. Glen’s draft mules didn’t seem to like Gary’s two Haflingers, competing and wearing out both teamsters’ arms and hands. Glen’s wagon didn’t have a cover. By combining their operations, Glen no longer has to drive a furiously pulling team with one hand while he talks on his cell phone, then stretch and wake up that hand by doing Kung Fu moves. But he doesn’t know what Kung Fu is; I don’t think he watches much TV.

When I asked Theresa and Harley from Wisconsin and Iowa what they learned about their Belgian horses Tom and Charley, half-brothers eight years old, they told me a couple days ago before brunch that they’d learned that to get in the trailer more smoothly they had to practice, to do it more often. The couple focused on keeping their horses hydrated and their appetites good. Theresa became a familiar sight at break times for chopping bucketfuls of grass as a snack, the purpose of which was to keep the horses’ appetites up.

They said their horses ate a bale of hay between them during the cold night we had last week. The idea was to keep food in front of them, to reduce the stress. Harley added that the horses adapted and became familiar with their surroundings. For instance, Tom was standoffish at the first. But he relaxed and both horses seemed interested in the trail, and stopped shying from visitors or railroad crossings and bridge expansion joints. Theresa found that the horses were able to keep up with the rest of the trail.

More soon about their routine with the horses. I’m exhausted. Thanks for the email and call, Suzy; tomorrow I’ll write more about posting pictures to share, folks. Thanks for the positive feedback, everyone. Thanks to Pam Dudley for her email and to Becky and Holly: please know we wish you were here, too. And we want to say Wish you were here to Sharon, who was mentioned by Clyde Bradford, who now plays the harmonica.

 

3 June Wednesday Genoa to Fullerton

Happy Birthday and Anniversary, Clyde and Eva!

My heart is light. The story today was the trail, especially the dirt road we travelled this afternoon. It curved and went up hill and down, taking us up into some high meadows with lots of good grass then at the top on a flat, there stood a mother and her sons, tall, smiling, and motioning us into their flat hard dirt barnyard. Her son saw us approaching and by the time we were even with their land, she saw we were stopping at the side of the road there, but they’d hung an electrical fence to graze a couple horses and a pony in that ditch. We were waved into their barnyard, home of uncounted round bales. The woman and her sons looked amazed to see the wagons and horses pulling in and making a rough half circle around our water wagon. She asked how we’d found that dirt road. Danny smiled and answered that was just the kind of road he wanted to find when he was laying out a trail.

The water wagon is Leon’s conversion van pulling a flatbed trailer bearing two blue porta-potties and a large round white water tank, squat and maybe seven feet in diameter. When we stop for a break, once morning and afternoon, we pull over to the side of a country road in the shade or sometimes, into a field where the tall grass has to be inspected by Danny on his walking horse for potentially harmful things hidden there. (We’ve seen quite a few snakes on the road, live and dead. Dead ones are better.)

While we had a break on the family’s place, Danny, Norma (a local mom who brought her children to ride in the wagons and rode a horse in the afternoon) led kids around on the brown mare and the pony, as D. calls them, otherwise known as Boomerang and Missy. After that break, the smallest Christensen daughter, little ‘rabbit,’ blond with bangs, tan and wearing cowgirl calico skirt and boots, relieved me of riding the pony. I looked a little like her in the beginning of my life when I first knew Danny as a friend of my young uncles, riding horses, usually away from me. So if it seems that I think a lot of Danny Van Fleet, I do; he’s almost family.

I hear that last year there was an incident involving that pony and someone’s emergency visit. But those of us who know ponies in general also know that in the best of situations, a intermediate rider is best to ride that little POA.

Odd news to report: as I dismounted this morning my button-up shirt caught on the saddle horn between two buttons, and when my feet landed on the ground, my shirt was completely open to the public. Thankfully, I was facing the horse, and I noticed it before I stepped away. Also, I was grateful to God I’d worn a pretty bra. I had to change in the van into just my jeans jacket for the rest of the day. I guess it was a wardrobe malfunction of the trail ride persuasion.

For his birthday, Clyde Bradford wore a cone-shaped multicolored birthday hat about eighteen inches tall. He drove his team wearing that hat with a serious face (sometimes-Clyde’s a smiley man). I chuckled and smiled every time I saw him. He and his wife Eva are celebrating their wedding anniversary today, too. It’s a joy they’re around.

I heard Clair Christensen telling his children as they were watering the horses after the ride to wash their faces in the water coming from the wide soft plastic hose into the horse tank, and then saw his face was dripping with splashed water. Clare is an awesome person, as is his wife, Brenda. He’s tall and light-haired; she isn’t as tall as him, with dark hair but they each have easy, almost constant smiles. Their whole family is, as Danny said when he introduced them, photogenic. On the Van Fleet website, that lovely young woman lining the draft team is one of their daughters. And the LeFevers, the couple that came with the Bradfords and Christiansons from UT, are sweetly devoted and in love still, after being married within the last few years. Saints, all of them.

TO ALL PAST WAGON TRAIN MEMBERS, YOU ARE MISSED.

Speaking of being sweetly devoted, to continue my profile of Theresa and Harley and their Prairie Schooner pulled by two Belgians, and what they learned on their week-long trip with us, as well as more of Danny’s recorded day of talking and the runaway wagon story, that’ll be soon. These libraries just close too early.

I’ve put a link/teaser to this journal on CNN Ireports, under “Nebraska Wagon Train Journal,” if you’d like to help Danny go viral.

Suzy was here the first week, and it wasn’t long enough. She is a woman who can ride anything, or come off and get back on without help. One late afternoon, as she and I brought up the rear of the train into camp, she says, “Wanta canter? Come on, it’ll be fun. Let’s. Grab onto the horn.” I said okay and away we galloped into the sun, and uphill. I loved it. And I love Suzy. She was one of Mitch’s Aunts, or Mothers; she was one of the trailboss’s right hands; she was a high school beauty and still is beautiful. She’s the kind of friend you can tell anything. Also, she gave away five-minute massages each night in our after-supper drawings Bee organizes. I luckily won one the last night she was here. She made my neck and shoulders forget their recent past.

With a lump in my throat again, I look forward to seeing her again.

 

4 June 2009

Overheard on our trip to the Winter Quarters Visitor’s Center: “Do you have a Temple recommend?” one Mormon asks another. They call the people who fled from Nauvoo, IL, the Saints. The elder that led our tour called the “Saints” movement out of Nauvoo a three-act play with first 3000 leaving, then 10000, then 1000. In February 1846, the first 3000 started taking the ferry across the Mississippi. Transport to Iowa there was slow going; twenty days hadn’t gotten it done, but then through “the tender mercies of the Lord” the river froze, so they could WALK over it. They finished the Temple to the best of their ability before they left.
The elder continued: Joseph Smith was called a prophet. If he was a prophet, then the Book of Mormon is true. If the Book of Mormon is true, then Joseph Smith is a prophet. In the Book of Mormon, readers are invited to pray for proof whether the book is true. This is a message from or through the angel Moroni, who is cast in gold and flying atop the temple across the street from the visitor’s center.
In front of the new Temple in Nauvoo right now are “statues of Joseph and Hiram Smith on their horses.” That image is important to us.

As they crossed the state of Iowa, the travelers planted crops for the ones that would follow. Council Bluffs grew large because of all the Mormons passing through there. The Mormons helped to open the west, because there existed a policy between the different governments interested in possessing the West, with settlement and land ownership being dependent on numbers of citizens occupying the lands; the country with the most human beings in an area controlled that settlement.
The taking out of covenants in the temple means that you will see your family again after death. (a side note: That’s already in the Bible, although that reunion is for all believers, not just Mormons.)

Everything they needed to begin a new life had to be taken in their wagons, so there wasn’t much room to ride. Nearly everyone had to walk. Today Bee’s granddaughters and the Christensen girls often walked through the train. Sometimes a pair of girls would be so far in front of the train they were unrecognizable. As I’d ride past a wagon, the smallest kids would jump down from a wagon’s back steps and run to another wagon, as if our wagon train was a moving village and they were just going visiting. Bee was walking next to her wagon and fell when her foot became caught. She hurt her head, and later, so did I: when I fell from a pony cantering. All is well, but I’ve got a goose egg on the topside of my head.

When something goes wrong with a horse, say he gets tangled up in his lead rope or someone falls off, the customary thinking is that the cause is poor horsemanship. For instance today I “came off” because I overcorrected when I lost my balance. An ankle weakened by girlhood softball “turned” in the stirrup and I began to fall to the left, so I went off the right side. I must have done a roll in the air, because I hit the road with the back right side of my head and my right arm and leg. Thank God all I’ve got is a bump. Fifty other things could have happened.

We traveled 24 miles today by wagon and on horseback. Our company was treated to a cookout by the Loop River tonight, where I sat around a table with John and Sherry from KY, the TM, Teri, a local young man, and a pair of the smallest wagon and horse riders. I made a faux pas when I told the boss I didn’t want to ride that pony again, because after I got back on she went every way but forward at her nice walking clip; she spun, she backed at teams and into ditches, she trotted and tossed her head. She and I were at odds, and behind all her herd mates at the end of the train. I finally got off to lead her, and she stepped on my foot and knocked me down. While I was leading her, she continued to walk in front of me, so I’d have to turn her completely around so we could gain on the rest of the mounts and wagons. At the end of the trail a professional photographer was waiting for us because of the picturesque background, but I didn’t get in the picture, because of being too disgusted with that pony.

