Freemont Indian Museum, Cove Fort, and a brief stop at Castle Rock

I ended up getting a later start than I had meant to this morning. I got up at about 8am and did some chores my uncle had requested, seems like fair compensation for letting me bunk at his house.

On the way to Richfield I decided I should really stop and see my grandfather since I hadn't seen him for a while. He was actually home and we chatted for a bit. He's building some railing around his back patio so he won't fall off it anymore. He's a good guy but not the handiest fellow with building things so I told him I'd come back tomorrow and help him build it. Hopefully it won't take all day and I'll still have some time to do more riding, but even if it does take all day it's worth it. Gotta help out family where you can, and I know my dad would have helped him.

I left grandpa's about 1pm, definately later than I wanted to and headed south on I-70 to exit 17, Freemont Indian State Park. I've visited here before, many years back so I sorta knew what to expect. It's a small visitor center, a little bigger than the one on Antelope Island, and absent of the nasty spiders! I went in and toured the museum and took some pictures, I hope it was ok. The signs said no food or drinks, they didn't say anything about flash photography.


I think it's interesting how people used what nature gave them to make things like these baskets. It would be cool to know how to weave one of these things.











Nice moccasins. When I was younger I did some leather working and tried beading, it's rather difficult so I'm always impressed my nice beadwork.













Lame as it may seem, these beads really impressed me. They appeared perfectly circular and the holes were almost dead center on most of them. They really looked like what you can buy now days that comes out of a factory, yet they are hundreds or even thousands of years old and were made by hand!










These clay pots were really cool. I took a ceramics class in highschool and nothing I made looked nearly this nice and it wasn't for lack of trying. The Freemont Indians were very good at what they did.

Unlike the Plains Indians which were largely nomadic, the Freemont Indians were farmers and so they build more permanent shelters to withstand the extreme weathers in Utah. Here is a picture of the inside of a Pit House (I think that's what they are called). I wonder how difficult it would be to build one of these.







I exited the museum and went for a hike to see some of the rock art that the Freemont Indians had left. I ended up only seeing one piece of art due to time, but it was still a nice piece. The hike there was surprisingly pleasant. I guess the rains and wind weren't such a bad thing. At the museum the nice park ranger manning the cash register gave me a map that gives the locations and distances of various points of interest. The one I wanted to see was called the Hundred Hands Cave. According to the map it was .10 miles away from the museum. So off I went.




I came to this sign, good thing the trail is marked.



















Not far from the sign I saw a nice landscape.














Enjoying the view, I followed the trail another ten feet....


I suppose this just goes to show that life is all in how you choose to view it. If you step back a ways, it's rather a pretty view! (Ok, I know that's cheesy as can be, but it seemed to me that this was some sort of life commentary and that was the best I could come up with.)

As you can see, the trail heads down and then turns left along that road. I followed it a ways, it crosses the road, and down the embankment on the other side. I could hear running water at this time and came to this bridge.

At first I was kind of annoyed, the bridge looked old but perfectly fine. On the way back I took a second look from the other bank and decided I was glad I had chosen not to ignore the sign. There were boards busted and missing that you couldn't see from the other bank.




I found the new bridge the park sevice put up and admired the welds as I went across. Having just learned how to weld last year I am always looking at such things. I crossed the bridge and came to this sign.

Nice, gonna have to give them an A for the new bridge, but an F for their distance measurment and map making skills. Oh well, the weather was nice and there was a breeze that kept it pleasant.

Here's a bunch more pictures I snapped on the hike there.

More pretty landscape.













The trail leading up to the cave.


















There are 31 handprints in the cave. There is no info as to why these may have been here, maybe it's the handprints from everyone in the tribe at the time. It is kind of mind boggling to me to think these have been here for thousands of years!











On the way back I passed by these two benches. I don't know why but I thought it was interesting. One is obviously pretty recent, the other I'd guess is at least 20 years old.






I didn't really get to see any other rock art as it would have involved more hiking and I was running out of time. I'll definately be back down here some time in the future and will have to try and make time for some hiking.

I got back on I-70 and headed over to Cove Fort. If you are ever in the area it's an interesting place. It's a dinky little fort out in the middle of what used to be nowheresville. It's now the junction of I-70 and I-15. It was built at the request of Brigham Young as a way station for stagecoaches and the pony express. It has 12 rooms, which are actually pretty nice even by todays standards. I learned something really interesting, back when it was first built, the average man was only 5'7" tall and the average woman was 4'11" tall. What has made us so much taller, the stereoids in the beef??

