Sunday, May 14, 2023
I headed for Wind Cave National Park Saturday morning, leaving Sue and Jim’s house around 10AM. I stopped to pick up groceries in Longmont, then found my way to I-25 for the first leg of the drive into Wyoming. There was an amazingly large number of vehicles heading north. “Where are all these people going?” I asked myself, rhetorically speaking. After passing by Fort Collins, the highway traffic began to gradually thin out. When I did finally hit the border, the road was not crowded at all.
I stopped at Exit 7 for gas. I did not yet need it, having ¾ of a tank, but I determined that if I filled up at this point, I would have enough gas to get me to Wind Cave and beyond, not needing to stop again for fuel until somewhere between Wind Cave and Badlands Sunday morning. I also stopped at this exit because there was a Love’s there. If possible, I stop at Love’s, if for no other reason that I like the name, I like there is a heart on their signs. I don’t know a whole lot about the company. Their marketing advertisements, for employees, suggests they are a good company to work for. They also mention that anyone who works for them has to have a positive attitude and like working with people, helping customers, treating them with respect, basically being nice, too. I like that, too. So, I filled up.
I listen to music almost all of the time while driving. Lately, I have been listening to Spotify whenever possible. I also listen to podcasts occasionally, and while I was driving I-25 north through Wyoming I listed to a Spotify podcast by Helen Denham (Episode #146, Interview with Mandy Chihualaf: Navigating Trauma, Indigenous Wisdom, Empowerment). The part I found most interesting, which seemed in tune with my drive, was a part about indigenous perspective of body, mind, spirit, and land. Land was included in what we might usually call collectively call body-mind-spirit, and the inference is that we as human beings are very much tied to the land, to Earth, and it is not separate from us. I was driving through wide open spaces, space filled with rolling fields of green, what seemed like ranch land, stretching for miles and miles to mountains and hills on either side, and which, not too long ago, been land belonging to Native Americans, where they roamed freely and lived off the land in a way that was probably very different than the way the land is utilized today. Mandy characterized today’s culture as industrial, meaning that everything we do today has some aspect tied to industry and finance, and this is different than how indigenous cultures viewed the land and life in general. The Native America culture viewed human life and the living world, all life on Earth, as being integrated.
The weather was cloudy. The forecast I had earlier, from weather.com, communicated that it would be cloudy and a little windy, but there was nothing much about any rain in the forecast. Well, truth be told, it was cloudy. But the wind was more than a little, and coming from the north, I am sure it slowed me down some. It blew the van around the highway some, too. Concerning rain, there were occasional sprinkles, but by far there was no precipitation on the drive: until I was within about ten miles of Wind Cave, at which point it rained lightly and steadily. This was definitely not what the morning forecast had said, but the current forecast, when I was arriving around 5:30, indicated rain would be prevalent throughout the night and the next morning. So be it.
When I arrived at the campground, named Elk Mountain Campground, as soon as I turned into it I was greeted by the presence of two very large Bison. They were just a few feet off the road, feeding on the grass, and as I stopped to take photos through my windshield, they simply continued to munch. They seemed to pay no attention to me, probably a good thing
Ig rained or drizzled through the night. I’d like to say it was uneventful. I went to sleep at 9, falling right off, and was wakened by the sharp crack of a noise. I had no idea of the time, initially. I just wondered what the noise was, then I knew. Mouse trap. I looked down at a trap I had left set, based on my experiences, and sure enough, a mouse had been tempted by the peanut butter. Very surprising. Was this the same mouse that I had seen in the shower stall back at Colorado National Monument, nearly three weeks ago? Or was it a new mouse who had somehow come in from the rain? I disoposed of it, reset the trap. Where there is one, there could be more, right? And I slept with a light on, hoping that would discourage what are normally nocturnal animals from entering my domain. I ahd no further issues, and I had a decent sleep.
I woke early, had my breakfast of cereal and a blueberry muffin, and drove to the visitor center. I wanted to find out about obtaining a ticket to one of the cave tours. There are several options. When the visitor center opened at 8AM, I was first in line, and I secured a ticket to the 9AM tour called Natural Entrance. It is a 75-minute tour with three stops along the way for some information given by a park ranger, who is the tour guide. I was quite impressed with this cave. Steps lead down, down, down, eventually reaching 200 feet below the ground. I did not take many photos, thinking they would not depict the experience realistically, but it was fantastic. Our tour went about 2/3 of a mile underground.
One of the things amazing about this cave is the actual wind involved. Due to air pressure differences, between the cave and above the ground, there can be a strong wind entering or leaving the cave. This was demonstrated by walking us into an airtight sealed room, then opening the door to the cave, and just opening the door to the outside a tiny bit. We were suddenly amazed at the strength of a wind created sweeping outward. Also, one can go to a spot along a trail and see a smallish hole, about a foot in diameter, that leads in/out of the cave, and I could hear the wind coming out. Amazing.
Another interesting fact is the relationship between the cave and Native America tribes of the local region, with the creation story that life was sourced from within the cave/Earth and left the cave to come to the surface.
It might be easy to say, with the knowledge we have today, that such a story is wrong, impossible, and that it is only a faithful explanation of creation. The same could surely be said about the story of creation in the Bible. And while I am on that, how do we know that God took a rib out of Adam to make Eve? How do we know it was not the other way around, that God took a rib out of Eve to make Adam? And how do we know that the serpent did not offer the apple to Adam, who ate it and then took it to Eve, instead of the other way around?
I did a short hike near the visitor center, Prairie View Trail. The day was gray and with drizzle, which imparted a sense of stillness, despite a strong breeze.
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