Every once in a while a photographer needs to get away from familiar ground and spend time somewhere that still feels a little untamed.

For me, that place is the Pine Ridge Escarpment.

Last weekend my daughter Riley and I loaded up before sunrise and pointed the truck west.

By 7 a.m. we were already leaving Lincoln behind, heading toward Ogallala—yes, spelled differently from the Oglala National Grasslands we would soon be crossing. Western Nebraska has its share of those small quirks.

From Ogallala we turned north toward Hyannis and the long stretch of Highway 2 that runs through the Sandhills. Before long we realized something was happening in the distance. Wildfires had begun breaking out near Lake McConaughy, and the air quickly turned thick and brown with smoke.

For miles the sky looked muted and dim. The sunlight filtered through the haze in that strange way only wildfire smoke seems to create. By the time we passed Alliance the air had finally begun to clear again, and the familiar wide openness of the High Plains returned.

From there we turned toward one of my favorite regions of the state.

Pants Butte Road.

That road eventually winds its way through Sowbelly Canyon and into Coffee Park, one of the quietest and most beautiful corners of the Pine Ridge Escarpment. We took our time driving through the canyon, stopping several times along Sowbelly Road to photograph the buttes that rise abruptly from the prairie.

Eventually we continued north through Harrison and on toward the Gilbert-Baker Wildlife Management Area. The skies were clearing and the air had that clean western Nebraska brightness that photographers hope for. I sent the drone up for a while to capture some aerial perspectives before we continued farther north through ranch country.

Out there the roads quickly become rougher and the land wilder. Antelope scattered across the hills and frequently bounded across the road in front of us, moving effortlessly through terrain that feels rugged even on foot.

By the time we reached the historic Immaculate Conception Church in the ghost town of Montrose, the sun was beginning to sink toward the horizon.

Montrose itself has a surprisingly rich history for a place that now sits so quietly on the prairie. The settlement was established in 1887 in what is now Sioux County, near the intersection of two well-traveled routes of the time—the Powder River Trail and the Cheyenne & Black Hills Stage Road. In those early years this part of the Pine Ridge country served as a corridor for wagons, travelers, and settlers moving between the plains and the Black Hills.

The name Montrose reflected both the elevated terrain surrounding the town and the wild roses that once grew across the nearby hillsides. Though the settlement remained small, immigrants from Austria, Germany, and Luxembourg helped establish a close-knit frontier community there. Travelers often stopped at a nearby crossing of Hat Creek, and the little town gradually grew to include the essentials of prairie life.

By the early twentieth century Montrose had a schoolhouse, blacksmith shop, and general store, serving ranchers scattered across the surrounding countryside. Even at its peak around 1910 the population remained small, but like many rural communities of the time it became a gathering place for families who lived miles apart across the grasslands.

At the center of that community stood the Immaculate Conception Catholic Church, built in 1887, which became the spiritual heart of Montrose. Parishioners traveled long distances by wagon or horseback to attend services there.

Life on the frontier was not without uncertainty. During the tense years surrounding the Ghost Dance movement of 1890, settlers reportedly constructed a fortified shelter nearby out of concern that unrest might spread into the region. While the fears eventually faded, it remains one of the more unusual stories tied to the early days of the settlement.

Montrose continued quietly into the twentieth century, maintaining a post office that operated from 1887 until 1948. Over time, however, populations shifted toward larger nearby towns such as Harrison, which eventually became the county seat of Sioux County.

Like many small prairie communities, Montrose slowly faded.

Today the site lies within the Oglala National Grasslands, roughly ten miles south of the South Dakota border. The prairie has reclaimed most of the town, leaving the Immaculate Conception Church as the final remaining landmark of the settlement.

Though no longer an active parish, the church has been maintained over the years, and occasional commemorative masses are still held by those who continue to care about its history.

Out here, history doesn’t always proclaim itself loudly.

Sometimes it simply stands on the prairie and waits to be noticed.

That evening Riley and I photographed the church as the last light of sunset settled across the Pine Ridge. Afterward we stepped inside to quietly explore the sanctuary. We signed the guest book that visitors still leave their names in and spent a few moments taking in the remarkably well-preserved interior. Despite standing alone on the prairie for well over a century, the structure still carries a sense of care and reverence, as if the generations who once gathered there never fully left.

Afterward we made our way across the northernmost reaches of Nebraska along the South Dakota border, eventually arriving in Chadron for the night.

Morning came early.

We grabbed breakfast and headed south toward Rattlesnake Butte, hoping the overnight haze from the fires might have cleared. Unfortunately, the smoke still hung in the air and the light remained muted. The photography conditions weren’t ideal, but sometimes that’s simply part of the experience.

You work with what the light, land, weather, and time give you.

Rattlesnake Butte rises prominently from the surrounding landscape in Dawes County, standing as one of the more recognizable formations in this part of the Pine Ridge. Like many features across western Nebraska, it carries both natural and human history shaped by those who passed through or settled nearby.

Early homesteaders in the region established simple sod homes in the vicinity of the butte, using the land as both shelter and reference point across an otherwise vast and open landscape. Landmarks like this were essential in an era before modern roads and navigation, often guiding travelers and settlers moving through the plains.

