Sandhill Cranes

For millions of years the sandhill cranes have come through what is now central Nebraska, stopping along the Platte River on their migration north. Families rest and eat for a week or two then move on -- a total upwards of 500,000. They come along with countless other species, all in a flyway's bottleneck pinch in the middle of the Great Plains. Their calls are haunting and deep -- truly ancient. To hear thousands lift from the fields and circle the river at dusk is an experience that lifts one, only for a moment, back into a right relation with the world. We go every year at sunset.