Here's the fort, it was constructed of lime morter and volcanic rock. The trees are Black Locust trees, and are nearly as old as the fort itself.

I visited this fort about 13 years ago or so and one of the things I remembered was the telegraph. As my tour guides were showing me in, I commented that it was primitive text messaging ;).

I knew telegraphs ran off of electricity, but it never occured to me to wonder where that electricity came from. In our modern day we just plug our electronics in, but back then they didn't have it so easy. And no, two strings tied between trees does not make a power pole. These jars beneath the telegraph represented the primitive batteries they used back then. The big jar in the forground was filled with copper sulfate. Unfortunately that's the only chemical I remember.

When I was younger my parents had a woodshop in our garage. I learned the basics of woodworking and as such any woodworking I run into is interesting to me. I'm especially interested in really old pieces since most of it was done by hand. I don't know if this is an antique or just a reproduction, but it looked nice either way.

The lady of the house (the wife of the man who was in charge of building and running the fort) cooked using this old wood burning stove. It has two ovens ( the tour guide took special care in pointing that out, I don't know why) and she cooked all manner of food in it. I want to know how she could maintain the temperature?

Here's the dining area, it's literally next to the kithen, there was no physical wall seperating them. The walls in this place are 2 feet thick, and according to the tour guide it helped to keep it cool in the summer and warm in the winter.

The glass used in the windows is not the original but period reproductions out of Germany. From what I was told, it is poured hot into a mold and allowed to cool. This method of making glass produces a lot of imperfections, such as ripples and bubbles as you can see. I think it just adds character and some cool effects.

I think this was one of the boys rooms. I love old firearms, I'm a bit of a gun buff and always seem to find them. Interestingly, the only person ever shot at this fort was one of the sons of the builder. His brother found a pistol while the parents were away and accidently shot the younger brother in the knee. Apparently the guy who got shot lived into his 90's and got the biggest kick out of telling people he was the only one ever shot there!

You'll notice at the foot of the bed ropes coming from under the mattress. Beds used to be sprung using rope, and after a while the rope would begin to sag so you would use a special key (sorry, didn't get a picture of it) to tighten the ropes. This is where the phrase "Sleep Tight" came from.

Old style treddle sewing machine. My tour guide was a little surprised when I told him I actually understood how the thing worked. In case anyone reading this doesn't know, the operator would use their foot to pump the treddle underneath it up and down. This would, through a series of pulleys and levers, cause the sewing machine to work. I bet this thing never wore out and probably never needed servicing. Not fancy, but damn reliable, not like the crap we buy these days.

I had to take a picture of this wardrobe. This was the "closet" for the young girls living here. Each girl would have had 2 dresses, one to wear while the other was being washed. They used aprons to help keep the dresses clean. So ladies, think about that the next time you whine that you have nothing to wear!

This rocking chair is the only piece of original furniture in the fort. It was owned by the orignal lady of the house. As you can see, it's rather small, she was only 4'11".

They let me go up the stairs and check out the vantage from the roof area. Here's a pic across the road, and there's my awesome bike that brought me here!

Since the fort was built as a defensive location, there were shooting ports on all 4 walls. The ports on the sides where the residences were are on the roof.

My tour guides in the fort were really very nice and patiently let me take all the pictures I wanted. As I was exiting the fort the lady asked me if I wanted my picture taken. Honestly no, I don't really care for pictures of myself, but I'm trying to get over that so I handed her the camera. Thanks tour guides, you were awesome!

On the way to the barn sat this wagon. It was known as a "Prarie Schooner". According to the sign on it, it's half the size of a Connestoga wagon, the big wagons you always see in the movies. The sign also gave a breakdown of how much it would have cost for the wagon, oxen, food etc. It reminded me of the really old computer game Oregon Trail, only it didn't end with "You all died of Dysentary." I liked the sign better I think ;)

The barn was huge. This isn't the orginal barn but is a period reproduction. According to my new guide (the dude sitting down in the picture) the timbers were cut in northern Utah and then shipped back east where the Amish cut them how they needed to fit and then brought them back out here and assembled them. Seems like a lot of work for a period barn, but it looked really good so it must be worth it.

The framing was put together with wooden pegs. The only nails used in the entire structure I'm told was in the floor boards.

