This past summer, our Old Spanish Trail group went on several  trips. There are many interesting Indian campsites and the remains of pioneer homesteads, “right here in our own back yard”. It is surprising how many of us who have lived in the SLV for most of our lives, are seeing some of these interesting sites for first time.

Some folks who go along on these hikes carry backpacks or some sort of canvas bag to carry all of their treasures, picked up along the way. I usually wear a jacket with baggy pockets to hold all of the pieces of flint and other interesting rocks which I cannot resist bringing home. In the future I plan to also carry along a sack to retrieve the many aluminum pulltabs which seem to be about everywhere.

Due to health reasons, I have recently been housebound. To ward off the effects of cabin fever I have been sorting stories I have written, re-reading newspaper clippings we have saved and have even emptied out my jacket pockets from the last field trip.

This search revealed pieces of flint that have marks showing they have been “knapped” or worked by some Red Man. Maybe they were discarded because they broke in the wrong place, or for some other reason.

One of the rocks I brought home has the coloration of petrified wood and is shaped very much like an “ivory” removed from the upper jaw of an elk. (Any of you elk bunters who want to see a petrified elk’s tooth — just ask me to show it to you, cause I’ll probably always have it in my pocket from now on!)