Thread: Road pics

Clouds and storms today.
Middle of nowhere on FM203 (FM= farm to market, which is a TX roadway class) Bosque County.


Pop up thunderstorms were building. 30 minutes after I took that pic it was raining too hard to see past the hood of my pickup and winds were around 60MPH for a bit.

Looking back at the downpour.


Looking the opposite direction from the downpour, another was building up right over our heads.


We got rained out. Still had two miles of buttons to install on the road in the first picture. Buttons are reflective markers that delineate the center line. THe white spots between the double yellow were put there by me. They're 40' apart and show the guy placing the buttons where I want 'em. I marked about 5 of the 7 miles of that road with white dots as most of that road is a NO PASSING ZONE. GREAT sport lemme tell ya.

Got home around 1900hrs. Drier than a popcorn fart. NO rain here.

Today started out good. Quiet road, coffee, and a smoke while the day breaks.


Picked up where we left off yesterday, got that road finished and it was time to re-locate. Sent the kids back through town so they could grab some grub, and I took off down memory lane.
I worked for this outfit back in the 80's. Had a fast KW with a big assed Cat engine and I hauled a LOT of cattle in four years. Don't know how many times I've back a cattle truck up this set of chutes, unloaded a load of steers, took a 30 minute nap and handful of road dope, re-loaded and would be up around Laramie, WY 18 or so hours later.


Looked around and was REALLY surprised to see the new owner of the old ranch still running the same brand they were using 30 years and three owners ago. These calvies were fresh from the sale. Fine looking steers fresh branded too.


That brand is supposed to look more like a "Z". The boyos messed that one up. It is called the 7 L and came from the first owners first ranch in Seven Lakes, NM.
Kind of miss working calves. Getting the burned hair stink, blood, and poop off of after cutting, dehorning, vaccinating, and branding a couple hundred head is a chore.

BIG country.

I get to disturbin cows ever now and agin on a mates farm. Mungery black angas. Don't fergit them Prairie Oysters !! I used to feel like I'd bin in a footy match after a day scruffing calves. Funny watching a mate who used to play rugby getting dragged about the yard by a small calf as he did not know how to get a hold of it !! Brands often stay with the properties over here when they change hands as well by the looks. Am enjoying the photos

Cheers

Gordon

Had some great times working for the 7L. Summer time after we'd hauled 10K head up to the high country, things would slow down for the truckers. I was single so I'd stay on up there and fix machinery that the "cowboys" tore up, work on wind mills, ride pastures, or whatever. Up there the neighbor ranches would all band together and work their cattle. We had a steer operation so there wasn't much "working cattle" done on our ranches. We'd load up and go the neighbor ranches just for fun. All of 'em were rope and drag deals. We'd gather all the mother's and calves and then the games would begin.

You could rope till you missed three, then it was off on the ground in the mud and the blood. Cookin' fresh nuts, beans, and taters on the branding fire for lunch. Work your butt off till about dark. After things settled down a bit, there was always a bottle gettin passed as the sun went down. Standing there listening to the cattle bawling, a horse stamping its foot every now then, and watching the world get quiet is one of the things I'll never forget.

I guess that's the closest to time travel I'll ever see.

Then there was the time we drove 2K head across 35 miles of some wooly damn country horseback. THAT was an adventure. Reason we did it that was was that it would have taken too long to truck 'em. It was 70 miles one way across dirt roads or 35 straight across. We decided to drive 'em. Bear in mind that the cattle were all crossbred mutt steers of every color you could think of that had been pretty much on their own for a couple of months on some good grass. They weighed about a 1,000lbs apiece. Lots of brahma ancestry mixed in that bunch. The boys were pretty full of themselves and damn sure snuffy. Once we got 'em strung out, there were four lanky SOB's that wanted to be out front. No big deal, they were settin a good pace and all we had to do was just keep em pointed in the right direction. They were strung out nicely and coming off a hill. It was a sight to behold. One of the cowboy's had his airhead wife out there and she decided that would make a GREAT picture. It would have under most conditions. Connie whipped and spurred out ahead of the herd, spun her horse around and snapped a picture WITH THE DAMN FLASH!

The flash went off the the four lead steers took off at a dead run to different compass points. Cattle being cattle, followed whoever was in front of 'em. It was an explosion of memorable proportions. Connie got roundly and soundly cussed and 6 hours later we thought had the bunch put back together.

Connie got sent home in tears. The rest of us camped out and did the night watch stuff. The boss brought enough food for a small army and conveniently forgot the whiskey. LOL Those of that had a bottle in our saddle bags shared it around and it didn't last long.

We got 'em to where we wanted 'em in a couple of days and were only 40 head shy. Took four of us a week of hard riding in really rough country to find those crazy bastards and get them with the rest of the bunch. They weren't all together. We'd find two here and three there and one somewhere else. It was fun.

I'd do it again in a heart beat.

Wullie,
Sounds like you won't forget those days for the rest of your life. It's too bad modern life and growing up and moving on gets in the way of things sometimes.

Originally Posted by donv

Wullie,
Sounds like you won't forget those days for the rest of your life. It's too bad modern life and growing up and moving on gets in the way of things sometimes.

No Sir, I won't forget the good times.

I guess growing up and moving on is part of the journey.

Stinks at times though. LOL

That is one great story. Thanks for sharing.

Here's few little older pics. Not from the road but from the shores of the Baltic Sea.

Sundown:



Cormorants flying. When seeing them flying at night we call them bad elfs, bringing bad luck. Not so much nowadays, but older folks were sometimes upset after seeing them fly at sundowns. Death souls escaping. BS to me.

Great pics!

Cool story about the cormorants.

Post all the sea pics you want to. I'm an old sailor too.