"cemetery"

Driving through Wyoming on our road trip, our main interest was ghost towns. I knew from some research I did before hitting the road that the state had A LOT of them.

On the way to Superior, which to be fair I wouldn’t consider an actual ghost town at all, my eagle eye-d husband spotted this cemetery. From the road it doesn’t look like too much. Up on a hill and covered in sagebrush, the majority of the grave markers aren’t really visible until you get up close.

…But within minutes of being inside the small gates, I was exclaiming “this is definitely in my top ten!!!” It hits all the marks for me. Full of unique headstones? Check! Landscaping different than you’d see in the midwest? Check! Old? Check! Kinda sorta off the beaten path? Check! There’s just something truly special about cemeteries in the desert.

The majority of burials in this cemetery were done between 1900 and 1923, although a new section was opened for public use in 1994. The Superior, Wyoming website notes that most of the graves are dated during the influenza epidemic that followed World War 1.

Did you know that the flu epidemic that swept the world in 1918 killed an estimated 50 million people?! 25% of the United States population got it and within one year the average life expectancy dropped by 12 years. Ooof! The national archives and records administration has some information on this which you can find here. Quick, interesting read with historical photos + documents. We did not learn about this in school so I definitely just spend a couple hours learning some history!

As well as finding this excellent cemetery, we also spotted wild horses! It started with one. When we pulled over to take a photo of it, I spotted the baby! Then as I got the 70-200mm lens on my camera and set up my shot, I spotted even more of them. There ended up being nine of them in total!

(Little side note here, I LOVE this lens. At this point, it’s a road trip essential! Being able to get gorgeous animal photos without disturbing them is priceless.)

Not to sound dramatic buuuut it was magical. I’ve never been a horse girl but seeing wild horses is honestly one of the coolest things ever. I was over the moon. There’s just something really special about it. In all our road trips, this is only the second time I’ve seen wild horses. I hope it never loses its magic.

Our time in Wyoming was short but it left me wanting more! My feelings on it are similar to my feelings for Utah which are ‘holy cow, why does no one talk about this gorgeous state!?!” Totally underrated! I can’t wait to go back.

Other posts from this trip –

• Ohio to Arizona & back
• the abandoned Anasazi Inn
• Mel Gould’s Buryville

Check out even more road trip posts under the ‘travel‘ tag & more graveyard goodness under the ‘cemetery‘ tag.

Old Burial Hill Cemetery in Marblehead, Massachusetts came highly recommended by many folks whose travel suggestions I hold in high regard. Not that that matters because after visiting Salem I had completely forgotten about those recommendations. Luckily, as we were leaving the area, I thought to look at the FindAGrave app. I spotted the name ‘Old Burial Hill’ and instantly recognized it as somewhere I remembered looking up previously. I’d have definitely been bummed to miss out on this beauty!

Old Burial Hill Cemetery was established in 1638. It’s one of the oldest graveyards in New England. Surrounded by gorgeous old homes, on top of a rocky hill, overlooking the Atlantic, it basically could not be any more picturesque. The headstones are all beautifully preserved, and in incredible shape for their age. Nearly every one of them covered in symbolism. Skulls galore!!! Will I ever get over the excitement of skulls on headstones? I think not.

Aside from the hot sun relentlessly beating down us, our visit couldn’t have been more lovely. It seemed like every time I turned around there was something super awesome that caught my attention. I was especially fond of how close the houses were to the graveyard. One house, in particular, stands out in my mind it had a kitchen window that looked directly out onto the cemetery. Taking photos of headstones near it felt weird because it was THAT close.

More from this trip –

▴ Three days in New England

▴ Ponyhenge

▴ The Burying Point

▴ the Atlantic Ocean

The very last stop on our epic family roadtrip / destination wedding adventure was easily one of my favorites. It’s hard to say something is your favorite when you literally just got married a few days earlier and spent a whole bunch of time with the people most important to you. So, let’s call this my favorite aside from the things that basically automatically get ‘favorite’ status. Although, one could argue an old cemetery complete with friendly livestock grazing inside automatically ranks up there as well.

This was another FindAGrave app find. Just like our previous stop, we were all hankering for a place to stretch our legs and explore. I browsed Roadside America but didn’t find anything that looked interesting on our route so I turned to my second app of choice, FindAGrave. The reason I always say it’s not the best is because of the limited information it gives on places. It’s nice for locating cemeteries but who really knows if it’s going to be worth checking out or not. I decided it was worth the gamble since it wasn’t too far off the highway in the direction we were heading.

