26-Apr-2024 -- It was about quittin’ time on a beautiful spring Friday when we parked due north of this confluence along the bend in River Road. Three men were working with small equipment in the field to our northeast. We passed over an unmarked barbed wire fence heading south and commenced a half hour battle through waist high brambles and a bit of yucca and cactus. Thankfully no burrs or prickers. For the first half of the walk there we followed a fence line whose barbed wire had long ago fallen off; this fence abruptly ended about halfway through, though we still looked back over our shoulders and used the line to orient ourselves in the sea of scrub, as we knew the confluence lies more or less in parallel.

At 4:40pm we arrived at the confluence, mere feet beyond a newer unmarked barbed wire fence. Expansive views all around, 75°F and absolute calm. Man, do I love the Great Plains. After photos we turned back the way we came, and we were back on the road by 5:15pm. The men were still in the field.

A train loading grain blocked us for 15 minutes as we aimed northward toward Coolidge. We stopped in Syracuse, Kansas for burgers at Black Bison Pub, and then continued southward to Cimarron National Grassland, the largest area of public land in Kansas and the only parcel managed by the U.S. Forest Service. Here we set up camp at sunset and spent the night under wild stars. Tomorrow: extreme SW Kansas for the next confluence and a tri-point.