Anything horse related always makes me think of my friend Mary who trains horses (there Mary, I said friend, you happy?) How do you think Leo would like wearing one of these and pulling a wagon or a stage coach?

Here's a picture inside the ice house. The floor is covered in sawdust and I believe if there was ice in here it would also be covered in sawdust which would act as an insulator. I'm guessing they didn't drink ice water much back then.

Here's some Ox Shoes. You'll notice they come split down the middle. Unlike horses, oxen are cloven foot animals and so each foot has two "toes". I didn't know this until the guide told me, but an ox is just a cow that has been trained to pull in tandem with another cow, or team of cows. In some way's oxen made better team animals that horses because a cow can eat just about anything while a horse has a rather specialized diet. Plus, if your ox breaks down, you can always make hamburger ;)

Something else I didn't know was that unlike a horse which can balance on only 3 legs for quite a while, an ox can't. If the blacksmith tried to shoe an ox by having it lift one leg for any real length of time, the ox would collapse from its own weight. So they come up with this little devise. You'd get the ox in there and then sinch the leather straps under its belly. This would help support the ox's weight while the blacksmith worked on it's feet. I'd like to know what they did of the ox threw a shoe out on the open range?

I enjoyed my tour of Cove Fort and learned a few things I didn't know. I decided it was time to enjoy some food, so I had a couple of granola bars and some water. If anyone has suggestions of food that isn't messy, won't go bad in the heat, doesn't require cooking and isn't in a can, please let me know. Granola bars are ok, but they are very dry.

The weather looked like it was getting ready to turn so I figured I'd better head out. On the way back over the mountain I hit road construction. I am soooo tired of seeing signs that say "Loose Gravel". In a car it's a minor annoyance, maybe you get some chipped paint or a cracked windshield. On a motorcycle it can mean you will lose traction and dump your bike. This sign always makes me nervous.

I made it through the construction and up and over the summit. On the way down the cross winds were bad again, bad enough that I slowed to 65 instead of the 75mph speed limit. While listening to my music and enjoying occasional glimpes of beautiful scenery between my attempts to keep the bike on the road and in my lane I looked down and notice my speedometer was at 0.... er that's not right.

For a minute or two I worried that something had gone horribly wrong, a snapped speedo cable, the gearing finally gave up, you name it. After pondering all the worse case scenarios I leaned forward to get a better look and realize it had just come loose from the back of the speedometer... annoying but fixable. I decided to pull over and pray no one hit me while I was on the side of the road hooking up the only thing that really could tell me how much gas I had left.

Mission accomplished I hopped back on the bike and accelerated as fast as I could back up to the speed limit. I decided to chance the weather and try and get some pictures of Castle Rock. This camping area is literally across the freeway from the Freemont Indian State Park (ie Exit 17 on I-70). It has changed a lot since I was younger and camped here. It still has a lovely dirt road, and my street tires did their best to remind me they weren't made for this type of riding. I stayed upright and was grateful to see the posted speed limit was 15mph, not so fast I'd lose control or have to worry about being rear ended.

With the weather still threatening to turn wet I only snapped a couple of pictures, but I think you can see the reason it was named Castle Rock.

I left Castle Rock a little sad that I couldn't stay longer and hike around a bit. The land formations are really cool, or at least there were when I was a child

I entered the freeway again and headed back for Richfield. It sprinkled a little and the air was cool and smelled of moisture, but my luck held and there wasn't any major rain.

Here's a picture of the pet bobcat in my uncles house. Ok, so he's not really a bobcat, but he's really big. I'm guessing he has some Maine Coone in him, or else he's eating Miracle Grow. He's a really cool cat, super mellow and just LOVES to be pet. Unfortunatel he sheds like mad and so I only pet him for a little while. If Katrina reads this, he's about the size of Dude, but friendlier :)

To Richfield, with love.

Aside from a few hiccups the Antelope island trip went well I felt. One of the rather nasty hiccups had to do with my speedometer. For some reason my bike enjoys eating speedometers. On the way home from the island I noticed the top part of the speedometer gauge face was cracked... concerning but not critical yet. However the needle had developed a VERY bad bounce, it would bounce about a 30mph spread, so it was very hard to know how fast I was traveling. With enough cars on the road it's not an unmanageable issue, I just match speeds with the other traffic. To an extent I can also tell how fast I'm going by knowing what gear I'm in and what my engines RPM's are.

