A Cow Who Won Her Freedom – Stories From the Front Seat

Kolob Terrace road cuts behind Zion National Park. As you drive through the winding roads and grassy plateaus you gain about three thousand feet in fifteen minutes. At the bottom the temperature is in the 80’s – hot – as you are in a desert. I finally had to stop just before the summit because my Ford Fiesta was unable to trudge through the seven inches of slushy snow. Yep – from the desert, dry as bones to SNOW. So you get the idea. Anyway on the trek back down the mountain my best friend Dani starts screaming at me to stop the car – I thought she saw another animal. Cows pretty much ran the show, milling about in the middle of the road.

She points at this black shadow and asks “is that a cow?”

Now you have to understand that we are essentially on a ridge – nothing to the right, nothing much to the left. As you can see in the picture below there is the top of a hill, a short plateau followed by a sheer drop. I pulled over as much as I could and threw on my hazards – not like there were many cars passing anyway.

I used the zoom on my camera to zoom in on the black shadow she was speaking of. It was indeed a cow.

See if you can find her!

My main question is why? Followed by how? Clearly she is all by herself there were no other signs of cattle around. If you could have taken in the scenery you too would be as confused as I. I grew up on a farm but I don’t know much about cows. What I do know is that they aren’t the smartest. What I made up in my head is that she won her freedom from becoming dinner by trekking to the hill where she stood.

You go adventure cow!

Your Cobweb Clearer, Kate