I guess we were looking at past history–what used to be with respect to pastoralism. Past history in the sense that pastoralism was historically seen as a sunset industry in an agricultural society with a history of overstocking on natural grazing lands.

This is harsh, arid country. It hadn’t rained here for a decade. There was little greenery. We had passed so many dead animals around old water tanks with pumped groundwater. Pumped ground water would be the primary water source as we had yet to come across a natural spring.

The hope was that there would be some water in the creek beds in the Hamilton Valley.