WY #1 - Cody, Greybull, Big Horn Canyon and more....

 July 5^th – Sunday.  We enjoyed watching live streaming of The Cross and particularly happy we tuned in to see part of our family become members there!  Really nice!  We left Hermosa, SD and drove to Wyoming, our first night just for an overnight before continuing on. We wanted to see the Devils Tower (note of interest, when the original documents recording this phenomenon were filed, they made a grammatical error and did not include the apostrophe, so Devils is the way it’s always been ever since, ha).  In 1906, President Teddy Roosevelt designated Devils Tower as the nation's first national monument. We got set up on our site in Sundance at Mountain View RV Park ($40 for our RVing friends).  It didn’t really matter to us how nice it was as we had one purpose in being here and then we’ll be off in the morning.  Here’s some photos of Sundance, WY area and of course the amazing Devils Tower!

Our first sight of Devils Tower....

This tower is HUGE!!!

 Yeah, right!

Huge boulders at the base of the Tower.  We are told these were actually broken pieces of columns having fallen from the sides! The tower stands 865 feet high, and people LOVE to come rock climbing here! There are also 7.4 miles of walking trails.  It may be best remembered for the award winning movie from 1978, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, which was filmed on this site and became a hit for Steven Spielberg.

On our way home, we came through the town of Aladdin, population 15! haha. Here is the old storefront of the Aladdin General Store, and was a very interesting stop! The aisles are full of things that haven't been seen in a century!  Many are dust covered, and would be an antique lover's paradise. We were able to get a modern ice cream cone.  haha

 Ever wanted an opportunity to buy a whole town?  Here you go!

Here are a few photos we took from our short time in Sundance, the biggest town in the Bear Lodge.

Lockup where the Sundance Kid was jailed.

 Earl and the Sundance Kid....

 The colorful large cowboy boots are all over town....

 Monday, July 6^th – We left earlier than usual today as we have a longer than normal day to get to our next “hub”.  It was a beautiful trip as far as scenery – driving through Big Horn National Forest on their scenic route, was just amazing.  Stressful, but amazing.  

You can see how it's beginning to get very foggy.

 It was overcast and foggy when we got onto the scenic highway, but only got much much worse!  It was getting really hairy and believe me, we were saying a prayer and I even asked for prayers on FB so I know lots of our friends were praying for us! God is good!  We arrived safely, and were thankful that almost the entire way, we had a Fifth Wheel in front of us, and it was all we could do to see his flashing lights, but it helped us know where we were and gave us some measure of comfort. You can barely see him in the photo below. I don’t know who if anyone, he had in front of him!   The roads were very curvy and either a steep climb or a very steep descent, so that didn’t help.  Earl used the engine brakes a lot. But…. We MADE IT!!!  Thank God!

 Here are some really pretty photos.  Again, as we’ve said so often, we are just falling in love with America all over again and again, as well as newly inspired worship of our Lord who created it ALL!  Such beauty!

There was a sign here saying this was Granite Mountain, over 600 Million Years Old.  Hmmmm

We stopped at a couple of scenic overlooks but most of these were taken while driving down the road. Traveling where you sit high up with a great ol big windshield is an awesome way to see the country!

Once we got into Greybull, we immediately went to the KOA and what a great site we have here!  $65 a night for my RVing friends. We’re planning to leave Friday, but once we saw our site and all there was to do here, we checked about staying on through the weekend, but wouldn’t you know, someone is coming in Friday afternoon and has specifically requested this deluxe site! Obviously he’s stayed here before to know what a great corner site it is, close to the pool, with no one on our patio side…. 