I tend to be a bit of a pessimist, and a perfectionist. As such I wanted my speedometer to be in top condition, and since it wasn't, I wasn't happy about it. I contemplated my options, and consulted the all knowing SOHC4 forum, and found what I felt was a reasonable solution. Someone had stated that their speedometer bounced really bad as well and they had poured Denatured Alcohol into it and poured it out. The running theory as I understand it, is some grease had gotten between the magnet and the housing and was causing it to read erratically, and the alcohol helped to clean it up. Well that sounded like a simple fix for the erratic bounce, so I tried it.... err the results were a little less than spectacular.



As I posted this image I decided that maybe the results were just more spectacular than I had hoped for. As you can see, the gauge face paint started to run, and was exacerbated by me using compressed air in a vain attempt to get the alcohol to evaporate before it did any more damage. Oh well, the gauge face was cracked anyhow so it's not like I destroyed a pristine part. I could still use it for the most part, AND the alcohol did seem to get rid of the annoying bounce.

Saturday my friend and his family came over for a barbecue as a thank you for his help in rebuilding my moms deck a few years back. Yeah, the thanks was a bit late, but life sometimes gets in the way. After the barbecue he needed to go out to another friends place and pick up his laptop, so I figured I'd take the opportunity to load my bike up with the sissy bar bag my brother in law is letting me borrow (Thanks Isaiah, it's working awesome!) and a few other bits and see how she would handle before I left for the trip. With the new windshield installed and the gear packed down she handled really well, we hit 70mph with little problem. On the way there the crack that had been forming on the faceplate finally finished and the gauge face broke. Since the top piece flipped upside down and lodged itself in the bottom of the speedometer, it's not a big deal. I can still read the trip and odometer, and heck I couldn't read the gauge face anyhow so whatever.



For anyone looking at the above picture and trying to figure out what's wrong with it, notice the 30 is upside down and on the right hand side of the gauge.

Since the odometer works, and as I said the speedometer sort of works (even the "working" ones aren't THAT accurate, they are known the show you going up to 10% faster than you really are) and I'd been looking forward to this trip for a while now, I decided just to go with it. Heck, I can always match speeds with traffic right?

Fast forward to today, Monday, I had scheduled to leave work early so we could get down to Richfield with plenty of time. When I filled up on Sunday I calculated my MPG with the windshield at approx 28mpg... I was not thrilled at all with this, but since it's what I had to work with I figured I'd just go with it. I decided I'd better fill up before I hit 70miles on the odometer, or risk running out. After about 42 miles my back end was feeling a bit numb and we were coming to the last town for a stretch so I pulled off the freeway and into a Chevron station. I filled her up and was VERY surprised to only put a gallon in. The more I thought about it the more it sort of made sense though. I had been doing 75mph in 5th gear with my rpms at 6k. I'm guessing at that speed the windshield was making an air bubble big enough to keep most of it off me, thus improving the aerodynamics. I also think that since I was holding her to such a high rpm the entire time, the non-stock carbs I had installed were working more efficiently at the higher range. I figured I'd try testing my hypothesis. After filling up we got back on the freeway and continued heading south at about 75mph. After another 26 or so miles we pulled into another Chevron and filled up. Estimated mpg is 38, so from this I'm thinking that 6k rpms is about where I want to hold the bike at if I can, as it seems to give the best gas mileage. I apologize to anyone who isn't into motorcycles for the above paragraph, it's just my musings on why my modifications are functioning the way they are. The main story is I'm just thrilled to death to be getting better than 28mpg!

Going back just a we bit, as we were heading in to Nephi (the last stop I mentioned above) I looked up in time to see what appeared at first glance to be a long 4x4 piece of wood in the road. For a split second I was VERY concerned. At 75mph on my motorcycle, hitting something that big would not have ended with me still upright. I very quickly checked my left hand mirror and looked back and then changed lanes right as I realized it wasn't a piece of timber, but the blown tread off of an 18wheeler. It has always annoyed me that semi's would run their tires till they blew apart, but when riding a motorcycle, this debris takes on a whole new dimension. I am not sure what hitting it would have done to my bike, whether I would have wrecked or not, but I'm sure grateful I didn't. Not more than a few miles after the rubber booby trap I saw flashing lights. It seems someone else had already had a VERY bad day. As I flew past I could see 2 firetrucks and a highway patrol car parked next to a vehicle on it's side in the brush next to the road. I have no idea the condition of the passengers in said car, but I sure hope they were all right.

