Let me begin by saying that I wish it were someone other than you saying that---I could dismiss it easier
Now, for the Pony Express Trail. One of so many wonderful days spent exploring Utah while I lived there was spent on the Trail.
I got on the trail at Camp Floyd and headed west--with no good expectations of what to expect. I think it might have been spring because the desert was alive with flora of all kinds. I was seemingly the only one on the trail in most places and so viewing at the "stops" along the way were enjoyable in their solitude.
It wasn't until I got to the western end that I began seeing signs of civilization. At Gold Hill there is an abandoned gold mine --more correctly a formally abandoned gold mine because there was a small community of squatters there apparently in search of their dreams and riches.
Whenever I immerse myself in history I try to put myself in the position of those who lived it---and that was easily done on the trail---it was a grand day!
"A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity, an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty” ---Sir Winston Churchill
"Political extremism involves two prime ingredients: an excessively simple diagnosis of the world's ills, and a conviction that there are identifiable villains back of it all." ---John W. Gardner
“You can’t go back and change the beginning, but you can start where you are and change the ending.” ---C. S. Lewis