Now, my mistake was blaming the pony for my frustration instead of myself in front of those little girls. If they don’t want to ride her, that could be in part because they know I lost my seat. Part of me thinks they should know how dangerous riding can be, but part of the necessary work the pony has to do is dependent on her being ridden more, and she won’t be if I say bad things about her. I was shushed by the power that is, which is hard to take but I deserved it.

I’m still grateful that Danny has offered to keep me on the informal crew here, for this journal, for the rest of the trip. I had thought I’d go back to Illinois to school when we hit Grand Island, which is only a couple three days away. Although today was hard, I wouldn’t have missed it for a smooth scalp and a kiss from Javier Berdun.

Postscript: I rode right through my customary naptime today, after the lunch break. Missy, my little mount, was quick-stepping right along smoothly, and I was lulled a few times to eyes closed sleepiness. But Clare, the patriarch of seven and a blast to talk with because he’s absolutely enthusiastic, had to pass the wagon in front of him, which he described as sleepy and slobbering, all four occupants in the “geriatric wagon” as he called it. Ha!

 

5 June

Today I’m in Grand Island a day or two ahead of schedule, because I had a bit of stiffness and swelling in my knee from my bail-out yesterday. Grand Island has a big new library and a few coffeehouses, so espresso is the good word today.

Two new wagons joined the team this morning. One traditional black-painted covered wagon is driven by “Nebraska Bob,” and is pulled by a couple brown quarter horses; the other wagon looks very comfortable, spacious, and the canvas arcs out from the sides allowing more air to circulate. This second new wagon is white, and decorated with black flourishes, and is pulled by a white and a black heavy horse team. Randy and his son Ben are in the high driving seat. Two saddled palominos were tied to the back of this white wagon when I met Randy, who’s from Cedar Rapids (IA); a couple of riders, Randy’s brother and a friend of the men, were on board when the wagon master said ‘Wagons roll.’

(This morning, while we were still at Forbes,’ an unmet rider came galloping on a palomino down the gravel road to the chuck wagon area, and asked, Did you see a big black horse come this way? I hadn’t. I guess he found the animal, because I heard someone point him south down a row of trees into a field, and there surely was a big black horse hitched to that wagon about an hour later.)

When the train left this morning, I followed in the Cadillac, wishing the idle were set lower than three or four miles an hour, because I kept creeping up on the train. When we turned onto the highway, The cooks and I in extra vehicles passed the train slowly. I went too slowly, and Rich in the motor home had to hit his horn telling me to get going, since we were taking up both lanes and that could turn into a disaster pretty quickly; I was busy shucking and jiving with my new friend Kate, a seventh grader from UT who thinks I am hilarious. I reached tiny Palmer (pop. 400; two or three miles ahead) half an hour or more before them. With my extra time, I told every business in the two-block downtown,--a feed store, diner, hardware store, bank, grocery, bar, and garage-- that “a wagon train is coming.” When Danny and the wagons came up the hill and turned into town, I stood there on the corner drinking coffee, feeling joy, pride and immense regard for all of the people on horseback and in wagons passing by. I’m happy to be part of them. Danny slowed down his horse and called over his shoulder telling me to check at the post office for a general delivery he was expecting. I was happy to have something to do for him; I’ve seen a portion of how much he does to make this happening a reality. Any little task I can do frees him up slightly.

But it turns out that when Danny rode past the Post Office on his blue roan, the postmaster was standing in front of it, and he told Danny regretfully that he’d already returned a package addressed to Danny because things like that don’t happen in Palmer. While I’m here in Grand Island, I’m to check the post office for more hats and scarves, too. (The package wasn’t there, but this time, the P.O. is notified one’s coming.)

Bee and I were talking about the way the train changes in personality as some people leave and others arrive. The first week there were only three children, two nieces and a nephew, but this week there have been ten or eleven. The Christensen family’s six of seven kids helped that. Ron’s due back, too, whose return we all will enjoy.

Mitch really shines when he’s spending time with kids and people his own age, early twenties. He is still able to throw off his inhibitions and have fun with the kids, playing ghost in the graveyard or just talking and watching the sun set. Two nights ago at the antique barns near the Indian Children’s School in Genoa, as the sun was beginning to set, Mitch was leaning against the hood of a truck, surrounded by kids much shorter than he, pointing at something in the field with the wagons. The group had a visible bond with Mitch at the center. A Kodak moment, I thought. (I was out of camera batteries; electrical outlets are lacking on the trail because all three of the cigarette lighters in my old car are dead.)

Harley Weyer, half of the teamster couple whose profile I began here the second of June, decided to learn how to drive in 2001. He visited the clinician Doc Hammill’s website, and made the decision to really do it after one of Hammill’s weekend clinics. He compressed his learning by attending many clinics (meeting Theresa at one). Charley and Tom are Harley’s second team. With his first, Harley had a mower accident. He admits, “This is a dangerous sport.”

I asked them what they’d learned about their horses that week as part of the Van Fleet Wagon Train, and they said they’d learned quite a few interesting things: although one of their team, Tom, was at first standoffish, he and his half-brother Charley soon seemed interested in the trail, and began to enjoy attention from visitors and tolerated petting hands. Bridge expansion joints, railroad crossings and other frightening things became noticeably less nerve-wracking to them.

Theresa found that the horses were able to keep up. At the beginning, everyone felt for the two Belgians because they weren’t shod, and we were using hard roads and gravel. But while we were resting in Winter Quarters, Harley took his team to John Metz’s to get shoes, and that made those big beauties more able on the trail.

Theresa said they had the best attitude because they were hydrated and well-fed, and because they’d been prepared for months at home before they came to Council Bluffs. The temporary electric fence the two put up each night for the horses had been shown to them at home. Grain wasn’t usually fed to them, but they’d been given grain at home in preparation for the wagon train, because of the concentrated nutrition grain delivers. For months, Harley and Theresa took the team on five mile excursions into town and back, up steep hills around Harley’s Iowa neighborhood for conditioning. “The weather got nice. We took manure in the wagon,” Harley told me, smiling his easy grin.
Another measure that really worked for them was a firm routine. They’d feed two or three hours before leaving time (round 9 AM) and hay all night long; Theresa would check at night, and give more hay if needed. She reasoned the feed helped them recover from the demanding days they put in.

I asked them which facilities for camping with horses along the trail were the best in their opinion. They liked Dodge Park, in Omaha our second night out best, and the football field in North Bend secondly.

Lastly, Theresa and Harley would like to tell anyone coming out this year or next that bringing helpers would be smart, to help as grooms to hold the horses during breaks, friends who are experienced drivers. And in general, anytime you’re uncomfortable driving horses, stop, and put the horses away for the day. Try again tomorrow.
 

6 June, Dangerous Day

Just as traveling the trail was dangerous for the Mormons and other pioneers, taking a number of covered wagons and mounted people down “hard” roads now is dangerous, too. Some of the outriders wear fluorescent green vests to direct traffic, and in a couple towns we’ve had police escorts, but we received no additional help today, and although there was a wreck a mile before we reached the entrance to the Living History Museum where we’re staying, no one of our party was hurt, and no animals stampeded away. A man in a short bed truck carrying a motorcycle was rear-ended by a small van, and both drivers were okay. We were on a four-lane highway during a busy time on the last leg of our day’s journey, from Worms to Grand Island. From the end of the train in Randy’s wagon, I heard the impact and Jeff, Mitch and Randy saying ‘We’ve got a runaway!’ But thank God, Red and Larry, Minnesota, kept the two lead mules under control after their initial jump at the crash. When we reached the site of the accident, the van was empty, with its nose crunched badly. The pick-up that had been hit had turned out of the intersection. Even the motorcycle he’d been hauling was thrown loose from its tie-downs. I felt a little guilty, because the woman had been looking at our group instead of paying attention to her driving.

A few hours before, on Gunbarrel road, a nice soft sandy gravel way, our train had a couple other dangerous moments. We passed an anhydrous ammonia tank that was leaking the poisonous gas out its top valve, the loose metal wobbling like a boiling teapot’s lid. There was a white frost around the valve, and down wind, I had to cover my face when the smell hit me. One of the teamsters called 911, and thirty minutes later, we heard a siren behind us checking it out.

Then a bit later, on the same road, we were stopped by a train. The lead mules were riled a little by the rushing monstrosity (horses and mules are prey, you know), and Red asked some outriders to get between them and the crossing. But the scariest, to me, was yet to come.

Danny and the train started across the crossing, and about the fifth wagon, which was Gene’s cart pulled by Buddy, the tiny quarter horse, the crossing lights and gate were activated. Another train was coming! So they got off there, and the train was split into two, half on one side of the train, half on the other. Near the track after the second train had gone was a busy hard road, and as the TM blocked traffic for us to cross, his Walking Horse reared. Freaky. Danny’s a great rider. His secret? He told me it was keeping the horse between his legs.

That evening near Stuhr museum at supper, he talked to the group about how fortunate we all were to have come through all those iffy situations unscathed. Could it be the prayers we say each morning before we leave? I think so.

Incidentally, Suzy sent this link and instructions for viewing and sharing photos from the train: www2.snapfish.com is the site to add a Trail West 2009 group album. I think you will find it easy to set it up; use Danny for a password--everyone can remember that. She will try to add an album when she gets her pictures uploaded.

 

7 June The Runaway Wagon

Connie’s Runaway wagon story. As told by Rich. Sitting under the chuckwagon tent.

Connie: “It was a dark and stormy night.” Laughter. “Rich, I think you got that pretty down pat there.”

Rich: “This is to document a situation, an event that occurred Tuesday, May 26th. My friend Connie Newland was out driving her Belgian team in an oat field waiting for her husband Al to come back from shuttling vehicles, moving around, minding her own business, enjoying the morning—and all of a sudden the team decided they were done; they were going for a little run.