We arrived at the address only to see it was wooded, gated, not visible from the road and presumably, up a bumpy looking dirt road. Worse than that was that, there was someone at the gate closing it up. We pulled into the large pull off area in front of the gate and asked ‘Is the cemetery up there?’ hoping if he had some sort of authority he’d say it was okay if we poked around. He cheerily responded that yeah, it was up there, the road was driveable, he was just visiting his grandparents, to make sure to close the gate behind us and to have fun!

We crept up the dirt trail in our rental cars. After going through a second gate, we entered the cemetery. I could immediately see that it was going to be a good one. Then I spotted why there were so many gates and why it was so important to keep them closed! A beautiful cow was grazing alongside the graves. I’m not sure if there were more but I was excited just to see her. It was a really beautiful sight, and of course, I’m always excited to see animals. I was also very happy we’d been dragging around the 70-200mm lens. I was able to get some nice close up without disturbing her.

After getting my shots of the seemingly random cemetery cow, I started to wander around the rest of the grounds. It seemed like everywhere I looked there was something that got me all excited. One of the things I loved most was the huge range of different grave marker types. The whole thing was the complete opposite of the uniformity most cemeteries have. There were crosses made from pipes, headstones that appeared to be stamped somehow, metal crosses, and of course, your classic granite obelisk among many other unique one of a kind things I’d have trouble even describing.

Thurber Cemetery has a ton of history, and what makes it most interesting is that they have signs scattered about with little factoids. Instead of being dry and boring, they were actually fairly humorous. Clearly written by someone with a lot of opinions – check out the one a few photos below. “idiotic cemetery restoration attempt…” 

I hesitate to describe a cemetery as ‘fun’ but I’m having a hard time thinking of any other descriptor that works as well or sums up my feeling on it. There was a cow, there were cactus, a little bit of every type of grave marker you could think of, and interesting information sprinkled throughout. I loved Thurber Cemetery. I’m really glad we got off the highway to check it out!
xoxo

More from this trip;
▴ just married!
▴ instant photos from our wedding week
▴ that time I got married in a ghost town
▴ Cadillac Ranch
▴ Boothill Graveyard
▴ Twin Arrows + Two Guns
▴ Steins Cemetery
▴ abandoned motel in New Mexico

Clearly, it needs updated since in the two years after hitting publish I’ve found many others I LOVE but I have a list of my top ten cemeteries!

The FindAGrave app isn’t perfect but it did lead me here and that definitely counts for something!

Normally the drive back from anywhere feels so much shorter because you have whatever you did to occupy your mind. This definitely should have been the case, since Jeff and I had just gotten married a few short days earlier, buuut the drive from Phoenix back to Dallas/Fort Worth Airport was long. LONG. Loooong. I guess what made it feel so long was that we knew we were on a tight-ish schedule. There was time to explore but at the same time, we all just really wanted to get some miles behind us so that it didn’t seem quite so daunting. Fifteen and a half hours is a lot of time in the car!

It had only been a few hours since our detour to Tombstone, AZ but we were all ready to find somewhere to stop again. This will be a repeating theme throughout the rest of the posts I have from our drive after the wedding. I love long car rides but what’s the fun if you’re not stopping every twenty minutes to check out things along the side of the road and take photos?! Luckily, my husband and my parents feel the same way.

I haven’t been to too many of them, but I’m hooked on desert cemeteries. On any road trip, I’m going to make an effort to find interesting cemeteries but in the desert my need to find them is even more intense. The FindAGrave app showed Steins Cemetery coming up, it looked pretty small. Only 24 memorials are listed but the three small thumbnails in the app looked promising. I was stoked from the second we pulled up! It was beautiful! Okay, maybe not everyone’s vision of a beautiful cemetery but the absolute perfect desert cemetery. A strange variety of memorial types – flat stones, crumbling concrete crosses, and small wooden planks – all weathered by the hot sun. No two headstones were the same, and most weren’t even remotely similar to the ones beside it. It was an interesting hodgepodge of styles, for sure!

The cemetery is small but an excellent place to stop, stretch your legs, and of course, poke around a bit. There’s even a geocache right outside the cemetery! Here are five reasons to start geocaching, if you haven’t already.