 We could move and stay on another site, but at this point, our plan is to head on out Friday morning.  Earl immediately checked here to see if getting our RV detailed would be allowed (as believe me, it NEEDS IT!!!)  He said absolutely, so Earl called, and bummer – he only does RV detailing in his warehouse!!  No coming here, so that’s out as we’re not about to waste a whole day doing that.  We did find another RV washing bay in a car wash here so may do that Friday morning when we leave.   We went into town and got the car washed and ate at a cute Mexican restaurant – not the best FOOD we’ve had, and you know, years ago, I gave up Diet Coke.  Didn’t have any for over 3 years (!) but long story, had one, and discovered it still tasted WONderful.  LOL  So now the ONLY time I allow myself to have a Diet Coke is in Mexican restaurants.  Ordered my Diet Coke with lime and it was AWFUL – finding out that they served Pepsi products.  YUCK!!!  So I changed to water, which was better for me anyway.  Ha.  We headed back and enjoyed a nice quiet evening at home.

Tuesday, July 7^th – We woke up early, but still just relaxed and slowly got my shower and around 11:00 or so, we left to take a scenic drive to Cody.  On the way, I thought this was not nearly as pretty a scenic route as we've been accustomed to out here, but it's just sort of a few miles of in the middle of nowhere. But once we got into Cody, wow – what a pretty town and lots  to do there.  We went to the Visitor Center and got some info.  We have been wanting to see a real Rodeo ever since Texas, but have not had one available when we were there, so were happy to see they have them here EVERY night.  But at lunch, we asked our server about it, and she was kind of hesitant saying, “Well….it’s entertaining, but not like a REAL rodeo.”  So…not sure if we’ll do that while we’re here or not.

Before leaving Cody, we went to see the Buffalo Bill Dam....WOW.

 There were three tunnels in a row - just one after another.

 There is a great video we took of the dam and surroundings.  If you'd like to see it, it's on my FB page.

On the way home, we proceeded to take a LONG circular drive that was supposed to be fabulous and PARTS of it were great, but we went on a wild goose chase, really, not on the road we were supposed to be on at all – we were looking for The Big Horn Canyon Overlook, and our RV office guy gave us directions which led us into the Badlands of Wyoming!!  Haha Seriously, miles and miles down a dirt road!!!  Some pretty scenery but we found out it was a wild habitat place, so at least we hoped to see a lot of cool animals.  Nope…. Not this time.  By now, it was almost 4:00 so we were tired of driving all over, so decided to come on home and enjoy reading outside on our pretty site here, and it was wonderful. 

Wednesday, July 8^th – We had a perfectly delightful day – one of our favorite things to do – stay at home and relax and READ!!!  Yay!!! The weather was spectacular, about 82 degrees, and if I was the least bit chilly I moved my chair into the sun and if it got the least bit warm, I moved to the shade.  Sigh….. love our days like this, every bit as much as the days we go see awesome things!  I started a new series of books, by Dana Fuller Ross, called The Wagons West Series, and the first is Independence.  Fascinating for understanding more of the history as we see the west! 

Thursday – July 9^th – After a relaxing start to the day, we took off for a very scenic drive to Big Horn Canyon and Devil’s Canyon today.  I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves.

One exciting thing happened as we drove through the canyon, there’s an area where it’s known there are wild mustangs, and we kept hoping we’d see one.  Nothing.  We’d just about given up when suddenly as we came around a curve, we saw one to our left, just beyond the guardrail!  Right there beside it!  We came to almost a complete stop and I was taking pictures and we were just wishing he’d at least lift his head from grazing.  Suddenly he started moving forward so we followed along with him and much to our amazement when he got to the end of the guardrail, he just walked right on around it and on to the road!!!  He crossed the road like he owned the place!  We turned around and then he was on my right, so close I could have reached out and touched him!  Isn’t he just the most magnificent animal!

More beauty everywhere we looked – got home about 4:00 and enjoyed a few hours of reading outside.  I am dreading leaving this place, one of my favorite RV spots ever.  We grilled out and watched a little TV and just went to bed so very thankful for another wonderful day!  How blessed we are!  Tomorrow we leave for Dubois, WY for a week’s stay.  Hoping for a nice park and an enjoyable wonderful week.