Devil’s Gate 5sept2016

Today was a whole bunch of driving. I woke up to a leak over my bed – awesome. Then I heard something weird and wanted to get my tires checked. Nothing was open. I finally found some dude who said they were fine. So I took off. And drove and drove. I kept thinking about the pioneers and how crushing it must have been to make it to the top of a hill just to see another one just like it… Over and over. 

Then they get to Devil’s Gate. It’s the craziest thing. A 20 foot wide crack in a 500 foot tall wall of rock. It’s not man made. Pioneers couldn’t go through it but  always hopefully checked it out. Then  they had to cross just south through Rattlesnake Pass. It’s a rare place where the Oregon trail, California trail, Mormon trail and the Pony Express all converge. There are really old honorary grave markers because a whole lot of settlers died there. 

I found it by accident – it’s not on my maps. But I figured out why pretty quick. The Mormons own the land around the national site (on BLM land) and exploit the crap out of it. They have an old timey village with serious fencing. You can’t get to the trail unless you go in through their “visitors” center and are led by one of their people out the back door to the trail. Fuck that. I skirted the perimeter looking for access but was denied.  It’s really pretty so I took pictures from a distance, drank a Coke and made an awesome sandwich. 

That was literally the only interesting thing I saw today. I’m a couple hours from Rapid City in a town called Gillette. I may be here a day… I have a flat. I knew it.