Wyoming

Header Bufflow Bill Cody Museum

Yellowstone & Cody

Thursday July 4th we left Bigfork heading south on HWY 83, it is on the east side of Swan Lake and West of Glacier National Park. About 1 hr from Bigfork we stopped at a Exxon station to get some ice and got to talking to a older man that had been there since 1946. I think he owned the station, but am not sure. He was full of stories and jokes and loved to talk. One place that he said don’t miss is Holland Park Inn, about an Hour south on 83 and about 4 miles up a paved road, at least he said it was paved, come to find out when we started up it was gravel for 2 miles and oiled for 2 miles. The oiled part was almost like pavement but the gravel was rough and dusty. But he was right, it was worth the trip. See pictures of lake and lodge under trip_pictures. We continued on south to Butte and stayed in a Motel 8 for the night. In the morning we continued south and entered Yellowstone at the west entrance. Stopped at Old Faithful lodge to see if they had any cancellations for that night, but our luck did not hold out, so we had to continue on to Cody where we stayed in a KOA until the 8th. If you get to Cody don’t miss the Buffalo Bill Historical Center. It took us two days to see the Buffalo Bill Museum, the Plains Indian Museum, Whitney Gallery of Western Art, and the Cody Firearms Museum. We did not even see all of the Draper Museum of Natural History.

On Monday we were off to Sheridan over the Big Horns, thur Burgges Junction Hwy 14. It was very hot in Sheridan 102 we should have gotten a motel with air instead of another KOA, but it cooled off in the evening enough to sleep.

Leaving Sheridan we stoped at Fort Philkearney

Header Ft. PhilKearney

Cheyenne

Pat and I grew up in Cheyenne, and she still has a lot of family there. So we spent some time visiting. The last full week of July is Cheyenne Frontier Days (CFD) this year was the 106th. CFD is the largest outdoor rodeo in the world. When I was a kid we use to sneak in through the bull pins, luckely nothing ever happened, the bulls did not pay attention to us. Some other great things to do in Cheyenne the last full week of July are:

  • Rodeo Every day starting Saturday through Sunday’s Finals
  • Parade Saturday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday
  • Pancake Breakfast Monday, Wednesday, and Friday
  • Night Show Ever Daty thru Saturday starting at 8:00PM
  • Indian Dances At the Indian Village

We went to the parade twice the pancake breakfast once, the Night Show and the rodeo Finals on Sunday.

During the week we went to Longmont, Co, since we lived there my first 20 years with IBM. We still have lots of friends there.

Custer, SD

Header Pronghorn in Custer State Park

Header Ca-Tonka

Custer is a nice little mountain town of about 5,000. Summer has many more because of the people traveling to the Black Hills, Crazy Horse Memorial, Mount Rushmore, and The Sturgis Rally. On Wednesday we took a little tour through Custer St. Park, Needles Hwy, Iron Mountain Road, Mount Rushmore, and Crazy Horse Memorial. There are eight Tunnels in the Black Hills we road through five of them, some not much larger than the one through the RedWood Tree in Northern California.

What You Need to Know About Visiting Custer State Park From their web site:

  • Location: park entrance located two minutes from downtown Custer
  • Hours/Seasonality: Park is open year-round.
  • Fees/Reservations: A park entrance fee is required. A temporary permit (valid for 1-7 days) cost $6 per person/$15 dollars a vehicle; annual park fee is $28.
  • Website: www.CusterStatePark.info
  • Other Attractions Inside the Park: Peter Norbeck Visitor Center, Black Hills Playhouse, Wildlife Station Visitor Center, Centennial Trailhead

Roger Wright and Peggy Williams are friends from our years in Colorado, both have retired, well sort of they still are working 40+ hours a week. We enjoyed our short stay with them.

Thursday morning we left their house and headed toward Sturgis, the rally does not start until Monday, but there were already a couple thousand bikes there and most all vendors were setup or in the process of setting up. After a couple hours riding around town and buying some tee shirts we continued on northeast on hwy 212. Thursday we did not see to many heading to Sturgis, but on Friday it was almost a steady stream.