Possibly [what] spooked ‘em [was] a team of black mules that was in the area, although the owners don’t think that was true. (laughter) And the first that I was aware of it my wife was pounding on the window of the motor home pointing east. And I looked east and I seen a cloud of black and brown dust high as the wagon. I couldn’t even see the wagon. But it was movin rapidly. I think it was east; my direction’s been turned around so bad. Maybe it was north. (laughing)

Anyway it was goin the opposite way, fast. Then Connie got ‘em under control, got ‘em stopped, and turning em back, eased em back, stoppin em and make em swing left, and make em swing right, and then move em a little bit and do the same again with swingin.

So Darryl and I jumped in the pickup, went partly out there and we thought, it probably wouldn’t be a good idea to bring an aluminum trailer and a truck up to a team of spooky horses, so we walked out there. Connie had them under control, but they were nervous. So she asked if I’d maybe get up there and help her drive, which I did, and we started workin them back toward the camp, and as we got closer to camp they’d get more nervous. We swung them around in a circle several times. They didn’t seem to want to settle down.

We started workin our way back toward camp again, and the same team of black mules come out with Darryl in it with my coat—my wife thought I was cold and she was sending me a coat out. And that was the farthest thing from my mind right then was a coat.

We let that horse look at those mules and say uh-uh, I’m outta here. It got real dancy and started to break, and then, got him stopped, and lasted about seven seconds, and he got dancey again, and he left, and the other horse went with him, and Connie and I went right with em. They weren’t runnin away; they were in front of us all the time, (laughter) but ah, they were moving fast. The only way we could have been faster is if Connie’d a went to the whip sooner, but she wasn’t thinkin about that at the time.

We swung em to the right; I was gonna try to circle them in the oat field. We swung out to a cornfield. There was a little bump. [Bome] what do they call those for irrigation. Anyway we took it at full speed. The wagon, they tell us, the right hand wheels were off the ground. I just hung onto the team, and Connie was hanging on to the seat, and we were moving fast.

Bout that time we tore the right and left hand wheel loose from the wagon, and, turned sideways, we started to cut a furrow about 18 inches wide and six inches deep in the cornfield. That slowed the team down, and they quit their run.

Then we decided to make them work and take that energy offa them, before we went probably a quarter mile through this poor farmer’s [Sass] cornfield cutting a pretty good slat, and come up a steep hill up the back into another cornfield and all of a sudden the wagon bounced up in the air. We looked back and we’d had a pile of dirt that had been under us that was probably three foot tall and three food across. did that twice; got em stopped, and by then, they were ready to stop and stand. Connie and I unhooked them and just held em. Darryl brought the pickup out. The excitement was over for the day, but it was kinda speedy for awhile. Nobody got hurt, the horses didn’t get hurt. The wagon was the only casualty, and it bent a couple of wheels but that’s fixable. But what a way to start the day!

 

7 June, Rest day, Stuhr Museum, Henry Fonda Memorial Highway, Grand Island, NE

Some of my favorite moments so far:
1) meeting forty or fifty new friends, such as Emily from Lima, Peru, and Texas. The first night Bill Craven played his cowboy country music from the stage of his modified bus, there was this serene woman with kinky hair tied back, standing and dancing gently alone, far from the stage and smiling. Emily has hip glasses. I walked up to her and introduced myself, and her smile grew wider. She immediately showed me a country dance step right there on the grass and we became fast friends. We’re both grad students, or were; congratulations, Emily, on completing your Masters! Hanging out with her is easy and good for me, because she’s a supportive friend. I have yet to hear anything negative out of her mouth.

2) riding ol’ paint quietly on the trail, when all you can hear is red-winged blackbird song or killdeer cries, the soft grinding drags and stamps of hooves and wheels in fine or rough gravel or dirt, and the rattle and shift of harness and wagon.

3) Walking at a good clip on the pony, my whole body falling naturally into its rhythm.

4) Dinnertime.

5) Getting to know people better faster than in real life.

6) Earning the trail boss’s big smile of approval, after he ponied Missy back to the last wagon where I was riding after I came off her, and I descended the wagon’s steps and got back up on her without his having to say a word.

7) Having fun with the kids around here, because they laugh at my jokes. Here’s one from Clyde: Do you know how to catch a unique bird? Unique up to it. And what about a tame bird? Tame way.

8) Coming into camp the first day, when Gary and I gave a whole little league baseball team a ride in the wagon.

And there will be more.

Good luck Sharon as you have surgery; we’re thinking of you, and the Dudleys, Lynn, Becky and Holly. . . . (and I can see Emily, and Abi, and Suzy, and Nancy, and Lisa, and Sarah, and Judi, and Randy, and all of the rest of you reading this blob, as somebody around here calls it.)

Night.

 

9 June

 

At the Stuhr Museum, where we camped for our rest day, the museum’s historian ate meals with us and shared with us tidbits of fascinating Mormon facts. What surprised me is the ways the people died most often on the trail. Men died in firearms accidents, because of inexperience; women died of Rocky Mountain fever, from ticks and not bathing.

Physically, trail riding is hard. Even when a person never falls off a horse, so many things can go wrong, there are strains, bruises and cuts that weaken the body under them. I have a perfectly round solid purple, red and yellow bruise to the right of my navel from leaning into the saddle horn when I trot on Pancho. No pain comes from that, though—my miniscule pain is a stiff knee from that bail-out off the pony last week. (By the way, the next day, the pony became tangled in his lead rope and rope burned his back leg just above the hoof. I feel bad for him.)

At lunch yesterday, Teri sat in some tiny thorns or a thistle,, so she was irritated all afternoon by her poky pants. Although many men would have helped her out, I tried, and could see nothing to remove. The plant was more like nettles than thorns. Sore legs and back, plus the occasional horse stepping on my feet are all that’s bothering me.

But some of the trail riders have permanent injuries they ride through every day. In fact, one of our teamsters needs surgery and is waiting until after the ride. Cowboys walk that way for a reason.

Today we rode in pouring rain. Soaked through, my jeans, my shoes, my socks were sponges. Keeping one’s saddle dry was a priority for a couple of the outriders; people who usually wouldn’t think twice about jumping off their horses to help stayed on the saddle just to keep their “powder” dry. As I rode in my blue slicker/poncho with water dripping from the point of my cowboy hat in front of me, I imagined Eastwood in Unforgiven. Now the question is, why in the world would I want to be like Clint Eastwood?

I’d walk the horse next to the wagon (Charlie's mostly this morning) until Poncho didn’t like the Shires’ trotting away from him, and he’d trot without being asked. After advice from many including Red, I stand much more often while I ride and try to half post with the rise and fall of the horse’s back. Less awkward feeling, that is.

I could handle only half day of riding in the rain. After lunch the sun came out and I tied Pancho’s lead to Boomerang’s saddlehorn, or really, Charlie did a fast half-hitch, and I crawled in with the kids in the water wagon, only I stretched out and went to sleep for the entire afternoon, not waking up until three when we pulled into the Coop where we’re camping here tonight in Gibbon. Nice work if you can get it. My kind of work.

 

A song by John Pack -- He sings it each night on Bill Craven's bus stage, to the tune of Wabash Cannonball

Click the play button on the media player at right

I have heard the stories
About the famous trains
But now I’ll tell you about one
That’s going across the plains
It’s a thing of beauty
Or so the people say.
We’re on our way to the Great Salt Lake
On the Van Fleet Wagon train.

Well the folks come out to greet us
As we roll into town
Some think we’re crazy
And to others there’s no doubt
We travel in the sunshine
We travel in the rain
We’re on our way to the Great Salt Lake
On the Van Fleet Wagon train.

Some days our hearts are heavy
Some days our feet are sore
Through summer’s heat or winter’s sleet
We all come back for more
There is no need to worry
And there’s no need to complain
As we make our way to the Great Salt Lake
On the Van Fleet Wagon Train.

If you would like to join us
But for a day or two
Leave your cares behind
And we’ll share the love with you
The spirit it will take you
And you can not explain
What it is that draws you to
The Van Fleet Wagon Train.

 

10 June

What we did today: left Gibbon Co-op and traveled to Kearney (pronounced ‘carney’) to camp at the Buffalo County Fairgrounds. Weather was a bit warmer than yesterday, threatening rain slightly and sprinkled once before we left, but basically perfect weather, mild and sunny with enough breeze to make you happy to have the right clothes. Guests: three or four children who rode in wagons, left for a time, then returned wearing pioneer clothing, and two members of the Platte River Riders who rode their own horses as outriders. (Also, I’ve been told that one of the group’s members that rode with us out of Lost Creek has written about it, too, on their website. Check it out!}

http://platteriverriders.blogspot.com/2009/06/danny-vanfleet-living-dream.html

Special today: Walt and Roberta left for home this morning. We ran the train past the front door of the “Arch” museum as a photo opportunity, and before that, PBS filmed us moving through the natural prairie landscape for their profile of the Van Fleet Wagon Train that will appear on “Saddle Up with Dennis Brouse” in the fall. Everyone in the photos or on film was dressed in old-fashioned clothes, and we were not to smile or wave at the camera; we were to try to look as if we were wearily looking for a place to camp. Personally special: after all this time, Teri and Ron took a couple presentable pictures of me today, so I’ll show the person who asked what I look like myself. Promise not to hold it against me?

Tomorrow is a rest day. We’re going to tour the “Arch” museum at eleven. Also, tomorrow, I’m told by Clyde and Eva, is Becky’s birthday. Happy Birthday, Becky!

