Upstairs bedroom in Post Surgeon’s residence, Fort Laramie National Historic Site, Wyoming, July 9, 2010
Crossroads of a Nation Moving West
Originally established as a private fur trading fort in 1834, Fort Laramie evolved into the largest and best known military post on the Northern Plains before its abandonment in 1890. This “grand old post” witnessed the entire sweeping saga of America’s western expansion and Indian resistance to encroachment on their territories. (National Park Service)
Balanced Rock trail, Arches National Park, Utah, September 22, 2011
Balanced Rock is one of the most popular features of Arches National Park, situated in Grand County, Utah, United States. Balanced Rock is located next to the park’s main road, at about 9 miles (14.5 km) from the park entrance.
The total height of Balanced Rock is about 128 feet (39 m), with the balancing rock rising 55 feet (16.75 m) above the base. The big rock on top is the size of three school buses. Until recently, Balanced Rock had a companion – a similar, but much smaller balanced rock named “Chip Off The Old Block”, which fell during the winter of 1975/1976.
Balanced Rock can be seen from the park’s main road. There is also a short loop trail leading around the base of the rock. Balanced rock was formed through a process known as weathering. (Wikipedia)
This post was originally posted on August 18, 2010 during our western U.S. vacation. I am bringing it forward as a “blast from the past” post to fit in closer sequence to new posts as I work through photos from that trip..
On July 13, we were camped at a site on the shore of Pathfinder Reservoir, south of Casper. We planned to take a short drive and then spend the rest of the day relaxing and reading.
Pathfinder Reservoir, Pathfinder Dam and Fremont Canyon all are all named for John Charles Frémont – the 19th century military officer, explorer and political candidate. Frémont was known as “The Pathfinder.”
Pathfinder Dam and Fremont Canyon:
The flow during the summer is usually much lower than this due to drawdown for irrigation and power production. Exceptional rainfall combined with good winter snowpack had resulted in almost all reservoirs along the having higher levels that had been seen for several years. Some, in fact, had campgrounds that were closed due to flooding.
Looking downstream, the bridge below us is an old footbridge:
A closer view of the footbridge and the canyon:
A view from the bridge:
We found a couple more locations downstream where we could view the canyon:
After our drive, we went back to the camper. While we were gone the wind had picked up and, with the heat, it very uncomfortable sitting outside. There was no power at the campground and we didn’t want to run the generator, so we decided to forfeit on day’s camp fee and move on down the road (see Wind Blown).
The Pathfinder Dam, is a masonry arch dam which completely blocks, from bedrock to canyon rim, the course of the North Platte River. Construction of the dam was completed in 1909. Fashioned from huge blocks of granite, quarried nearby from the same formation into which the river had trenched its canyon course, the dam stands 214 feet high, has a crest length which reaches to 432 feet, and tapers from a base 97 feet wide to a top which is no more than 11 feet in width. The building of Pathfinder Dam was a successful testing of the late nineteenth century concept of arid lands reclamation in the western United States. The reservoir basin had a shore line greater than 75 miles in extent and afforded opportunity for storage of more than one million acre feet of irrigation and industrial water to previously arid lands.
Park Avenue Trail, Arches National Park, Utah, September 24, 2007
From Park Avenue parking area, the trail descends steeply into a spectacular canyon and continues down the wash to Courthouse Towers. (1 mile, one-way)
This post was originally posted on August 17, 2010 during our western U.S. vacation. I am bringing it forward as a “blast from the past” post.
One of the reasons we camped at Pathfinder Reservoir in July 2010 was its proximity to Independence Rock.
Independence Rock is a major landmark along the westward emigrant trails (Oregon Trail, California Trail, Mormon Trail.)
In 1841, Jesuit missionary Pierre Jean De Smet wrote, “The first rock we saw, and which truly deserves the name, was the famous Independence Rock. It is of the same nature as the Rocky Mountains. At first I was led to believe that it had received this pompous name from its isolated situation and the solidity of its base, but I was afterward told that it was called so because the first travelers who thought of giving it a name arrived at it on the very day when the people of the united States celebrate the anniversary of their emancipation from Great Britain… lest it might be said that we passed by this lofty monument of the desert with indifference, we cut our names on the south side of the rock under initials (I. H. S.) which we would wish to see engraved everywhere, and along with a great number of others, some of which perhaps ought not to be found anywhere. On account of all these names, and of the dates that accompany them, as well as the hieroglyphics of Indian warriors, I called this rock on my first journey ‘The Great Record of the Desert.’”
When we climbed to the northern highest point on the rock, we didn’t know that the trails had actually passed on the south side – today’s modern highway and rest area is to the north – so we didn’t really search for names on the south, though we did take the trail all the way around.
We did find some old name carvings on the top and, unfortunately, some more modern engravings and markings, though it is now illegal as this is a state historic site.
Edmondston-Alston House porch, Charleston, South Carolina, June 12, 2012
General P. T. Beauregard, Confederate commander who gave the order to fire cannons on Fort Sumter that started the American Civil War, watched the bombardment from the house porch on April 12, 1861.
Dogwood blossoms, April 9, 2010, West-Central Arkansas
Unfortunately, our lovely dogwood tree close to the house sickened and died after blooming in 2015. We suspected that it had been weakened during the drought of 2012 and, subsequently, fell victim to some type of dogwood disease.
Skinner’s Saloon through a window in a building across the street,
Bannack, Montana, July 30, 2010.
Skinner’s Saloon – Originally built on Yankee Flats, Cyrus Skinner moved this building to Bannack’s main street in the spring of 1863. It became the popular gathering place for Sherriff Henry Plummer’s gang of road agents. Skinner had left Bannack before the hanging of Plummer, but he was tracked down to a mining camp near present day Missoula and hanged for his purported role as a spy for the Plummer gang. The building was later used for many years as a store.
Bannack, Montana was founded in 1862 after a major gold discovery. It served as the capital of Montana Territory briefly during the civil war. The last residents left in the 1970s.
