Still dark, the paved world disappeared somewhere back on the highway, swapped for a dirt road and a set of printed directions that no GPS would recognize. "Follow the dirt road, go through a gate and be sure to close it, continue past an old spillway and down the dirt road until you see Little Keyhole, where the road ends at the Belle Fourche. You'll see us there under a big cottonwood tree."

Those are the kind of directions that require a little faith. Two cars worth of people pulled up the directions from their email and turned onto the two-track before full sunrise.

Hawks. A heron. A group of tom turkeys, next, in full display on the edge of the road: tail feathers fanned out, chests puffed up, completely unbothered by the cars that had slowed to watch. They were not moving. We waited. They strutted. Eventually they decided we weren't worth their time and ambled off into the grass.

Then the gate. Squeaky, loud, rusty; quite possibly announcing arrivals half a mile away. Someone hopped out, swung it wide with a high-pitched squeal, waved both cars through, wrestled the latch closed, and jogged back. It's a small thing. It's also just how you do it out here.

A two-track delivered participants the rest of the way–geese in a V almost pointing the direction. And at the end of the road, under the big cottonwood tree, a cacophony of birdsong well underway.