Ghostly Experience     07/30/21

Southern Hills RV Park, Hermosa, South Dakota

When Rebekah was told what her older son Esau had said (that he was planning on murdering his brother Jacob), she sent for her younger son Jacob and said to him, “Your brother Esau is consoling himself with the thought of killing you.  Now then, my son, do what I say:  Flee at once to my brother Laban in Haran.  Stay with him for a while until your brother’s fury subsides.  When your brother is no longer angry with you and forgets what you did to him, I’ll send word for you to come back from there.  Why should I lose both of you in one day?” ~ Genesis 27:42-45     Isn’t Rebekah so much like us?  She wants her sons protected from the consequences of murder (as a good mom should), because if Esau did in fact murder Jacob, not only would she lose Jacob, but she’d also lose Esau because the “law of the land” demanded an eye for an eye, so Esau would be lost to her as well.  But she hasn’t learned from her past mistakes.  She once again takes matters into her own hands (without consulting Isaac), and sends Jacob away – out of the Promised Land, which Abraham made sure to keep secure for Isaac because of God’s promised covenant.  She also seems to be foisting blame for their current circumstances onto Jacob when she says Esau is angry because of,  “…what YOU did to him”.  I don’t wish to point fingers and use the childish claim, “She/he started it!”  She most likely pressed the issue for years with Jacob “You know, Jacob, God told me you’d be the blessed one, not Esau.”  That “He promised me that Esau would serve you.”  And who’s the one who started the blessing deception?  It was Rebekah.  Be careful what we tell/teach our children.  Teach your children  – and grandchildren – well.

Today’s weather forecast was Smoke.  All those pictures that look like the day is overcast and/or rainy?  No.  It’s heavy smoke today, come to us courtesy of the Canadian and western US wildfires, and a shift in the wind.  Fortunately, as thick as it was today, we couldn’t really smell it, nor did we have trouble breathing.  Mostly it just irritated our eyes a bit and cut off any long-range views.

What does your mind conjure up when you hear “ghost town”?

Is it abandoned wooden buildings in some state of disrepair from age?  A weed-covered road?  If you’re out west, how about dust and grime, and tumbleweeds blown about?  Possibly some fog if you’re there early morning?

If that’s what you’re anticipating, you won’t find it today. 

To be perfectly honest, we were a bit disappointed, because that’s exactly what we had pictured.  Sure, we could’ve done without the tumbleweeds, but there should’ve been something resembling an old road, and more than just one dilapidated structure. Instead of our idea of a ghost town, it looked more like Jesus had come and taken everyone away, based on the cars sitting around anyway.  Two of them actually looked like they were in an accident. 😊

Spokane was originally intended to be a gold mining town, but the Spokane Mine also produced silver, lead, beryl, copper, mica, hematite, graphite, and zinc. Both the town and mine were founded in 1890. 1927 was one of the town’s best years, when the town’s profits totaled $144,742. The town turned this money into a school, and several new miners entered the area. The mine soon began to fail again, and it closed in 1940. By this decade, the town was already largely abandoned. In the 1950s, a few companies unsuccessfully tried to reopen the mine. The mine’s buildings eventually burned down, and others that were deemed unsafe were destroyed by the U.S. Forest Service. A watchman remained in the town until the mid-1980s, and after that, the town was officially abandoned. The remains of the town include the schoolhouse, a few old cars, and a root cellar. ~ Wikipedia.org

In honor of the occasion,I’m adding a few black and white’s alongside the pictures we took. 😊

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It was still interesting, but not what we were expecting.  We did see several people mounted on horses though, so that was fun!  Plus, the ones we saw when we first exited the Jeep.  Sweet things let us pet them!  One ate a few of the carrots we brought for our lunch, but the other wanted nothing to do with them.  Guess his mama taught him not to take candy from strangers!

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Now.

What to do, what to do? 

Back in the Jeep we spent a few minutes reviewing our options and settled on re-hiking the Lovers Leap trail.  Of course, most of it was the same (although there were a few less red raspberries for us to pillage), but we were able to uncover some discoveries as we hiked.  God always seems to be willing to show us new and exciting things!

Today, one of the discoveries was a huge male Bighorn Sheep all alone by the side of the trail.  He watched us, and we watched him for several minutes, until he got bored and took off  – – right over the side of the cliff.  😊

There was also a few flowers, a grasshopper who willingly posed for an excellent picture (as you saw), and Blaine accidently uncovered what we can only assume was a ladybug nest.  Now that was really incredible to see!

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Weird, but neither of us could remember walking through a burned area on the trail, and yet, it had to be there last time.  So of course, I took pictures!  lol

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Still feeling the urge to explore, we drove to another trailhead within the Park.  With no plans to take on the entire 12-mile-one-way hike, it was supposed to run alongside a creek, so we thought to just do a little of it.  It wasn’t very exciting, or particularly beautiful, but we hiked for a mile or so before turning around when it began climbing a steep hill.  Been there.  Done that today.  No desire to do it again.  Besides, the trail started becoming pretty overgrown, apparently due to lack of use.

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Driving through the Park, we came upon more buffalo in the road. Imagine that! These seemed like they were migrating to who knows where. They kept coming over the ridge, and then crossing the road right in front of us. It never gets old! And never ceases to amaze us!

As we continued on towards home on one of the unpaved roads through the Park, we discovered that those metal grids over the roads that keep the cattle from crossing the line, really do work!  Unless you’re an independently minded buffalo calf.  We sure hoped the babies were able to make their way back to the mamas, cause the mamas weren’t going to them, and the cows in the pasture most likely don’t care for buffalo visitors.

Back home, Blaine insisted on baking me a birthday cake.  Originally, I requested a cranberry/apple pie, but there are no fresh cranberries around here.  Then I decided on the orange dreamsicle cake we had a few months back, but needed two ounces of orange extract.  We looked in quite a few stores at various points along the road to South Dakota, and also once we arrived in Hermosa, but couldn’t find orange anywhere.  Strange because they have things like butter extract (what in the world would you do with that???) and coconut, vanilla and lemon, and that’s about it.  When we finally visited a store and discovered it, it was $6 an ounce!  Forget that!!

So this year it was my same favorite – Boston Cream.  I let Blaine cheat and make it using a yellow cake mix, vanilla pudding (using the “shake” preparation method), and ganache using a heavy cream substitute (milk, butter and flour).  I only helped out a little.  😊

It was delicious, even though, since we had to do a cream substitute, I made too much and we couldn’t actually ice the cake because the chocolate was a bit too runny. 

Here’s a little something to make you smile! Our seventh grandchild, Matthew. Four weeks old and already 11.5 pounds. 😊