More from this trip;
▴ just married!
▴ instant photos from our wedding week
▴ that time I got married in a ghost town
▴ Cadillac Ranch
▴ Boothill Graveyard
▴ Twin Arrows + Two Guns

Throwing it back to November’s road trip again! (Scroll on down to the bottom of this post for a complete list of posts about this trip in order)

The last full day of our trip was all about making our way, slowly but surely, back into Colorado so that we find a hotel close to the airport for our flight the next morning. We didn’t really have many things mapped out and we’d be covering a lot of ground that we had already gone over a few days earlier. Roadtrips are weird because they’re equal parts rushing, and just sightseeing at our leisure. Like, it’s totally fine to spend all day wandering around somewhere that wasn’t exactly planned but the last thing we want to do is drive around looking for one specific thing. Some Google research told us there was lots to explore but there were also lots of mixed reviews on how accessible said spots were. We decided to just wing it and drive. If we found something worth photographing that’d be great. If we didn’t that just meant we’d get to the hotel sooner to try and sleep off our colds!

While cruising down the highway we spotted an interesting looking sign in just enough time to slam on the brakes and pull in. The sign read Mill Fork Cemetery. I had nooo idea what to expect but I was excited because I had said earlier in the day “I just want to check out like one more cemetery before we go home.” As we crept slowly up the rough driveway I spotted a rickety wooden bridge off to the left. The only thing visible past that was a fence. I could not jump out of the car fast enough. I darted to the bridge, tip toed over it and excitedly opened the gate. Initially I was a bit underwhelmed. There were only a traditional headstones, there rest were small plaques. Inside the big fenced in area was a few other fenced in areas. The more I looked around though, the more I realized what incredible find this was!

Mill Fork Cemetery is super small, FindAGrave lists a mere forty-six memorials, but this place sure packs a punch. Maybe it’s the surrounding landscape? Or the fact that it’s so well maintained? I mean, how many cemeteries have you been to that have a guestbook!? While not the prettiest or easiest to photograph, the small fenced off areas inside the larger fence felt so intimate. The pristine grounds made it clear someone cared very very much about this place. The guestbook, which was housed in a small house shaped box, made you feel welcome. Visiting here didn’t feel like you were invading someone’s personal space. Instead I felt like I had been invited to be apart of something really special.

By the end of our short visit at Mill Fork Cemetery I had already declared that it ranked among my top five favorite cemeteries! If you’re out cruising around Utah, you need to put this spot on your itinerary.

If you’re interested in reading more about Mill Fork Cemetery, I recommend checking out this article from the local newspaper. It seems as though many buried in this incredibly peaceful place died tragically.

Other posts from this trip…

▴ engagement story / Cisco, UT
▴ Antelope Island
▴ Eureka Cemetery
▴ ghost town – Silver City, UT
▴ ghost town – Frisco, UT
▴ abandoned mill

After ooh-ing and ahhh-ing at all the incredible animals on Antelope Island I suggested we head to Eureka, Utah. Eureka is listed on quite a few websites as a ghost town so obviously that was what drew us there. The photos looked promising. Upon arriving we quickly realized this was not that case. I mean, there are definitely abandoned houses, and storefronts but there is also a pretty sizable population of folks who still reside there.

Would it have been cool to get some shots of the abandoned buildings? Sure but shooting buildings that are surrounded by people’s homes is something I’m not super comfortable with. It feels like an invasion of privacy. Neither of us had cell phone service, and hadn’t bothered to really think ahead about where we’d be heading next so the only thing we could do was just keep driving. It didn’t take long before we stumbled upon Eureka Cemetery. It didn’t look all that interesting from the road but it seemed like a decent place stretch our legs for a few minutes. The majority of the graves near the front of the cemetery were fairly new meaning not something I’d photograph but then I spotted ‘big deal’.

I had to get a shot of that grave marker. I hopped out, got my photo, and realized just how lovely the colors were. I’m generally not a fan of shooting in direct sunlight but I’ve found that when I shoot cemeteries in full sun I usually end up loving those photos the most. The lighting conditions mixed with the gorgeous colors (Utah, I love all your yellows!) yielded some spectacular photos! I’m so happy with how these turned out. The incredible mountainous scenery, the barren cemetery, the unique headstones! I’m in loooove!

Other posts from this trip…

▴ engagement story / Cisco, UT
▴ Antelope Island