Our 40th Anniversary Vacation – Part 2 of 3

The road from just south of Crawford to the Bed and Breakfast was pretty wash-boardy.  A couple of miles down the road we saw what looked like pieces of culvert sitting upright, each only about 2’ high placed all across this field.  Back from the road a way was a building.  When we got to the B&B we asked the owners (Tom and Carol Foster) what those were for.  They said that uranium is mined there.  Somehow water is used to flush the mineral out of the soil.  They said one of the neighbor ladies, who they thought was a little goofy, said one night when she was filling her dog’s water bowl she could see the water glow.  She later moved into town.      

                                                                      The B&B (Foster’s Schoolhouse) was very unique.  An old one room school house that still had the chalkboards lining the walls. Carol is a retired school teacher and you can tell you did some of the decorating with old book shelves and the old books that were on them.

The front door of the old school house was now the back, so the old coat room where the kids hung their coats and the woodstove used to be was now the bedroom.  It was very narrow with a full sized bed along one wall and  enough room to walk along side of it.  At the other end of the room, there was a single bed.  It was all tight but not cramped.

 They put another wall in parallel to the bedroom wall and that room was the bathroom.  They had an old claw foot bathtub with curtain for showering.  There was a chalkboard on the original wall and Carol had added some old school desk in there too.

 The next room was the largest where the living-room, dining-room and kitchen were.  It looked like someone added on to the one side so that there was more living space.  Since they have a lot of hunters staying there in the fall, this room was also decorated with deer and elk mounts, along with more old books, an old globe, a picture of the oldest living student and the last student that attended school in that school house.

The Fosters had a couple of dogs, a number of cats (inside and out), chickens and guineas  They also had a big red barn with a loft.  Carol said they have barn dances there every once and a while.  Tom is the kind of a guy who likes to go to auctions and find bargains, so when someone offered him some old café booths, he bought them and put them up in the loft for people to use during the dances. 

Our first evening there we thought we would go for a walk and we headed up the road, in the opposite direction that we came.  As we were approaching the top of the hill we could see a house and barn and a guy walking out to get the mail . . . and he was carrying a 30/30 rifle.  We found out that this was Rex and we also found out a lot about his life.  We later found out that he likes to talk . . . a lot. Anyway, he said there were some mountain lions in the area, some that weren’t afraid of people because someone had raised them and then turned them out into the wild.  At breakfast the next morning when we told Tom and Carol what Rex had said about the mountain lions, they really did say too much. They didn’t seem the least bit worried.   Anyway, it’s always nice to visit with the local people.

The next day, Tuesday, we drove to South Dakota and did the drive through Custer State Park.  We got to see some buffalo and feed the begging burrows.  Tom and Carol had told us about a pizza place in Custer City so we went there for dinner.  We took the back road heading to the B&B and a bull elk jumped out in front of us, which we thought was pretty cool.
Wednesday, we got up early and went for a trail ride at Fort Robinson State park.  We were in the saddle by 8:00 a.m. When we finished we went to the Carter P. Johnson Lake there to fish.  We talked to a guy and his son who were from Ceresco. Later we fished the Ice House ponds and Grabel ponds.  I caught a nice trout on my first cast.  Not much after that.  We spent Wednesday evening exploring the Barn at Fosters.
Thursday morning we got around early and made the drive to Burwell taking the scenic route – (highway 2).