After we left Nephi, we pulled back on to I-15 south bound. As I was gaining on another semi truck I noticed the wind was getting really rough. I figured it was the draft from the big rig, so I accelerated to pass it. As I was passing the turbulence lessened a little bit, but once I pulled ahead it got worse. It took me a few minutes to realize it but I was dealing with a cross wind. It's not too bad dealing with something that is constant, but this cross wind would come and go. As I was contemplating this I noticed two vehicles pulled to the side of the road, and a third one, a truck pulling a road construction sign pull quickly too the right shoulder and stop. While I took the next few minutest to contemplate what was going on, I noticed another construction truck coming the wrong direction on the left hand shoulder. At this point I dismissed all 4 vehicles as being part of a road crew and continued to ride along my merry way.

Shortly after this the speed limit bumped up to 80mph, so I gave her a bit more throttle and enjoyed the thrill. Again, she handled it very well for about 15 miles or so, and then it came time to pull off in Scipio. I had started to notice some lightning flashes on the horizon we were headed toward and decided I'd better put the rain cover on the sissy bar bag. I pulled in to another Chevron (I'm biased, I like Chevron gas, and I'm willing to pay a bit more or drive a bit further to get it.) I filled the bike up and was a little saddened to see the mpg had dropped to 35, but still not too bad and I had been having some fun on the throttle, so that may have explained it. I pulled off my laptop bag since I didn't have a rain cover for it, and gave it to my mom who was following me in her car (it's always nice to have backup :) ) We discussed the odd happenings with the trucks on the freeway and she told me that we must have just missed seeing someone go off the embankment and that is what those 3 trucks had been stopping for, the other one that was going the wrong direction was probably actually picking up road cones. So 2 really nasty accidents on the way down today, and neither of them were in a place that I would have thought of as particularly dangerous. The first one, the car on its side was on a really straight stretch of road, and this one wasn't really much of a turn.

We started off again, taking a different highway, and I noticed the temperature had dropped pretty dramatically, and the smell of moisture was in the air. Sure enough it began to rain. It wasn't to terrible, it was heavy enough to keep from dirtying up my visor, but not so heavy that it was dangerous. For about 5 or so miles I enjoyed this natural swamp cooler effect. The speed limit here was only 65mph. After a while I had a white car pass me in a no passing zone, which I thought was really tacky and rather dangerous. It wasn't until I got to Richfield that my mom was able to inform me that I was actually only doing 55mph... so I guess I won't hold it against the white car for passing me. After about a 3.5 hour drive we pulled in to my uncles drive way which is where I will be calling home for the next few days as I venture out on day rides, exploring the beauty of central Utah. Here is a pic of the bike parked in front of his bushes.



His house is actually in a little town just to the east of Richfield called Glenwood. It's a small town, no street signals yet, but it has grown the the 20 or so years I have been coming down. Here's a few more pics of around the town, the post office is pretty small as you can see.



Glenwood is right near the mountains.

The family reunion was fun, unfortunately about only half the family could make it. But even with only half, it was a study in controlled chaos :)



It began to rain a little and we had a pretty double rainbow. Unfortunately my camera doesn't do the colors the justice they deserve, but it gives you a decent idea of what it looked like.



Here's a pic of the sun coming through the misty rain in a valley a ways off.



I rode the few blocks back from the park where the reunion was held, to my uncles house and parked on his sidewalk. After a few minutes I looked down and noticed a puddled of oil forming and decided it'd be rather rude of me to let my bike leak oil on his sidewalk so I moved it a bit. I know the oil is leaking from my oil pump, and seems to be getting a little worse as time goes on. For now I just plan on checking the level and keeping a spare quart with me. I must not be leaking too much since I topped off before leaving home and after 170 or so miles the level doesn't seem to have dropped much. Guess I'll be fixing that when I get home. For now though I just want to enjoy the time down here.

Brandon

Antelope Island- Where the outhouses smell better than the outside!

I decided I was tired of wrenching on my bike only to ride around town so I planned a trip to Antelope Island, which is the biggest island in the Great Salt Lake. Over 10 years ago as a Boy Scout I had ridden down the 7 mile causeway that connects the island with the mainland on a bicycle. Back then it was so windy that you had to lean into the wind at almost a 30% angle just to stay upright. With all the wind back then there wasn't very many bugs.

This time around there wasn't as much wind, and my two wheeled ride is powered by the ghosts of dinosaurs. I pulled up to the payment booth and read the reader board which informed me that the insect population on the island was really high... bugger.


