Across the Desolation

Today was the 650 mile journey from Cooperstown, ND, to the work site at Alliance, NE. In order to get from there to here involves traveling through some of the most desolate prairie in the upper Great Plains; acres and acres of hills and grass punctuated only by an occasional town such as Pierre or Valentine. Most people would say it's a vast space of emptiness, and while it's true the area is very much devoid of any population, the landscape is far from boring.

The journey across central South Dakota is amazing in many aspects. Out ahead of you it appears as if someone has simply laid down a swath of asphalt across the rolling hills of green grass. There are no ranches, farms, or homes within the range of vision, there's not even any cattle to be seen, just a pale green carpet with rogue brown spots still adding texture. It would appear as if the road is the only human aspect to the entire landscape and you being the lone temporary inhabitant. 

But then there is the fence; the fence is a sure sign that somewhere there is a human presence. The fence lines cut straight lines over the organically shaped hills demarcating property lines determined decades ago. And as with nearly all fence west of the Mississippi it is the ubiquitous barbed wire. Three strands stretch for thousands of miles across the prairie, suspended in the air by wood or steel posts. The barbed wire holds in the imported creatures but allows passage for indigenous wildlife; they simply jump the fence or go underneath.

The hours pass much more quickly if one admires the job nature did of shaping the landscape, noting the ridges and how the coulees and valleys fall away from them. Lush grass and trees grow in the bottomlands while yucca and a few sparse weeds are all that thrive on the sandy hills. Occasional sheds and shacks scattered about haphazardly add the spice of human activity. 

Soon the sandhills of Nebraska give way to a plane and Alliance pops up above the flatness surrounding it. Watertowers stand above the trees, buildings become more numerous and so do the roads. Alliance, home to a huge BNSF mechanical facility, and a Days Inn motel, my new temporary home in Alliance.