Five Springs

Five Springs. Crossroads of Culture. Several of the prehistoric trails that led through the Big Horn Mountains intersect here. The first people using these trails may have entered the area on the very same path you are now using, as long as 10,000 years ago! Over time, possibly due to rising temperatures and a decrease in moisture, the buffalo-centered plains people interacted with the hunters and gatherers of the mountains, sharing this trail system. The trail you are now following was the main access to the Medicine Wheel for these Ancient Americans., Today, Native American Indian people and cultures from around the world still cross paths here. Native American Indians, representing 81 different tribes, still utilize this ancient trail to practice their traditional ceremonies. Some traditional people prepare themselves for over a year for their journey to the Medicine Wheel. You may cross paths with them here! Please respect the needs of visitors here for prayer, meditation, inspiration or solitude by giving them space and not taking pictures. , Most American Indian people feel that the Bighorn Medicine Wheel is for "All People." Some may ask for privacy and your patience as they practice their traditional ceremonies. Please think of this request as a chance to slow down, watch nature, and experience a culture a little different from you own. ,

"I am an old woman now. The buffalo and black tail deer are gone, and our Indian ways are almost gone. Sometimes I find it hard to believe that I ever lived them. We no longer live in an earth lodge or teepee, but in a house with chimneys, and my son's wife cooks by a stove. Often I rise at daybreak and steal out to the cornfields. As I hoe the corn I sing to it as I did when I was young. No one cares for our corn song now. Sometimes at evening I sit, looking over the river. The sunsets, and dusk steals over the water. In the shadows I seem again to see our Indian village, with smoke curling upward from the lodges. But it is an old woman's dream. Our Indian way of life, I know is gone forever." , Buffalo Bird Woman, Hidatsa