Black Hills geocaching

“JOURNEY VS. DESTINATION column

Black Hills’ treasures reach beyond gold

The last full day of my recent trip to Nebraska and South Da-kota would have made George Armstrong Custer a happy man.

In 1874 Custer and his troops paved the way for an influx of gold miners to the Black Hills. Their expedition explored the area, while breaking a previous treaty with the Sioux Indians, who had been given the land for their home.

Custer – killed along with his troops in a massacre by the Sioux at the Little Big Horn in south-western Montana – might well have smiled to see the likes of me ambling up to an old gold mine near Hill City. But he might have been disturbed to see the only treasure I found in the area was a geocache, not the sparkly dust worth a mint.

I’d done research on area caches before heading west, especially seeking out tough or unusual offerings. This specific cache was to have been the highlight of the last day of my South Dakota trip last fall. But Jeep problems spelled other, much more pressing priorities, and I didn’t get there.

This time around all went as planned. After logging on a pub-lic computer at the Custer Public Library to clear out my e-mail account, I headed north to Hill City. Hearing the whistle of the 1880 train, I stopped to check the schedule for its run to Keystone and back.

The next steam-powered trip would leave in about an hour and a half. Since steam trains are one of my hobbies, I spent $20 on the ticket and figured I’d be back in time.

Quite soon, I was headed northwest of Hill City, turning off onto a Black Hills Forest Ser-vice road. I’d read enough logs from other people who’d found the cache to know most had gotten very close to the site on four-wheel-drive roads. I turned onto the first one my GPS led me to… and then there was another. Men-tally, I ticked off which turns I needed to make for the return trip.

It wasn’t a tough road. No ob-stacles other than a big mud pud-dle here and there. I wound among the Ponderosa pines seeing wild turkeys, deer and other animals, while wondering just where the heck the magnificent mine had to be.

Going as far as I dared, a huge mound of dirt was piled across the road, stopping access. The GPS said my “find” would be about a quarter mile away. I started walking. Crossing a small creek, I started to see the wooden framework of the mine.

I climbed a hill, found the geo-cache, made my trades and then further explored what was left of the mine, carefully avoiding holes. This mine was in great condition and certainly off the beaten track. The remains of other buildings were all around, as well as what looked like the main boiler (is that right?) of a steam engine train, probably used to power something.

I’ll need to do more research to figure out how that mine worked, along with its other dilapidated structures. It was a worthy treas-ure in its own right.

Then I took the train ride. While nothing to knock you off your feet, it was comfortable and fun to watch the scenery roll by and hear the history of the area. You’ll rarely find me passing up a steam train.

For the evening, I’d decided to find my way to the French Creek campground in the Buffalo Gap National Grasslands, close to another area under consideration for wilderness designation.

I cut through a corner of Custer State Park, heading east, and then headed to the town of Fair-burn. If you’re a rockhound, you’ve heard of the famous Fair-burn agates. First, you had to go through this town-at-the-end-of-the road. I mean, Fairburn was 3 miles off a highway, sitting on gravel. It had a few old buildings, but also a school still in use.

Finally, I found the right road east of town, traveling by a num-ber of ranches and pastures be-fore reaching my location. I took the Jeep across what was called French Creek (there was a pud-dle) and headed to the marked agate beds, finally choosing to walk when I reached a closed gate.

The agates were apparently found in these rounded hills, much the same type of landscape you see in Badlands National Park. Now, this had to be funny. I was scooping up rocks like a madman, piling them into my jacket pockets. And I had no clue what an agate looked like or what I was looking for. (In checking my stash later, at home, my lack of agate knowledge was indeed verified. Oh well, I found a lot of pretty rocks… and we all know, I like rocks.)

Going back across the creek, I set up my tent in the camp-ground, hoping there would be no late-Saturday-night, drinking expeditions from town headed my way. Just in case, I put my bug spray in the tent, ready to blind anyone who might stop by with DEET.

However, it turned out to be a great evening of solitude in the wide open expanses of the Great Plains. The stars seem to shine so much brighter and in much greater numbers in those ultra-dark skies.

Sunday I arose and hit the road, ready (??) for the long haul home on I-90. But I still had one geocache left to find. It was a virtual cache, meaning there would not be a physical container from which to trade items.

Nope, the “treasure” of this cache was to be an old homestead on the national grasslands, sitting within view of I-90, be-tween the super highway and Badlands National Park.

The find was simple. You can drive most anywhere in the grasslands and I took the Jeep on a doubetrack through a pasture, weaving my way through some cattle to the homestead.

It was just on the edge of the spectacular Badlands Park scen-ery. The home and a couple other structures had been built into little hills. I imagine sod was placed over the top of them back in the day.

While the structure was failing, the framework of a door and windows still marked the en-trance to the home. Peeking in-side, you could see the old springs and headboard of a bed among the fallen roof beams, as well as a cupboard and an old hanger.

As always happens in such cir-cumstances, I tried to imagine living there in the harsh climate, homesteading however many acres the government was giving at that time. And as always, I documented the site with photos.

Then my eyes focused on the semi-trailers streaming by in the distance on I-90. It was time to hop in the Jeep and head east-ward in earnest. I bid the old home and its ghosts farewell in the bright morning sun.


copyright by lizs”

“That's great Lizs. You're a wonderful writer and should consider a career in journalism.”

“Great writing, lizs.

Snake: I can't tell if you were serious to say she should "consider" a career, but she is in journalism already.”

“T Mac - I'm just bugging her. She's like my favorite little sister and has pigtails begging to be pulled.”

“I meant older sister.”

“Ouch. I'd duck if I were you! :)”