The causeway that connects the island is about 7 miles long, with a lane headed either direction. As I rode I noticed the lovely smell of the Great Salt Lake, it smells of methane. It's a product of all the brine shrimp washing up on the shores and rotting, VERY smelly.


There's a lot of birds in the area, from seagulls to sandpipers. There were these little birds with black heads and greyish white bodies that were in groups. They were amusing to watch, they just bob their heads up and down for no readily apparent reason.

Once you get to the island your choices are pretty limited, right or left. I chose to go right, which would bring me to the visitor center. I stopped at the first pull off to check things out and take some pictures. Catching site of a latrine it struck me as funny that it was probably as smelly outside the latrine as it was inside.


I took my riding gear off and immediately regretted it. I had sprayed myself with bug spray before leaving home, but apparently it wasn't near enough because the horsefly's and other buzzing things either landed on me or divebombed me. I snapped a few quick pics and put my gear back on. I rode to the visitor center, which wasn't really huge, but did have a few interesting things. In addition the the flying bugs, there were these spiders all over.

I wondered why the Barn Swallows that were flying everywhere didn't eat the spiders, maybe there are too big for the little birds. The barn swallows had made several nests in the eaves of the visitor center and they were fun to watch. There were 2 or 3 chicks per nest it seemed and they looked old enough to fledge soon.



These Bison statues are all over the island and they are all painted differently. This one was in front of the visitor center. The visitor center had some interesting information. The Great Salt Lake is 24 to 26 times saltier than the ocean, so the only organisms that can live in it are the Brine Shrimp (Sea Monkeys :D ).


After going through the small visitor center I walked around the west side of the building and found this little guy just hanging out. He looked to be the same age as all the rest of the chicks that were in nests, so maybe he was a little more adventurous than his siblings. The mature Barn Swallows were all a glossy black on top while the chicks black feathers were muted like this fellow. His perch was so low that I could have reached out and touched him, and I was tempted to see if he would hop on my finger, but I figured that may lower his chances of survival, or scare him. I love animals and handling them, but when it comes to wild ones I try to observe with my eyes and just take pictures.

From the visitor center I rode around for a while just seeing what was on the island. There are several places with picnic tables, camp sites, sandy beaches, and even a Grill. I stopped at one of the highest lookouts on the island and took these pictures. This seagull just sat on the rail and just watched everyone.


















There are many hiking trails and I took one near where I took the above pictures. I had already doused myself in bug repellent again and it seemed to be doing a pretty job, except for keeping away these huge fuzzy bugs I wasn't familiar with and they kept flying at me. I didn't get a picture of them since they wouldn't hold still long enough for me to.

After the hike I rode toward the ranch that is on the island. I thought it was still a running ranch, but it was more of a museum. On the way I got pictures of the islands larges inhabitants, and a sign that makes ya just a little uneasy to be riding on a motorcycle.



Fortunately I didn't get any pictures closer to the Bison, since that would have involved me being physically closer to them. For anyone who hasn't seen one in real life, they are about 6 feet tall at the shoulder and weigh more than a big cow. They are big, shaggy, and can be bad tempered. It's sad to think about it though, over 100 years ago there were herds of them that numbered in the millions, but as the settlers pressed west the bison herds were decimated. Now there are only a few hundred pure bison left.

I arrived at the Fielding Garr ranch and was greatful to see modern toilet facilities. The ranch is about 130 years old and was in operation until approx 1970 when control was given over to the Parks department. It started out as a cattle ranch, but at some point they were herding sheep instead of cows. Here's a pic inside the shearing barn and the big engine that powered the belt and pulley drive near the top. The setup reminds me of the stuff you see in pictures of old time factories in the New England area around the time of the Industrial Revolution.

There was a store room with all sorts of really cool things. The saddle made me think of one of my co-workers who trains and rides horses, so I snapped a picture of it. The tooling was pretty nice looking.

I found an old detinator box, plunger style.
The only thing missing is Wylie Coyote.

There was a fair amount more to see at the ranch, if you ever get a chance to visit the island I recommend it. As I rode back from the ranch to the causeway I couldn't help wondering about the ecosystem that has evolved in this otherwise hostile environment. There are grasses and shrubs that are growing in soil that is super salty. Nature is an amazing thing, it can adapt to just about any environment.

Here is one more bison statue that greets you as you enter the causeway to leave the island. He seems like a handy sort of fellow ;)