 

11 June

Some days I wake in the half-light before five when Red turns on the loud humming generator in his trailer and opens its back door, to fill Ranger and Cooter’s feedbags with grain and a special red liquid supplement, talking kindly to his mules and to me, too, who’s sleeping in the front of the horse compartment, the ‘bunk house,’ on a camp cot off the floor and a foam pad a foot thick, until his grandkids show up this week. What’s he say?

He says, Morning! Now don’t get up, you just stay there in your nest; I’ll be out of here in just a minute, soon as I take care of my Ranger out there (his mule makes a small horsey harrumph, as if he’s listening closely and talking back to Red). He reassures me that I don’t need to get up yet, to just stay ‘in there’. But he’s the nicest alarm clock ever, and I really DO need to get up, if I’m going to be ready for the day, clean, breakfasted, and on the spot to help Danny with the horses and saddle the horse I’m going to ride.

Most days I just throw on all the clothes I took off the night before and drive my car to the porta-potties first thing. Then I figure out what I need to take into Rich’s shower trailer or, if I don’t need a shower ‘cause I took one the night before, where I can change. I brush my teeth in the car or standing outside it, looking around at the morning outside and the stirring in camp, Charlie coming to the water tub near the potties, carrying two buckets, all dressed and ready for the day, or Rich , Lefty, and Sue setting up the chuckwagon breakfast, in the nerve center of camp. (Diane had to be home to go back to work or she’d be there with Sue; Darryl felt peaked, so he went home, but I hear he’s coming back soon.) The smells of grease melting in black iron over gas fires get the hunger going in the gut, and make a person glad to be alive.

Next thought: where are those white thermal coffee pitchers? Ah, it’s still on the stand-alone camp stove over a burner, in the big white enamelware pot. Or maybe Sue’s made it in their camper; if so I either go back to the car to get one of my coffee cups, or I grab a Styrofoam one from the table where the three white thermal pitchers will be as soon as it’s all brewed.

More later. Night.

We shuttle our vehicles to the next campsite after we all stand in a rough circle and someone says a prayer, and the line of vehicles is impressive , long enough to encourage other drivers to stay put at the stop sign or light and just take a look up and down the road at the whole shebang, wondering what we’re about, at least that’s how it feels.

 

Hi to Chuck!

 

12 June, Kearney to Elm Creek

 

First, I’m glad to hear that Sharon’s knee surgery went well, and that she’s on the trail to recovery, from Clyde and Eva. Tonight Clyde was given a microphone during Bill’s after supper show, and he told every joke he knew: the unique bird, the tame bird, Eskimos’ laundry, harmonica, and stuttering bible salesman. He was grrrrreat! Our cowboy singer and poet, Bill Craven, has been with us since Freemont. His “retirement home” is a black and white schoolbus renovated into a fantastic home with a wood burner and his state singing awards decorating the walls above his desk. There’s always coffee brewing at Bill’s. Lefty, the Sunday Dutch oven cook whose friendship is enjoyed by all of us, does off-the-cuff standup and very well, too; he made us laugh our head off tonight when he chose from Bee’s drawing when he won some sunglasses with large red plastic eyelashes and a squirt-gun, and posed in beefcake attitudes for pictures. John P from KY sang a new song he'd written about all his friends on the wagon train, ending the list with his wife, Sherry, ‘the love of his life.’ To round out this evening’s extra-special show, a local veterinarian and his wife, Dr. and Mrs. Edwards, played “Whispering Hope,” “Danny Boy” and “Red River Valley,” a couple of Andrew Lloyd Weber’s songs from Cats and the Phantom plus more, on the saw and electric keyboards. We’re lucky tonight to have the chuck wagon and music bus set up around our host’s machine shed, so we’re dry and clean in the midst of this Nebraska quagmire after days of rain.

I was lucky, too, today, because I rode the pony again, just for a half day, sharing her with another infrequent rider, Ron from Chicago. She’s narrow, so a comfortable mount, and she was a good girl, because I gave her her head pretty much—she wants to be in the front, so that’s where we rode. We’re all lucky to have each other, because it’s the people that make this adventure the gas it is. Last night we had a camp fire; a local man, first name of Dennis, and his wife and grandson Jason came out and visited with us, and Dennis brought his flamethrower to force-burn the damp firewood some had gathered from a brush pile we passed near the Archway Museum near Kearney. Instead of going to write, I drove to Bob’s Superstore and bought a bag of marshmallows. One of the children brought some fancy mini-tridents she said her family had won back in UT, and that whole bag was roasted and enjoyed by all. “Rabbit” blackened nine at a time, three on a tine, and ate them all until she was a cute sticky mess. And her parents didn’t complain a bit. Clare and Brenda’s family enriches our group one-hundred fold, and we will miss them terribly when they leave a week from tomorrow. They and their children are beautiful from the inside out.

Tonight I want to thank any and all the gas station employees from all the little towns we’ve visited who have stood on booth seats to plug in my laptop and made me feel so welcome to loiter, drink coffee, and write these entries until closing time. Bert’s the latest one, so in honor of all of them, I thank Bert.

And I thank God for the Van Fleet Wagon Train, a very peaceful home.

 

13 June

 

Compliments came my direction today—for riding and for this journal. Thank you, thank you, I said, grateful for every kind word. The wagon master said I was the biggest surprise of the whole trip, and added that he meant that as a compliment. If that’s what he said, so he did.

Let me try to tell you about my relationship with horses. In twenty-five words or less, riding a pony the first years of my life lodged horse sweat in my nasal memory right there near the scent of bacon frying. Same for the smell of hay and horse manure, and the feel of a horse body under my cheek, hand or legs: just feels right and happy.

The first drawings I ever wanted to do really well were of horses; tongue tip out and up, head down and both hands on the paper, I got good at the head and neck, once in a while I’d come up with a nice solid four-legged body. When my family moved into town from the farm when I was ten, Dad rented a house that set on an entire block, situated in a large established old yard, with a pasture and barn. Small town kids would stand at the fences, hands still on their bikes’ handle bars, drawn to my brothers and me because of the horses in the pasture. We made friends fast because of those animals.

Man alive, it’s epic to move cattle on a horse with your dad and brothers and uncles. We’d keep the horses out on my grandma’s farm in the winter, and sometimes Dad would move his palomino in the back of his pickup, using white stock racks that went into the rectangular holes in the top of the bed’s lip. I can still hear the clatter of horse hoofs jumping into that tall box on wheels.

But as soon as I was given the keys to my own wheels, horses were forgotten, and I lost something of myself those late teenage years. Until the last six or seven, horses weren’t anywhere near my hands anymore. The Seinfeld episode when Jerry makes a faux pas with an important old woman because he casually expresses disdain for people who had a pony when they were growing up, and she asserts proudly, “I had a pony,” just reminded me of how lucky I was to have had Midnight and Nibsey in my past.

My youngest daughter became interested in horses when she was seven or so, and horses came back to me. Or I went back to them. Being married to a man who also had a pony growing up, but didn’t want to go to the trouble and expense, further damaged our marriage and made it hard to follow my desire to give my daughter that freedom and joy, but I’m glad to say I’ve done what I could. She’s now training up her first yearling filly, leading and loving her very own future horse. I’m proud of her, and grateful she indirectly neutralized my mid-life crisis with new horses.

Soon as I can afford it, I’ll be looking for a good trail horse. But enough about me—

Today’s ride from Elm Creek to Overton, eight miles of sandy soft gravel roads, was lovely. Since it was a short day, not even close to the fifteen to twenty we do sometimes, we had our two breaks, but no lunch break on the road, eating at the athletic/rodeo grounds belonging to the school in Overton when we finished the ride. After so much mud the past four or five days, a couple of Danny’s horses needed bathed, so two of the sweet kids and I bathed them using a hose and tying them to the arena fence.

The two horses stood like statues for the most part, and seemed to relish the cool water on them, and after I scraped them with John and Sherri’s squeegee, their coats shone in the summer light. You should have seen these girls standing high on the pipe fence panels, combing the quarter horses’ forelocks and manes. I should have gotten a picture, but I was too tired to run off and get the camera. The girls and I were cooled off, but I was even dirtier than I’d been coming off the trail.

Before I close this time, I want to tell you about Glen’s appearance in the Olympics’ opening ceremony, driving a mule team on a platform a bit wider than the team and wagon, through skaters bearing weird larger-than-life puppets, loud music, dancers, and thousands of people. Just that should have earned him his own medal. Just because it looks easy doesn’t mean it is.

A little guy in a tall black hat alongside the road today, when asked if he wanted to ride in a wagon, said “No, it looks boring,” but at the next corner, there he was, ready to try. (Some of us suspect it was the mention of pretty girls his own age that changed his mind.) When we got to Overton, I overheard his telling his family that what we were doing wasn’t anything as dangerous as the pioneers experienced, that we had roads and camp. That’s true, but day in, day out, this experience is changing me, and that’s partly due to the unnamed negative possibilities we face together each day. It’s anything BUT boring.

 

14 June

 

June 14 (I’m wearing a temporary flag tattoo in honor of Flag Day. Bee gave them out during the drawing tonight.)

Some days of this trail I’ve woke before the coffee is made, before anybody’s out. Then, if there’s light, I water Danny’s horses, one at a time, leading them to the orange plastic tub on the ground by the water wagon nearby. Over three weeks, I’ve gotten better at keeping the horse at arm’s length on its own side and not crossing in front of me as we walk which makes it more likely my foot will be stepped on, and is irritating. Raymond, the first wagon’s mule skinner, who wasn’t here nearly long enough, showed me how to lead horses in the beginning of this ride. His instructions have helped me be more confident with the big animals, and if I need to, I tug the lead sharply down to let a horse know he’s messed up.

