Monuments road trip
NOTE: Sowbelly Road, featured in this trip, is minimum maintenance and receives no snow removal. Road closed signs go up in the fall and stay well into spring when the last drifts finally melt, which is far later than on the surrounding plains. Please plan accordingly.
Discover Northwest Nebraska’s Monument Road Trip will take you through a variety of landscapes as you explore the extreme northwest of Nebraska. Rich in history and beauty, this tour provides opportunities for sightseeing, birding, hiking, fishing and photography along a loop that, driven with only short stops, takes about two-and-a-half hours to complete.
This trip is about 50 miles in length.
Drive north on Monroe Canyon Road to the first stop on the tour, the Gilbert-Baker Recreation Area at the bottom of Monroe Canyon. The campground is a bird watcher’s paradise and the creek flowing through is one of few in the state where trout reproduce naturally.
Gilbert-Baker Wildlife Management Area encompasses 2,537 acres and is home to elk, turkey, deer and other wildlife. Hiking opportunities abound, so don’t hesitate to prolong your trip in order to take full advantage of the area. Just be sure to bring your camera along. Drive north just a bit further along Monroe Canyon Road and you’ll find a road heading east that will take you to a Gilbert-Baker pond which is stocked with trout seasonally. The pond is also home to bass and bluegill.
Once you’re ready to move on, continue driving north on Monroe Canyon Road on your way to a trio of monuments that mark the region’s frontier history. Keep right as the road turns to gravel (a feature of all the roads from here on out), you’ll now be following Edgemont Rd and nearing Oglala National Grassland.
The grassland includes 94,000 acres of mostly mixed-grass prairie with the occasional badlands. Pronghorns, swift foxes, and coyotes are some of the wildlife you might see while traveling through. According to the U.S. Forest Service, birders can expect to find grassland birds like lark buntings, Brewer’s blackbirds, sand-pipers and chestnut-collard longspurs.
Continue northeast on Edgemont Road until you reach Montrose Road. Head east on Montrose Road until you reach a T-intersection with Pants Butte Rd. Turn north, and follow the road east (Pants Butte has merged with Montrose Road, leaving you still on Montrose despite the intersection). A sure sign you’re on the right path will be the sight of Immaculate Conception Catholic Church, founded in 1887 and its cemetery sitting atop a nearby hill. Continue until you reach the church and Montrose.
Montrose is a now defunct village located not far from where the Powder River Trail and the Cheyenne & Black Hills Stage Road intersected north of present day Lusk, Wyoming.
Plan to spend some time stretching your legs in the area. You can start by touring the cemetery, but be sure to leave yourself time to make the short hike north to a pair of monuments honoring the events of the Battle of Warbonnet Creek, where the U.S. 5th Cavalry turned away what was rumored to be 800 Cheyenne who were attempting to link up with Sitting Bull in the weeks following his victory against Custer.
The battlefield monument sits on a hill that would later house a civilian built fort that served to protect Montrose during tensions that arose during the Ghost Dance War. Closer to the road, just across Warbonnet Creek, head east from the trail to the battlefield monument and you’ll find another monument honoring the encounter that led to the only casualty of the battle.
At this site, William “Buffalo Bill” Cody killed and scalped the Cheyenne Yellow Hair as he and a group of warriors were attempting to cut off a pair of couriers attempting to reach the main 5th Cavalry forces. Cody claimed the scalp as “the first scalp for Custer,” and later featured it in his wild west shows. Though the battle featured just one casualty, it was considered a rare victory for the U.S. during fighting the fighting in 1876.
(For a more complete telling of the battle visit: https://www.historynet.com/buffalo-bills-skirmish-at-warbonnet-creek.htm)
When you’re satisfied to move on, backtrack west on Montrose Road to the T-intersection with Pants Butte Road. This time, continue south along Pants Butte Road, heading out of the grasslands and back toward the pine-filled buttes of the Pine Ridge and Sowbelly Canyon. Turn east once you’ve reached Sowbelly Road and head west into the canyon that gets its name.
Legend has it, Sowbelly Canyon gets its name from a confrontation between a band of Cheyenne led by Chief Running Deer and U.S. soldiers from nearby Fort Robinson. Running Deer’s group had been wintering in the canyon. Tipped off about their location, the soldiers, who intended to round up the band, rode out, so confident that they didn’t send a scout ahead or mask their approach. Aware of the approaching troops, the Cheyenne spread out through the canyon and ambushed the soldiers. The surviving troops found themselves in a narrow portion of the canyon with tall cliffs lining the sides of the ravine where a creek ran. The Cheyenne were easily able to trap the soldiers there for days until eventually their Captain devised a plan that led to their escape. While trapped in the canyon, the soldiers had only pork belly to eat, thereby coining the name of Sowbelly Canyon.
Midway through the canyon you’ll come across C.H. Coffee Park which was donated to the town of Harrison in 1976 by Guy and Ila Coffee. The park features multiple shelters with charcoal grills and is a great place to stop and have a bite to eat or just relax before completing your road trip. Complete your tour by continuing to follow Sowbelly Road west where it intersects with Monroe Canyon Road where the road trip began just north of Harrison. Be sure to check out the other sections of Discover Northwest Nebraska’s webpage for information regarding restaurants, attractions and lodging within Harrison.