Wyoming

As we cruised west on US 26 out of Ogallata, NE, we took a detour north to visit a roadside oddity just north of Alliance:  Carhenge created by a guy and modeled after Stonehenge.
Entering Wyoming, we stopped to see the Guernsey Ruts where we saw the deep ruts cut into the rocks on the Oregon Trail.  I followed them for several yards over some rocky land.

Still on US 26, we passed through Casper and headed to Riverton and Lander to spend the night in Sinks Canyon.  This is where the yellow-bellied marmot kept popping out of the rocks and looking at us all evening.  The sites (maybe two) that were anywhere near level had tents in them, even though the tent sites had raised level platforms for the tents.  Why do they take the level RV sites?  We have run into this at several state and national parks.

The next day we viewed the Sinks, where the river rushed into a mountain wall (or so it seems during the spring runoff) before dropping into a cavern only to exit into the river a few miles further on.  

After seeing all we could see in the park, we headed down the road to check out Atlantic City and South Pass City which are advertised as being ‘ghost towns’.  We followed a dirty winding road to get to them.  Alongside the road were huge patches of snow! The present population in Atlantic City is about 57 according to the sign.  South Pass City is mostly restored.  Maybe about fifteen people do still live there as we saw. 

We got back on I-80 following US 191 and got off at Rock Springs to travel around the Flaming Gorge.  This took us into Utah for about twenty miles.  The road has a lot of nine percent grades and winding switchback sections. The gorge is not easily seen from the road (US 191, Utah 44, and Wyoming 530).  These are paved mountain roads with some passing lanes.  At the dam was the visitor center and a great view point.  We did get a space in Deer Run campground  at the Cedar Springs Marina several miles down the road that was again not very level but it was paved.  Some of the campsites were ‘doubles’ and a couple of level looking sites had tents in them.

The next morning when I turned on the furnace (it was COLD!), it made a horrific noise like it was grinding something up.  When I tried again, the fan worked but no heat.  We could hear the igniter trying to light the gas.  The guy at the local repair shop who looked at it said it happens often that the wire comes loose and gets sucked in to the fan blades.  Fifteen minutes later we were good to go again.

We headed further up the road to Fossil Butte National Monument outside Sage.  The visitor center is where all the fossils are that we could actually see.  Again this was a very winding paved road up a mountain then back down again.  

At the topmost viewing area, the rangers were hosting a ‘fossil dig’ for some students that day.  We could also see some of the trail ruts from the top of the hill.

We were seeing wind farms all along the mountains.  Signs that promised elk, deer, etc., crossing the roads, were lies. We still hadn’t seen any buffalo.  Seems the antelope out number any cattle that we saw.  The wind was still very strong either as a cross wind or head wind, and at times it seemed like both at the same time.