The name itself almost certainly comes from the presence of rattlesnakes common to the region. The prairie rattlesnake is well adapted to the rocky outcrops and mixed-grass prairie that surround the butte, and encounters with them would have been frequent enough for early settlers to take notice. Like many place names across the West, the landscape was often named for what people experienced there—and in this case, it left a lasting impression.

Even today, the butte carries that same sense of quiet prominence, standing above the surrounding prairie much as it has for generations.

From there we continued toward the Nebraska National Forest – Pine Ridge Ranger District, eventually turning onto a forest service road called Spotted Tail Road.

The first stretch of the road seemed manageable. We stopped several times to photograph the canyon views, and I spent some time working with my Hasselblad X2D 100C, alternating between the XCD 20–35E lens and the XCD 90V lens while capturing multiple exposures for focus stacking later.

The morning had warmed nicely by then, and both Riley and I were shedding layers as the sun climbed higher.

Riley had brought along her new OM camera and seemed perfectly content photographing the quiet, vast landscapes we had stumbled into.

Then we reached a sign along the road.

Four-wheel-drive vehicles only past this point.

What followed were some of the steepest and most narrow forest service roads I’ve ever driven. The sandy soil and deep tire ruts made the climbs slow and careful, while the descents demanded even more attention. Along the way we crossed the occasional cattle guard—or “auto gate,” as some people prefer to call them depending on where you’re from—as the road wound through the hills.

Sharp rocks, loose sand, steep drop-offs, and stretches barely wide enough for one vehicle made for an interesting drive. At one point the truck leaned just enough downhill that Riley and I instinctively leaned the other direction, as if somehow our combined body weight might help keep things upright.

Turning around wasn’t an option.

So we kept moving forward.

Eventually the road somewhat leveled out for the last few miles before bringing us back to the highway.

When we finally reached the pavement we both laughed a little, partly out of relief and partly because it felt oddly familiar.

For some reason my daughters and I seem to have a talent for finding the sketchiest roads wherever we go.

Last year in Maui we somehow found ourselves driving the backside of the Road to Hana along the island’s south coast after dark—in a convertible, no less—on a stretch of road where people usually recommend a Jeep. That drive involved narrow cliffside roads, blind corners, and a lot of hoping the headlights would reveal the next turn in time.

So the Spotted Tail Road almost felt like tradition.

My daughters don’t always appreciate these adventures quite as much as I do, but they’ve come to expect that if I’m behind the wheel, there’s a decent chance we might end up somewhere a little more “interesting” than originally planned.

Fortunately this time the road eventually eased and carried us safely back to the highway.

From there we drove north and west toward Crow Butte.

Along the way we stopped at Flag Butte and discovered something unexpected: the Flag Butte School, a one-room schoolhouse established in 1895 as District #18.

Standing there beside that building, it wasn’t difficult to imagine what life must have been like for the families who lived here more than a century ago.

After photographing the school we continued toward Crow Butte and hiked into the Ponderosa Wildlife Management Area. The land there is rugged and beautiful, with badlands erosion, pine ridges, and wide prairie views stretching in every direction.

Crow Butte is one of those places that quickly challenges the common assumption that Nebraska is nothing more than flat, treeless plains. Rising dramatically above the surrounding country, the butte stands nearly nine hundred feet higher than the White River valley several miles to the northwest.

The area around Crow Butte also carries a long and layered history, once the site of conflict between tribes and later home to stories of frontier survival and even Prohibition-era activity hidden within its ridges.

We photographed the butte both from the ground and from the air using the drone before finally beginning the long drive home.

As we crossed Highway 2 again the wildfire smoke returned, though we never saw the flames themselves.

Riley and I remembered something from last summer. During a Fourth of July trip to Fort Robinson, we had stopped at the Pizza Hut in Crawford—twice—because it had been unexpectedly good.

This year we discovered it had closed.

So on the way back we stopped at the Pizza Hut in Broken Bow instead. It wasn’t quite the same, but it still made for a good laugh and one more small memory from the trip.

Originally we had planned to stay through Sunday, but Nebraska had other ideas.

Saturday afternoon temperatures were pushing close to 60 degrees, but by Sunday morning the forecast called for 18 degrees, snow, and wind gusts approaching 60 miles per hour—not to mention the wildfires that were still spreading across parts of the state. Rather than spend the night waiting for that front to roll through, we decided to head home Saturday evening.

That kind of dramatic shift is something you learn to expect living here.

In Nebraska, the weather can change almost as quickly as the landscape.

Photography trips often become about more than just photographs.

Sometimes they’re about the road, the landscape, and the quiet moments you share along the way.

Last weekend in the Pine Ridge Escarpment was all of that.

And it reminded me that there is still far more of this country left to explore.

I plan to return several more times this year—this time focusing more on hiking deeper into the ridges and canyons in search of new photographic opportunities.

Because out there, beyond the highways and towns, Nebraska still holds places that feel quietly and wonderfully wild.

Photographs from this trip are available as fine art prints on my website. If a particular image speaks to you, I invite you to explore the full collection and bring a piece of the Pine Ridge into your space.