Marker Monday - The Sante Fe Trail

I love field trips! When we moved to Kansas I knew the Sante Fe Trail ran through here but I never realized it basically ran right by our door! Fifteen minutes north of our home is the town of Cimarron where the kids and I stopped the other day for a photo opp in a covered wagon. Look how small it is!! The boys and I tried to get a grasp on what it would be like to pack up only what was important and travel the plains. Wow!

In Cimarron the 1800's settlers would have a choice. They could continue west along the mountain route of the Sante Fe Trail or head along the southwest fork known as the Cimarron route.  The mountain route was longer but safer and had more reliable water. The Cimarron route was shorter but settlers had to travel for at least 60 miles without any place to get water while they worried about Indians. Hmmm, which would you choose?

After playing in the wagon or a bit we drove a little further to a destiation halfway between Dodge City and Cimarron on Highway 50 along the Sante Fe Trail. In some cases parts of highways, like Highway 50, travel the original Sante Fe Trail.  

I didn't realize the Sante Fe Trail had been used for over fifty years. At this little sight seeing stop it claims you can still see the wagon ruts made so many years ago. Below is an aerial photo of the wagon ruts. The Soule Canal by the way is an irrigation ditch dug by farmers in the late 1800's with the intention of irrigating crops from the Arkansas River. Unfortunately the canal was a failure but the ditch is still there.

So this is what we were supposed to be looking for here as evidence of the wagon ruts.

As we walked the path I kept scanning the horizon looking for remnants of the ruts. Depressions, different plant life....

I guess I'm not seeing it. Can you?

I'm sure they are there but maybe I just don't know what I should be looking for. Maybe we should come back at another time of the year.

It is a sight though isn't it? Looking across the prairie at the vast nothingness. It's hard to imagine traveling for months across the prairie in nothing but a wagon and then arriving to at your destination to live in nothing but a sod house.

It was difficult trying to explain to the boys just what exactly we were supposed to be looking for across the prarie but it was an educational spot to stop. I'm a sucker for historical places like this and make every effort to introduce my kids to such places. They are too young to remember much or realize exactly the significance of this spot. But my dad always says, "Little by little is the way you expose your kids to learning. Eventually they'll put all the knowledge together themselves and they'll get it." Dad should know! There was never a trip my family went on without some educational experience.

Thanks Dad for helping me to pass on a learning legacy to my own kids!

For Miles in Every Direction......No Trees

I bet when you read my profile on this blog you came across the words, "plains of Illinois" and scratched your head. Before I moved here two years ago I didn't believe Illinois was part of the plains either...isn't that Kansas and Iowa? Nope...Illinois has plains...and here are the pictures to prove it.

EAST - Those are wind turbines you see over the state border into Indiana, about four miles away. One of these days I'll post about those. Very eerie at night but very cool. The red barn is only two miles away. See that? No trees.


SOUTH - This old barn is about a half a mile away and is fun for the boys and me to explore in the spring before the corn gets to high in the fields to walk through. Just past the pine trees is our nearest neighbor about three quarters a mile away from here. Those pine trees don't count; they're just a windbreak.


NORTH - If you look carefully you will see a barn and a silo on the left in this photo which is about three miles away. That's not a tree on the right just my lilac bush.


WEST - Here is my poor clothesline that gets battered by the spring winds. This barn is only mile away. And once again...no trees.


I grew up in Indiana, just a hop skip and a jump away. Every time I make the three hour trip back home I am always surprised by how much the landscape and topography changes in, what I view, such a short distance. I love trees...I miss trees. I grew up cutting down trees every winter weekend for our wood burning furnace. Despite how much I complained back then I'd volunteer to cut wood today if it meant I could spend time with trees! Trees were a major part of my life...but I never realized it until I didn't have any. Illinois doesn't have trees. Yeah, we have four trees in our yard but it isn't the same as that cozy feeling you get walking in a woods surrounded by trees. Giving hugs, the trees do, keeping you warm by blocking the wind.

Needless to say, but I'll say it anyway, we don't see too many people out here. The mailman and maybe a couple farmers drive down our road during the day and that's about it. Since there are no trees I can usually see them coming miles away. Of course being so far out in the country means I feel comfortable letting my kids go outside to play without me. On the flip side, it also means they feel comfortable running around as naked as a jaybird during the summer with no trees to hide behind! Like they would hide...little exhibitionists! I'm just hoping that's a phase they'll outgrow or I'll have a lot of explaining to do when they're teenagers!

The wind...somedays I wonder if the wind will ever stop. My first spring on the prairie I wondered if I wouldn't lose my mind from the sound, the feel, the constant battling against the wind. Battling to keep my hair out of my face. Battling to keep lawn furniture from blowing away. Battling to keep clothes on the clothesline. Battling the giant snow drifts built by the wind. Battling the constant roar in your ears....oh wait, that's the sound of the kids. That's a different battle for a different post.

This is the plains of Illinois and I'm learning to deal with it and to love it. (Send saplings!!)