Rancher-woman explores the neighborhood

Rancher-woman was on her way home from taking the trash to the dump yesterday and decided she needed a reward for accomplishing such an odious task. She stopped along the road to try to find some petroglyphs she had learned about from one of the area’s old timers. Rancher-woman loves petroglyphs (click here to see her private collection) and loves to explore places she has never been...as long as it doesn’t involve leaving her ranch for more than a few hours. So this little adventure was right up her alley.

The old timer’s directions were, “hike up the steep hill by the gas pipeline, go north where you see the old fence, and they’re right there.”

Up the hill she hiked.


She could not find the fence, nor the petroglyphs. But she did find her neighbor’s house...or what was left of it.

She thinks he probably moved out around 100-120 years ago. She assumes her long-gone neighbor was a he, because no woman in her right mind would live out here in the middle of nowhere.

Her neighbor was a very hard worker and built his house from the rock and timber that he scrounged from the area.

He certainly appreciated the beauty of the land and built his house at the top of a ridge to take advantage of the 360 degree views. Or maybe he was just trying to get a better view of approaching enemies and trespassers?

As Rancher-woman explored her neighbor’s property, she came across this cave, not 100 yards downhill from the house.

A rock slide covered much of the entrance, but Rancher-woman tip-toed across the top of the debris, hoping her good snake karma would protect her (click here for that story). And here is what she found.

Much to her delight, there was not one shred of modern-day trash in this cozy little cave. Surely others had found it long before her, but they had the decency to leave it just as they had found it.

Maybe her neighbor was an outlaw...albeit an industrious one. Maybe he hid in this manmade cave when he saw the law approaching. Maybe Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid lived here! Or maybe her neighbor was a boring sheep farmer and simply carved out this room to store his food, since it was so danged far to town to buy ice.

Rancher-woman will likely never know who lived in the house on the ridge, but she’ll go back to visit every now and then just to be neighborly.

The house and the cave are as mysterious as the petroglyphs she never found - their age, their origins, their history indeterminate. All Rancher-woman does know is that the existence of these ruins in her extended back yard makes living 7 miles south of nowhere even more interesting and adventurous, and she’s in the running for luckiest girl on earth.