The high plains of Wyoming are a sight to behold....seems like everywhere you look, the rolling hills go on for miles and miles. A few of them are sporting some artwork.
My favorite was a historical fort that had the silhouettes of Indians on horseback atop a nearby hill. It was too far away to get a good Picture though.
Paul and I couldn’t imagine making our way through this area 150 years ago, without getting lost. Our truck is behind one of these hills.
Buffalo is a small town, population 4500 or so, and sits at the foot of the Bighorn Mountains. Our first full day we packed a lunch and headed up the hill. Going up in elevation also got us out of the heat, and it was a cool 56 degrees when we started our hike.
The day didn’t go perfectly, as I forgot to download the trail map, and we headed the wrong way on the trail. We finally found the “right” trail, which had a nice lake and stream along the way.
It also had a few places where we pretty much had to forge our own trail- that part wasn’t too much fun, and I was trying so hard not to fall that I didn’t get a picture.
The last section was wooded, and pretty cool. All told we went about 5 miles.
The following day we were looking to explore more by truck, less by walking, but we still headed up the mountain.
This time we took the very narrow, very scenic road through Crazy Woman Canyon.
Eventually this road met up with the main road that goes up and over the mountain. We continued on our way till we saw a sign for the fire tower.
We knew they allow visitors so off we went, down a long dirt road. The trail to the tower is pretty short, but pretty steep as well. The rock formations were awesome, as was the view from the top.
Our busiest day was the day we went exploring scenic Rte 14.
The first part of the day was spent hiking Tongue Canyon Trail. Not surprising the trail follows Tongue River through a Canyon.
After hiking in a couple of miles we elected to turn around. Paul had seen a sign for a cave, so of course he wanted to go check it out.
Not me, I took off my shoes and cooled off in the river.
In fact, it was so hot, I dunked my head under, several times.
Turns out it was 100 degrees when we got back to the truck.
Done with our hike, we followed Rte 14 up the mountain, where the views were pretty good.
Every once in a while there would be a sign pointing the age of the rock on the side of the road.
This whole mountain is littered with small federal campgrounds and day use areas built in the 1930s by the CCC. Their work in this country was incredible- seems like everything they built was built to last.
On the way home we stopped in the small town of Dayton for an ice cream, which is sold at the mercantile store. We bought some local syrups as well, and couldn’t resist the fresh kettle corn.
Payment is on the honor system, so I told Paul we could buy as big a bag as we had the right change for- of course we managed to find enough for the largest bag.
Our final day in Wyoming we took it easy and headed to Petrified Tree Education Area. There is a .8 mile long interpretive walk that takes you past petrified trees.
Before we started on the trail we chatted with a couple of volunteers. One of them screamed as she approached us....scared us all....turns out there was a rattlesnake sleeping within a foot of the trail. He was sound asleep, for sure. He barely moved as we watched him for several minutes.
Because the growth rings are still visible, they estimate the trees were 800-1000 years old when they were buried.
One of the stumps was partially excavated to show more detail.
The fencing surrounding it was part of an Eagle Scout project- I think that was just as interesting to Paul as the petrified wood.