I knew about the short, quick tug down, but I’ve been second-guessed all my life about horses, and I’ve not seen Danny do that to his animals. Each horse owner has a way they like things done, and it’s easier to get along if I attempt to learn each person’s way. But the way Raymond told me about leading a horse, in his Lower Alabama / Florida drawl, has stuck in my mind and has really helped me. Thanks Raymond. Miss you!

By the way, when I woke this morning, I looked out of Red’s bunkhouse window and saw horses galloping together in a circle around the arena. Strangely, I couldn’t hear anything, but was enthralled to catch glimpses of them racing around, all going in the same direction, showing off their speed and power. Danny had clapped his hands a few times in the midst of them, to force them to blow off some of the strain of being tied up so much.

Tonight I was told to scatter the rest of a bale of hay by the arena gate the way I’d seen it placed this morning, in a long even line down the middle of the oval. Easy, right? But at least three of the horses in that pen were at the gate blocking it as I came in with two or three flakes, trying to eat it out of my arms. I waved my free arm at them, and as they moved away, one spun and nipped at another, and then spun again, kicking as it headed off. A tail swished against the back of my head. Paul from WV was there, and he reminded me that I had to have my wits about me when I’m feeding, because the horses all think they’re starving. So spreading the next flakes, I moved quicker and kept looking around.

What I saw was Poncho, the bottom horse in the pecking order, being muscled out by the other horses; each time the paint would choose a pile and begin grazing, another would walk slowly over to Poncho’s pile and push Poncho away with its head. So with Jane and Paul’s input, when the paint wandered into the small pen adjoining the arena for a drink of water, I closed the open gate behind him and tossed him an entire slice for himself. I stood there inside his personal feeding pen and passed the time with three or four nice kids sitting on the fences around me.

A special buddy of mine has straight long blond hair and cowboy ways at the age of nine. She was interested in ordering the horses by riding difficulty. Two newcomers both wearing black cowboy hats hung out with us and spoke amicably with us about keeping cowboy hats clean and wagon trains in modern traffic. Another, the oldest and the grandson of the chuck wagon master, had a laser pointer and was tickled to see that the red dot would travel far enough to show up on Jeanie Lou, Bee’s biting, kicking mule who, incidentally, got out today and roamed around camp, I’m told, until our cowboy singer grabbed a hackle dragging from the mule’s leg, and then led her by that back to Bee’s campsite. Red’s mules were loose at one point, I heard also, but I don’t have the full scoop about that now.

Nebraska Bob’s gargantuan quarter horse team has one young horse and one more experienced. Yesterday as we lined up to move out, Sherri from KY and I climbed into the Christensen’s wagon, still out in the meadow where they’d camped overnight, and watched everyone working to get Bob moving. Bob’s young one didn’t want to move forward. Colton and his father, Clare, were working to help Bob get that team going, and Clare’s wife Brenda drove their wagon slowly past the other, to entice the other team out of the pasture while the father and son pushed the back of Bob’s wagon, getting it going against the horses, who pushed back for a short time, then took off at a good clip, until we all joined the wagon train out on the road, ready to go but not eager to leave such a nice campsite as that farm, with freshly cut hay lying around the horses’ trailer and a trampoline for the kids. Nebraska’s hospitality is bountiful!

Funny: a visiting lady sat down next to me after supper was pleasantly served in the community building, and handed me a pink feather after she held it for a moment and said, “I’m tickled pink to meet you.” We laughed together about that, then I laughed harder when she said next, “I’m a clown.” She really is a clown, in hospitals, because she’s been a nurse for a long time, and she believes in laughter’s healing power. She surely made me feel good! I think she and her husband are riding the wagons tomorrow, from Overton to Lexington.

Baby powder, gold bond powder, any nice dry talcum is a must for wagon trains. I use so much it puffs out of my shoes when I walk around camp, and, according to my friend Jane from WV, it sends barely visible powder signals out the back gap of my jeans when I trot by her wagon on Poncho.

I know, I know, too much information. Story of my life . . . .

 

15 June

 

Today was a fourteen mile day, sunny and warm/hot, from Overton to the Lexington fairgrounds. Special was twofold: a husband and wife, daughter and grand-daughter rode with us in the wagons, and a family joined us on a couple of their own horses with the dad riding all day, and the son trading his horse with his mom at lunch. The second family was with the Overton Rodeo Club, and opened the community center building on our camping grounds for our supper last night when a couple raindrops fell. Their horses were an appy and a flea-bitten grey. Eric, Shawn and Johnna welcomed the wagon train and seemed to enjoy their day with us. Eric inspired confidence just having him around that if we needed some good riding done, he’d do it; Johnna was on her cell phone solving problems at the slightest indication that she could help with information. She put Charlie in touch with a good farrier; she called her mom to get the right spelling for Ernie Wempen’s last name.

Who’s Ernie Wempen? He’s the husband of the first group mentioned above, an eighty-three year-old farmer, blind since 1961, who drove our lead mules today with Red. Glaucoma took his sight, but Danny’s wagon train was used by God to put the lines in his hands again. He had a good day. And he inspired a few of us. Ernie farmed with mules in his life’s beginning. I watched his hands holding Ranger and Cooter’s lines, and they exemplified “soft hands,” at least to my novice eyes. His expression is peaceful, intelligent, somehow faithful. One of his blessings is his second-wife, Kathryn.

I rode with her the first part of the day in Charlie’s wagon, with her great-grand-daughter driving and her daughter sitting beside her and Bill from Niles, IL. Kathryn wore a broad-brim gardener’s hat; she’s just had a small cancer removed from her nose, so the skin looked slightly peeled there. Her denim shirt was intricately embroidered in small flowers. Before I really knew about Ernie, his wife and I traded book recommendations. She’d read Cather, and Giants on the Earth, and told me about a couple I haven’t read yet: Bess Streeter Aldrich, and a likely gem called Karyn’s Box of Memories, based on the actual discovery of such a box at the bottom of a crock bought at auction.

Ernie’s been on two blind dates in his life, and he married both of them, she told me; he’s had two wives, but never seen them. After supper, a few of us were sitting under the chuck wagon tent looking through old songbooks and singing. Ernie and Kathryn, Red, Nebraska Bob, Ron, and Teri and I had a few laughs singing the tunes to “El Paso,” which Teri helped us with, and “Sixteen Tons,” which Bob, a strong, silent, slim man who I’d never have suggested lead us in singing; I wouldn’t have dreamed he’d actually be willing. But he said he was in school during the song’s heyday, so he knew it pretty well. Danny, sitting on the fringe of the group, told us a story about his father’s calling a friend, Jack Flaherty, every time the song came on and holding up the phone to the radio when Jack answered, so Tennessee Ernie Ford’s voice was heard singing “another day older and deeper in debt / St. Peter don’t you call me, cause I can’t go / I owe my soul to the company store.”

I’m grateful that I could meet the Wempen’s, and that Danny’s dream made an old timer relive his youth driving mules again.

A heck of a storm blew up all us tonight around dark. Since Boss was out ‘driving the trail’, I drove around camp talking to the adults and making an emergency plan, which ended up being ‘go to Walmart,’ half-a-mile away. But we didn’t need to do anything. Thank God again.

This morning, Danny’s horses were out. Just before five, Ron rounded them up and tied them inside the arena fence, where they’d been paddocked for the night. I was the one to leave the chain affixing the gate loose enough for the horses to make their getaway. But the result wasn’t what I expected. Danny told me about it with a smile and a gentle chiding that a farm girl hadn’t closed the gate tight, acting surprised. He got a pat on the back from me, and a genuine, I’m sorry. Then he told me Ron had gotten them in, and I answered, “Ron’s a helluva wrangler, isn’t he?” Danny agreed. He’s accepted that I have a learning disability when it comes to horsemanship, and his patience is renewed showing me the ropes. All of this, and much more I’ve yet to tell you, is testament to the rich blessing this wagon train has brought to my life.

 

17 June

 

Another side of the wagon train you might want to know about: I’m standing at a bar, literally; there’s no stool. Some locals are playing on three pool tables in the front and back, and behind me at a table for eight are Teri, Danny, Darrell, Ron, Charlie, Jerry, “Bear,” (who makes Lefty look small) and Lefty. Some of us drink non-alcoholic water and pop, some of us don’t. Lefty and his friends have plans to ride a horse into a bar, and they’ve talked to the police and the newspaper about it. Cozad’s going to soon be famous for more than just the Hundredth Meridian (west of which farming can not be done without irrigation).

Because a journalist’s work is always there to do, I brought my pooter into “Illusions” and the most accessible outlet was under the bar. So here I am. But my friends want to check their email or proof a business card, or I want to show them pictures of train times, so I’m not going to get anything done.

And I didn’t. The horse didn’t get any farther in the bar’s door than its head. Now it’s almost twenty-four hours later. I’m in a Shell gas station/convenience store near I-80, where it’s quiet except for the roaring hum of the Red Bull cooler—no, now that ceased, so the radio’s the only sound, and it’s turned so low I almost can’t make out the song (strain, wince: Sweet Child of Mine, Guns & Roses). I’ve worn my Ipod almost all day, but through a break in my tunes I could hear the Doors, and I gave the pod a rest. I’m so easily distracted, I might have to plug in the ear buds again, if too many customers come in and do as this one is doing, discussing the flavors of chew.

