Mile 680: Scott’s Bluff
"The third of the soft stone landmarks is Scott's Bluff, slightly more than twenty miles from the Chimney. Scott's Bluff owes its name to an incident of the fur-trapping days.…
Mile 655: Chimney Rock
"On the north side [of Courthouse Rock], between it and the river, a large area of swampy ground makes the going uncertain, and Chimney Rock, the next famous landmark, looms…
Mile 636: Courthouse Rock and Jail Rock
"Late in the afternoon, when the evening sky was lemon-colored and placid, we distinguished the dark bulk of Courthouse Rock outlined against the sunset and knew that this day's journey…
Mile 554: Lodgepole Creek Road
"The Lodgepole Creek Road was unknown until 1857 and was used very little until '61, when the government routed the new mail stages that way. Within a year or two…
Mile 554: Lodgepole Creek Valley
"Here is the valley of Lodgepole Creek through which passed historic trails, telegraph lines, and railroads. The famed Pony Express followed the valley in 1860-61. “Nine Mile” Pony Express station…
Mile 552: Julesburg
"On the south fork of the Platte River, nearly opposite the mouth of Lodgepole Creek, stood, from the late fifties, a flea-bitten collection of shacks—unpainted, unwholesome, and thoroughly unlovely. It…
Cholera
"[W]e have the testimony of physicians of the day that it was the genuine, simon-pure article which filtered up the Mississippi on the river boats from the port of New…
Mile 520: Diamond Springs and California Hill Detour
At this point, the Pony Express Bikepacking Route is still south of the South Platte River. North of the river are two landmarks. To reach these, you'd have to cross…
Ants on the Prairie
"[Ant] mounds were like inverted mild pans, six to eight feet across and six inches high, and often hels a fair amount of Indian beads about the size of tiny…
Bullboats
"The very early fur traders' parties and the exploring expeditions had their own method of crossing which was entirely useless to wagon caravans. They made bullboats. The rules were like…
Crossing the South Platte
"From the moment they had passed the junction of the rivers the emigrants were fired with only one thought: to get across the South Platte. The Colorado gold-seekers of '59,…
Mile 475: O’Fallon’s Bluffs
"We passed a marker of the site of Bishop's Station and soon came to the first of the famous trail landmarks south of the river: O'Fallon's Bluffs. This unspectacular elevation…
Mile 437: Cottonwood Station
"Eighty miles west of Fort Kearney the emigrants found a spring surrounded by cottonwoods. Near it the ravines were filled with scrub cedar. It was always a favorite camp and…
Mile 366: Plum Creek Station
"As the emigrants approached Plum Creek, which was considered as the very center of buffalo country, the wagons lurched squarely across dozens of deep and parallel paths—some scarcely a foot…
Jerking Buffalo Meat
"To 'jerk' buffalo meat, the camp constructed a large rectangle of boughs or wooden strips, like a huge picture frame, and laid poles thickly across it. Then they elevated the…