What’s this got to do with wagon trains? My experience is all I can tell you, and I’ve spent hours this past twenty-five days buying coffee black, with six creams, or with an extra shot of ‘STOK’ which appears to be concentrated cold espresso, (By the way, across the parking lot right now is a little coffeehouse called Lasso Espresso) or like tonight, a couple diet Pepsis, getting for my three dollars electricity, late hours, air conditioning and a booth where I can sit and write. In the beginning, the second night out, Rich made for me a study in an oat field next to the trailer where his generator for the chuck wagon is kept. He hung a trouble light; I set up my Coleman camping table and my lawn chair and computer, and I sat there to write. Everyone in camp was out-of-sight, presumably sleeping, and before I shut everything off, I’ll guess thirty-five June bugs turned kamikaze into my screen.

Then there stood Rich again, asking me if everything was all right. I told him it was freaking great, which it was, like a room without walls, and he said, “Give me a couple hours.” What a sweet man. I’ve grown to love most of these people. Anyway, as I was saying—
Going to the library or a Casey’s is better, because I have to work; there are no people to visit with, unless you count the employees, which I do visit a bit, but not like my compadres in the wagon train. I’ve seen some great small town libraries, too. When I walked into a tiny Carnegie building in North Bend I believe it was, the librarian could tell I was from the wagon train by my hat and boots, and took pictures of me to put into the library newsletter, suggesting a caption, ‘see, even wagon train riders come to the library sometimes.’

As I read the journal I’ve written so far, I see where I’ve left out some important stories. Such as when the Kansas School of the Blind detoured during their camping trip to meet up with us where we were camped and eat supper with us, then sang two songs they’d prepared for us, accompanied by their teachers on violin and guitar, both about wagons or the West. Charlie took three of the children driving in his high wagon, and let each of them drive, which went more smoothly than you’d think. The three students each wanted to go as fast as possible! They had only to tell the Shires to trot and they’d trot, so the horses got a workout that afternoon.

Bee left this morning, earlier than we all expected, because Lee, her husband, needs to have emergency heart surgery. She took Lauren, Alex, and Jeanie Lou, too, and we went without their company against our will tonight. We wish Bee and Lee good luck, and I pray the surgeon’s hands, brain, and tools all do perfect work as man is able. Love to Bee, Lee, Lauren, and Alex, and we’ll see you next year!

 

18 June

 

I’m at my car, early in the morning before I’ve even brushed my hair, so I’m wearing my weird reggae hemp hat, with a long bill and something like an open weave pouffy baggy body. Raymond walks by and in his Florida panhandle drawl, says, I like that go to hell hat of yourn.
 

A loud monstrous truck passes us from behind on a hard road. As he passes the wagons, passengers extend their arms out the sides of the wagon, palm down, whole member pushing down toward the ground, meant to communicate Slow down you fool. Sometimes I even make a praying sign too. Most people get it. Danny’s horse spooks, sidesteps right, into the horse next to him, and for a few steps, the stirrups are caught against each other. Neither rider misses a swing of their horse’s stepping rhythm. Danny takes it in stride.

After the period of collapse, for an hour or so after we get to camp after riding, a few of us are standing around and hanging out. We hear a truck’s engine approaching, then the bumping of heavy tires over the cattle guard. A red truck comes under the ranch entrance pulling a familiar silver and black trailer. Somebody asks, is Glen coming tonight? Is that Gary already? I look hard into the driver’s space behind the windshield—it’s SUZY! She’s come back! I run to the truck and hug her tight. What a great surprise. And she brought her horse this time, a gent named Tuffy she rode to breakfast this morning bareback and gave rides to the small boys with Mr. Red this afternoon.

 

Nebraska Bob’s horses fled a wire fence they collapsed this afternoon before supper.

 

21 June, Rest day in North Platte, location of Buffalo Bill's ranch, Scout's Rest

 

Leon Wilkinson has gone home to Bloomfield to deal with hail damage amongst other things, so I’m driving the water wagon and shuttle bus. My second full day of that job was yesterday, the day of the parade in North Platte. When we’re moving at a mule’s pace down a sunny, sandy road, the porta-potties creep along behind us, when Leon’s here. What I want to do instead is travel ahead of the train, stop two hours distant figuring about four miles an hour, and shut off the Chevy van’s overtaxed engine for an hour or two. Then I could go back into its living quarters behind the front seats, and write at the little table until my beloved wagon train appears on the horizon. Writing time has been hard to find lately. But yesterday morning, I tried it, and parked on a dry, dusty service path next to a canal crossed by a wood and cement bridge, green sand hills and bluffs to our south, grass stirrup-high, and level places for everyone to get off the road. The only thing wrong with that lovely rest was it was less than two hours down the trail, but I knew the teamsters were moving along fast, to ensure our arriving in North Platte with plenty of time to line up for the Nebraskaland Days Parade at one.

I pulled off State Farm Road, the same curvy country highway that had moved me to poetics earlier when we’d relaxedly driven our miles-long line of trailers and pickups to the fairgrounds in North Platte from Maxwell. (If you’ve never seen those golden bluffs in six AM June sunlight, you owe it to yourself to do so.) God’s Midwestern color box, golden brown, blue and white, and green, grey and lightest brown, transcends the everyday nature of the landscape at certain moments, but capturing its magnificence in words is more than I’ve been able to do so far.

My pulling off the road angered my boss. When the Wagonmaster rode up on Blue Boy, the first thing he said was something about the error of pulling off the trail; I was supposed to follow the same day-gloVF arrows as did everyone else because of the plumbing underneath the water wagon; I knew I’d done the most careful driving I’m capable of doing with that long, wide, awkward rig, so when Danny suggested I look and see how much clearance there was underneath I hurried over to the other side of it, dropped to the ground, and measured it with my hand, just as you do a horse. Assuming a hand is around four inches, I had six or seven inches between the sand-grassy shoulder and the lowest pipe under the trailer, but I told him eight out of hurt pride. I guess my being willing to check how close I’d come to ruining everything placated the man, and handing me the reins to his horse, he backed up the pig from its heading north on a dirt road to west on the highway for me, not to do me a favor, but because he needs to keep his equipment intact. While he expertly drove, his horse screamed for him, wide-eyed. I reassured Blue his ‘daddy’ wasn’t leaving, but the horse didn’t believe me.

Then Danny left the rig running, took the reins from my hands, mounted with a small hop of his right foot , and as his blue roan spun under him, told me, Follow us. I don’t want to take any chances.
Follow you! My face hardened under my anger, but I got in the cab and followed him, loping a quarter mile to catch the train. Focusing on the horse’s legs, on what lead it was on, helped me let it go; no need to stay teed off about making a mistake and being called on it. At least that’s what I think.

And about the words at the last entry’s end about Nolan—Nolan saw Nebraska Bob’s team go past the supper tent and followed them into the host’s shady barn yard, taking Speck’s halter, and had the presence of mind when I tried to capture the younger’s halter to tell me to let it go, that it would follow the other horse. He was absolutely right, and he’s a young man. Small difficulty deferring to better judgment, for me.

As I photographed the parade yesterday, Danny passed me and said proudly, I think we ARE the parade. We did make the front page of the North Platte Telegraph. Check it out at nptelegraph.com.

I’ve heard from David and Carol Armoto that Bee’s husband Lee is doing well, that it wasn’t as serious as first thought. Thank God! We wish him a speedy recovery, and we wish the Spanish Fork crowd, especially C-L-Y-D-E, were back instead of heading home. But we’ll meet again. Happy trails.

 

From Brenda Christensen, June 22nd ...

We made it home last night June 21 at 7:00 p.m. We spent Saturday night in Cheyenne WY then left from there Sunday morning. I am having a hard time adjusting back to civilization, but enjoying the wash & dryer and flushing toilet. We miss our wagon train family A LOT. The first thing Raquel did when she got home was take her pony for a little ride, you could tell they really missed them. When we pulled into the yard last night the 3 haflingers started neighing they knew they were home. Tell the wagon train family WE MISS THEM and to have a GREAT DAY. I'll e-mail more later and have Heidi help me send some pictures for the blog. XOXOXO Brenda

 

22 June 2009 North Platte to Hershey (named after another Hershey brother)

Our day riders were Candy, and Dave from Central City, NE; our new teamster from Cal, Mitch’s grampa, and his two friends, Therol in the wagon with Cal, and Larry, an out rider. Nolan rode Larry Hanson’s horse, Rainbow, and the Scott, Bailey, and even Charley, our dedicated teamster, rode for the first time this trip, today, because his wife is here to drive his team. Sheree is a beauty that can drive a team: as her husband would say, now that’s a good woman!

Teri told me that Hanson’s Rainbow is just the kind of horse her boss on the dude ranch wants, but Larry, only half jokingly, wants about ten times the going rate. Obviously, Larry likes his Arab, Rainbow, very well. She is well-behaved, experienced, a safe and calm kid’s mount, and gets along with other horses. Rainbow is the horse Lauren, Bee’s grand-daughter, rode every day she could. The last evening before they left for home because of her grampa Lee’s emergency surgery, I watched Lauren trot Rainbow back and forth the width of the field where the wagons were circled; she rode bareback with barrel reins. She smile brightly at her friends, and her smile nearly giggled whenever the bumpy trot struck her as funny.

Ron, from Prairie View, IL, helped out Dixon and Rita, UT, today. They’ve been adding a lovely 1890’s two-seated covered buggy to our train for a couple days, and Dixon’s shoulder injury, inflicted a few years ago when an ox stepped on him, acted up. Ron enjoys driving, so Dixon and Rita sat together in the back seat while Ron acted as their chauffer. Ron stepped up and enabled the couple to keep truckin’ on the trail. Good man!

I have to tell you, seeing the train from a distance, as I did last week the day I did advance publicity, and again this morning, coming up behind me as I sat in the driver’s seat of the shuttle bus stirs an excited sense of possession in me. Like a mirage at first, but the gradual approach, no glint of chrome or ‘running’ headlights, no cloud of dust behind. I’m in love with a wagon train—after the second water break today, I didn’t want to pass it and go on back to camp, so I just idled along behind it. I miss it when it’s gone. When I see it come out of the blurry distance, my throat gathers a catch, and I’m glad. I want to wave my arm off, back and forth over my head, shouting, Hello! Wagons Ho! Yoo-hoo!

When the train passed me on Jeffers/Route 83 in North Platte’s parade, I was so crazy about it that I snatched my cream felt cowboy hat off and caught the last wagon, Christensen’s, hopping up the steps and sitting down on their brown leathery seat cushions. As we swayed to the beat of their Haflingers’ walk, I told kids staring at us with their full candy sacks in their hands and their mouths open at the wonder of it that we’d come from Iowa and it’d taken us a month to get there. Whether or not they understood, I was marveling at it myself.

Sherry and John may be going home today or tomorrow. Their truck emptied of oil Saturday as John was sitting in it, with it running at idle, and then, suddenly, their truck died. Danny loaned John his truck, a tan flat bed with ‘Van Fleet Wagon Train’ in a wagon wheel logo on the side. Sherry and I are the only rockers in the group, unless Amber and Sherri from CA like rock and roll. (Sherri is a reader like I am.) Since she lives in KY, I look forward to seeing her again.

 

23 June

 

The sand hills of west central NE look like foothills to my prairie eyes. The Rockies are at least a state away. These green moguls are scarred and cut by history, by thousands of wagon wheels scratching the soggy sugar sand just beneath the universal grass.

I’m sitting in my car on the side of a curving washboarded road, technically gravel but not really, because it’s more sandy dust than rock. We’re camping on a hay ranch in the Platte River valley, and to the north are these strange hills that have tipped wagons and forced the abandonment of precious heirlooms to lighten loads and permit passages to new lives but with a price.

Tonight a rainstorm is coming in from the east. Huge clear raindrops are covering my windshield, gradually blurring the three-quarters light blue, one-quarter spring green still life God drew in living color and three dimensions whenever the time was right. I’m used to flat, flat, and more flat. Here, the horizon seems heaped like a blanket covering trapped air when you furl it over your bed, just before it settles lightly over the sheets. But these puffs are semi-permanent and substantial, imprinted as if by cowpaths with the hardships of people fleeing in wagons, pulling handcarts and riding horses, so many of them they cut grooves over the hilltops and wide swaths between them.

As the night falls and the sudden rain slows, the blue is now triple strength and smoothed out, instead of varied as it was before. Sheet lightning and clouds blowing in from the south east will change the Nebraska sky, but the constancy of these heaped green hills testifies to nature’s permanence and man’s limited span.

Today the wagon train left the road for the same sand hills that the sesquicentennial train took. We’d seen the picture of Ben Kern’s tipping wagon (with Glen right there plain as day, standing by) in the Genoa Museum, and this day, most of our teamsters tried their luck doing it again. But before the hills, we took a road north out of Hershey, then went straight west until a small jog in the road led us to another landmark from the 97 train, the grave of an unknown baby boy those folks dedicated in their passing through. The landowner was digging thistles with his dog Livre, as if he were waiting for us; I’m not sure he was, though. But when I parked the water monstrosity ahead of the train I’d left a mile or two behind, and got out to wait for my favorite sight lately, a man in a red and white truck stopped on the road beside me, and told me through my passenger window that right there was the grave of an unknown baby that had been buried by the Mormons on the trail. I told him that was the reason I was there; that a wagon train was coming behind me, and would be there any minute.

He said he knew that; that he wanted to get some pictures of them. Before he went back to his truck, he told me about the ruts out there to the west of us, where wagons had cut the landscape permanently. (These aren’t the words he used exactly.) I said, Yep; we’re going to take our wagons over those ruts after while.

His face slightly fell, and he said something about my already knowing, then he went back to his truck and left. Later, Scott told me that I should have said, Thank you; what else can you tell me? Dang. He could have told me more, I’d bet.

For those who wonder how taking those hills went, I’ll tell you: since I had the water wagon, I was available to take the wagon riders around on the road since for safety’s sake, they were told not to ride in the back of the wagons when they passed over the ruts. But all of them chose to walk; none of them chose to ride with me except Mitch, who wanted to use my computer to check Facebook.

So, after watching from a distance Danny, Teri, Larry from Idaho, and Ron lope zig-zags up the hills on horseback and then sit up on top looking over other hills I can only imagine, and seeing the wagons separate from their passengers, I followed the two-seated buggy around the curvy road skirting the hills, under the shade of old trees, slow as a Standardbred can trot. When I came to a stop sign where the gravel met the hard road, I turned off the van and took off walking north up the highway to the place where the wagons would soon appear. I noticed my increased strength while I was walking, by the way; this wagon train has been really great for my body.

The wait took longer than I wanted. I couldn’t hear anything for long minutes, maybe fifteen. The Trego ranch’s hand and his two-year-old son dressed like a little cowboy drove up in the ranch pickup, and I made conversation with them, fixing my eyes on the crest of the hill where the ruts were widest and deepest, almost exactly opposite an informative plaque. A green and white lizard distracted me, and the baby ranch hand wearing a big white cowboy hat wasn’t as interested in where it went as was Rita, Dixon’s wife, who rides with him in the buggy. She and I found the little guy climbing up a piece of grass. I tried to catch him. He got away. Then I heard someone’s voice in the wind.

Nolan rode Larry’s Rainbow down the widely-marked hill to tell us they were coming down soon. He enjoyed riding those hills so much that after he’d told us that, he turned around and rode up the hill again. When Red’s wagon came over the line between sky and grass, a live movie seemed to begin. Gooter and Ranger stepped surely and proudly down that hill like they were eager to show how superb a team they were. Next was Paul and Jane with Smoke and Coke, who wobbled back and forth with the sway of the land, but when it was done, Paul said he’d planted corn on steeper hills than that one back in West Virginia. Glen said it was easy; halfway down, Cooper, Lori’s son dismounted and took pictures. Then Charlie, the driver of the highest wagon came down, no problem.

We’d done it! Danny couldn’t wait to tell Ben Kern.

 

25 June

 

Often, something happens on the trail, and someone will say, THAT’S gotta go in the blog. (Some even call it a ‘blob.’ When I told my my trailmates a few days ago that ‘blog’ comes from ‘web log’ a lightbulb showed above their heads. Of course, some seemed to be thinking.) Like yesterday, Bill from Niles was holding a horse for someone during potty break. The horse spooked at nothing Bill could see and yanked Bill’s hand so that the back of it, where the veins show, ripped on the rough wagon boards and bled. Someone asked for and Gary offered a first aid kit. Glen brought the plastic box to the water wagon flatbed and set it down, opened it, asking me something about a band-aid. I said I didn’t need one, then I felt pretty stupid when I turned to look behind me and saw Bill’s hand, realizing Glen wanted me to bandage Bill’s injury, and I got to it, covering the open skin with an antiseptic cloth, then gauze and tape, then one of those ‘butterfly’ bandages to cover the rest of the cut. Bill still had the energy to walk up and down the sand hills with the wagons. Later, Bill said, that’s going into the blog. So there it is.

And when we were shuttling the vehicles out of North Platte Monday morning, just before I got into the shuttle bus, I realized I had the wrong bag for the ride; I had my shower bag still, not my traveling bag. I’ve been using Red’s bunkhouse for a nest since Raymond left, and that’s where I needed to go to switch bags.So I didn’t go to the prayer and went to Red’s but before I was out, Red pulled out with me inside! I hung out the passenger side of the horse trailer, waving and shouting. I could see Red in the mirror, but I couldn’t catch his eye.

If I’d just sat down back there in the trailer and ridden along, there would be no shuttle bus. So I kept waving like a Santa in a door-size poster. Dave saw me, driving behind us, and he honked. Red saw me then, and I could see him laughing in the mirror. I lifted my little stair on the side of the trailer, latched it, and took off for my ‘rig’ seeing a laughing face in each truck I passed. I’m a clown, I guess, and I don’t mind. Smiles and waves all round. Just a bit of teasing came my way about that. There’s always something!

Writing in Windy Gap, a bar in Paxton across from Ole’s Game Bar where we had supper, I met Fast Eddie, retired rancher and bronc rider among other things, born in Sutherland just east from here. Eddie wore a clean white dress shirt, jeans, boots, and a white cowboy felt hat, and is still attractive at his unknown age. He said that the town used to be called Alkali, until a rancher from around here named Paxton became a senator and they changed the name of the town. There was a fort to the west, and a Pony Express station that would be under interstate 80 now. He’s just resigned this year from the Buffalo Bill Rodeo Committee after twenty years. He drove cattle with horses right through Paxton until ’75. He told me that sand hill grass puts weight on cattle faster than other types of feed. The grass of the sand hills doesn’t have to be altered to be a concentrated nutrition source. Setting on the aquifer now, this area was called the Great American Desert in the nineteenth century according to Eddie and Dennis, a Vietnam vet who sat down with us. They told me of winds during the dust bowl period in the thirties creating what are called blowouts in places of buffalo wallowing. Sand hills filter water into the aquifer, replenishing it.

Eddie and his friend Dennis told me of Jim Goekie, a geologist fascinated with the Ogalalla aquifer (named for the Indians, not the town where our trail ends very soon) and the sand hills who wrote The Platte of the Sand Hills, and lived in North Platte. The sand hills came off the Rockies, possibly as the beach of an ancient sea in the middle of the country. Dennis told me twice that the sand hills are ‘God’s Country.’ I agreed, but had to add that the whole shebang, the universe, could be called that, couldn’t it?

Eddie summed up: Tough country, bad country, the sand hills contain quicksand, creeks too wide to cross, bogs, sloughs, sinkholes. In the sand hills, you can get into a bowl made of green land, and you can forget where you came in. Prairie fires, blizzards are even more dangerous; people can get lost easily in an unrecognizable landscape. Where the sand hills end, the badlands start.

This morning I looked out over a misty hayfield, the sun high because we crossed the time zone line between Sutherland and Paxton and this is the apex of summer. Foot-high green grass and massive round bales spread as far as I could see to the east, with the soundtrack of lovely morning birdsong. I’m not exaggerating when I say Monet’s haystack series evokes the same appreciation within me as What met my eyes this AM. When I returned to camp last night a heat lightning storm showed pink reflections of a storm so active it resembled a fireworks finale just under the horizon. Lying on my hood watching it last night, I saw three falling stars, too. No, I didn’t make a wish; if wishes were horses then beggers would ride, doncha know?

Oh, beggars ARE riding when I ride. I forgot for a while...

 

These photos by Ron Hoy
Look at that sky, will you?	Teri on her rockin horse		Glen, Skyler and Gary on the shady lane	Sheree & Charlie in North Platte before the parade
Because these two brothers were fighting in the wagon, their mother made them walk at the end of the train, all the way home. The smaller came into camp on his big brother's back. These are Lori's sons, Cooper and Colby.		Just a pretty picture, the train going through the ranches, thanks mostly to Glen Nelson.	Mitch and one of his 'sisters', Bailey	After supper at Ole's Big Game bar, Mick presented Lefty with this throw, in thanks for Lefty's volunteer work for Friends of NRA.
		Roger, Skyler and Glen	Glen's brother Roger, from Ogallala

 

They say the Lord when He returns will ride a white horse
And those are rare—How many have we seen across Nebraska?
Two? Three? As we passed pastures, our teams and mounts
Promenaded blessedly before their brothers and sisters with us.
Onlookers with wonder and yearning in their eyes, seemed to cry:
“We could do that! Where are you going? Can we come too?”
Sorry, horses of Winter Quarters to Ogallala,
Only the rarest owners drive teams today.
Duty calls people to stay home, and
Wagon trains don’t happen every day.
Wagon trains take dreamers; though not all dreamers dream alike.
Look how far we’ve come on one dream together.
Lord, what could horses do without their masters?
And what would we do without the Danny's?

25-26 June, last days

Glen Nelson Wednesday night did what he could to get permission for us to move through a couple ranches Thursday. The photos that accompany this entry show how awesome our last full day was, moving through the same landscape as did the Mormons, except with more trees and fences, including cattle guards, those metal pipe-covered ditches that’ll break animal legs. When you see the train arcing off to the side of the ranch gate, that’s where we’re avoiding a cattle guard.

The ‘story of the day’ Thursday was galloping. The four local boys who accompanied us across the ranches loped up and down the hills, raced away from and back up to the train, and sometimes sat on their horses up on the ridges, seeing the other side that we in the wagons couldn’t see. I was reminded of something Danny said about the way he and my uncles would ride when they were kids, the same way, never walking if they could run. They “rode the hide off their ponies,” and Thursday, we saw what that looks like.

Mitch and Nolan, Rich and Sue’s grandson, riding Boomerang and Rainbow, kept up with those cowboys until potty break. When Mitch followed the wagon I was in, Boomerang was panting like a dog. At the orange water tub we carried on the porta-potty trailer where they brought their horses to drink, Danny laid into “our” two boys about driving those two trail ponies too hard, (it WAS over 90 that morning) and acting like ‘city slickers’ do, not saving their pony’s strength for the long day ahead. Neither talked back. Mitch said later the chewing upset him, and Nolan seemed to take it to heart, too, staying quiet a while. But they rode more mercifully afterward.

The day the teams took on the ruts I was still driving the accompanying van for Leon. We came onto a soft sandy road shaded by trees. After riding in the brightest summer sun relentlessly, the relief must have given Teri a burst of energy. She said to those of us at the end of the train, let’s race, and took off like a bat out of hell. Nobody could keep up with Domino, her appy “rocking horse” who pranced energetically all day every day. When she let him go, he got up and WENT maybe 200 yards in a few seconds, until she reached the rest of the train and pulled up, so she wouldn’t spook the others. She galloped away in a little cloud of dust. I’m telling you, galloping is a thrill, even to watch.

Coming into Ogallala the last day, the front two wagons raced abreast at a gallop. All morning Paul, who rode in the #2 position all the way, edged around Red a few times, and Red, the lead wagoneer, always cut him off. I watched over Charlie and Sheree’s shoulders, riding in their wagon and laughing.

Then someone distracted Red on one side, and Paul’s wagon got around him. All of a sudden, we were all trotting or galloping or jumping up and down, clapping and shouting in a wagon or buggy seat, descending the hill on the four-lane interstate over Lonesome Dove’s finish line. Then—

Red’s wagon took a sharp right, down a deep ditch onto a flat, turning quickly to the left and coming right back onto the highway in front of Paul’s team. Red had won the race, and we’d all won something nobody can ever take away from us, sweet fragrant memories of the Mormon trail, Van Fleet style.

 

These photos by Mitch Scruggs
Red	Bee	Danny	Who are these masked men?
Kassie and Kate	Ethan and Aaron, back of Red's wagon	What's Lucky doing to Darrell?	Clair and Brenda Christensen and family plus one Mitch
Uncle, niece / daughter, dad Burns	The RUTS	Lori and her son Colby outriding the ruts	Danny, Bill and Charlie
Larry driving Red's mules	Lori driving Glen's mules	Train crossing a little bridge	From behind Charlie & Sheree
Bayley on Danny's Blue Boy	the waterhole	me driving the 'potty wagon'	Raquel on Cinnamon
Dixon and Rita and Shadow	Nebraska Bob and Ron	Larry on Rainbow

Epilogue

After the half day traveling by fast wagon from Keystone to Ogallala, the time had come to head east. I think I missed saying goodbye to Nolan, but that’s because I didn’t see him in my hurry to hide my threatening tears. I couldn’t say goodbye to Charlie; he helped me get along so much. My eyes didn’t make much contact and I cut short the farewell words. That’s the way I had to leave my wagon train friends and family, as if I would see them again very soon.

Driving home on I-80, towns where we’d camped passed in reverse order. Paxton was first, where we ate at the Big Game Bar; Sutherland was south of a wonderful ranch where we stayed the night after the train went over the sand hill ruts. In Hershey, Cheri and Amber from CA invited me out for a coke at Butch’s and we were stopped by trains both walking uptown and coming back to camp. North Platte was the parade town where I saw Buffalo Bill’s ranch, and where we had to say goodbye to the Bradfords and Christiansens. We camped in a farm family’s front yard in Maxwell, and at supper, the farmer recited poems he’d known since he was a child. Brady was a tiny town, too small to be on interstate signs, but that’s where a nice family that farms with horses let us stay in their front yard. Gothenberg stands out because I remember thinking it might be a nice town to live in; it was the start of the sand hills and our campsite was near a large lake. In Cozad, we stayed on the edge of town on city property, and had lots of visitors, but sadly, Bee with her grand-daughters, Lauren and Alex, had to leave to be with Lee. Lexington was where I earned the nickname ‘Paul Revere’ because of driving around the camp, asking everyone to make a plan in case we had severe weather. Overton was where Danny’s horses got out in the middle of the night and Ron and Teri caught them, and Mitch took the blame for me; the Wempens joined us in Overton, too. Elm Creek was nicest for the chuckwagon , because they set up under a machine shed roof. While we rested in Kearney, pronounced Carny, we met Dennis and his little grandson, Jason. In Gibbon I sang Rainy Days and Mondays with Bill accompanying me, and the Kansas School for the Blind visited us and performed with us (they’re the hungry mob in the picture with Lefty, Rich and Sue). Leaving Wood River on the horses, the rain came down in buckets. In Grand Island we saw a wreck on Henry Fonda Boulevard when someone wasn’t watching the road ahead and rear-ended somebody else (maybe because of us). Worms, population 36, had a big bar called the Nightcrawler that held more than 36. We had professional pictures taken down by the Loup River near Palmer when we stayed next to a cattle feedlot, and the Forbes family grilled burgers for us. While we were in Fullerton, there were carnies in our camp. Genoa brought an ice cream social to us. A family that owned a large field on the edge of Monroe also had a zebra in their back pasture. In Columbus the Christiansens, Le Fevres, and Bradfords joined us, and Suzy, Teresa and Harley left. In Schuyler, we camped by Lost Creek and after Emily fooled us with her blond wig; we all went dancing downtown. The Chamber of Commerce was waiting for us in North Bend, and there was a sign on the City Auditorium about us, too. We first met Bill Craven AND Emily in Freemont, where Danny called an additional day of rest. The oat field near Washington was the site of the one and only runaway wagon of the trip. And in Winter Quarters, we got to know each other, around a fire, on a trip to Walmart, Metz’s, and a Mormon museum; relaxing in the chuckwagon tent and talking on the ride from Council Bluffs. We made fast friends, all of us. I can’t wait to do it again, but I’ll have to wait. Next time, y’all come too!

 

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