Wyoming

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USA National Parks 05-07-'08 to 18-07-'08

The following facts and figures are from our tour guide.

Fort Laramie

As we moved North into Wyoming we saw increasing number of oil wells pumping away in the farmers' fields. Wyoming also has large coal deposits and supplies 6 states with coal in trains up to a mile long. One member of our group counted the 7 engines and 136 wagons in one train, although it may not have been a coal train. Wyoming was the first in the world to give women the vote and the first US state to have a woman governor.

Much of the country was undulating with some rocky outcrops.

From the bus we saw a gliding field with hangar and trailers but being a week day there was no apparent activity. There was a lot of irrigation that would not be good for growing crops but not good for gliding.

This started as Fort William, a private venture, but was taken over by the Government and renamed. The barracks, built in 1874, and other buildings have been restored and are open for inspection. The Fort never had a wall around it and it was abandoned in 1890. We saw some long eared Mule Deer.

The 3,200 km long Oregon trail passed here on the way from the Missouri to Oregon and later on to California. Between 1836 and 1860 20,000 people died along the trail; only 2%!o(MISSING)f these were killed by Indians. The deep wheel ruts made by the wagons can still be seen along parts of the trail. The settlers had to complete the journey in the 45 days when there was grass for their animals but before the snow and cold set in.

The settlers shot the buffalo, partly for meat and partly to starve the Indians out. The treaties signed with the Indians were also broken, depriving them of their hunting grounds.

The Pony Express ran for 18 months; 120 riders rode 650,000 kms, 1 was killed, 1 schedule was not kept and 1 mail was lost. The riders, young wiry orphans preferred, changed horses every 25 km and riders every second day in the 5,000 km trip in 8 to 10 days.


Mount Rushmore National Memorial

On the way to Mount Rushmore we stopped to see the unfinished granite monument to Chief Crazy Horse. It was started in 1948 and work is still in progress. Only the 26 m high face is finished but the rest, the horse and the Chief's body and arm pointing to his land, are only partly roughed out. $26 million needs to be raised to further the work.

The sun was not in the best position for photographing the Mount Rushmore sculptures. The size and accuracy of the representations of the Presidents at Mount Rushmore was impressive, although the faces are only ¾ the size of Chief Crazy Horse. There appeared to be some continuing work going on at Mount Rushmore although it may have been plugging up cracks in the rock with silicone rubber to prevent water and ice damage to the sculptures. The original plan was for the Presidents' clothing to be completed but I can't remember why it was not done.

We spent the night in Deadwood. This gold mining town stretches out along a narrow gorge. When the town gold ran out and the town was dying the town council got permission to put in casinos. The town now seems to be wealthy enough.

We passed through Sundance where the Sundance Kid came from. Mt. Sundance was a Sioux temple.

Gillette, which has a population of 20,000, was named after a railroad surveyor. It supplies ¼ of the coal for USA. The coal seam is 100 ft thick, 5 miles wide and very long. There are 16 open cut along the seam.

The Bighorn Mountains had snow on them.

We had lunch at Sheridon, population 1400, the lowest city in Wyoming. Coal was found in 1883 and is still being mined.

Custers Last Stand was at Little Bighorn. In 1876 with 242 men he attacked the Indians, but did not know that there were 2,000 hiding there. Custer and all his men were killed. In 1890 the Indians were defeated at the Battle of Wounded Knee and the survivors were put in reservations.

The climb up the Bighorn Mountains was sudden and steep, but with great views over the prairies. There were black deer and mule deer by the roadside. The descent was steep with spectacular views of coloured rocks and peaks, then out onto flat red soil. We stopped at Dirty Annie's Store in Shell. It is arid here but the crops in the flat valley were irrigated.

We spent the night in Cody, the home of “Buffalo Bill” Cody. There is an excellent Museum there with one section dedicated to Buffalo Bill. Other excellent sections were a Nature section and a historic fire-arms collection.

Yellowstone

From Cody we climbed the Absaroka Range into the Shoshone National Forest which has the highest point in Wyoming. The road went up a canyon, crossing and recrossing the Shoshone River and over the Sylvan Pass at 2,600 m (8,700 ft) high.

Despite the efforts of an army of fire fighters, in 1988 a lightning initiated fire burnt 1/3 of the Yellowstone National Park, the largest park in USA (excluding Alaska). Recovery is slow with some areas seemingly having no pine regrowth, while in other areas the new pines are 2 to 3 m high.

Yellowstone Lake is big, 352 sq km, up to 122 m deep and high at 2365 m (8,000 ft) above sea level. There are some steam vents under the water creating hot water, up to 48 degrees C, in sections in the lake. It got its name from the yellow rock in the area.

Many of the thermal and mud pools seem to be around the rim of the caldera although the lower geyser basin (Fountain Paint Pot, Great Fountain Geyser) and upper geyser basin (Old Faithful) were further in. This was all somewhat disappointing because the geysers usually decline during this drier part of the year and the last few years have been drier than normal. Old Faithful performed spectacularly but the eruption interval has increased from 60 minutes to 90 minutes. The hot spring Terraces, with their white and orange terraces were attractive, but some had dried up. The mud pools were barely active and some of the geysers seemed inactive, although we may not have been there at the right time. And the thermal regions are not close together.

However Yellowstone had lots of wild animals. We saw several Black Bears, one Grizzley (we think), several Moose, several Buffalos (one rolled in the dust then got up and did a little dance). One Buffalo was close, perhaps 10 to 15 m, to the bus so we got out and photographed it while keeping clear our escape route back into the bus. There were mule deer walking through the town at the terraces and there were many Elk in Mammoth Springs. There was a Bald Eagle's nest in a tree near the road but we could not stop.

We spent the night at West Yellowstone, a city in a narrow extension of Montana. The altitude was 2,700 m (9,000 ft) and the hotel had a warning about high altitude symptoms. I had them - shortness of breath and a slight headache, but I recovered quickly.

Grand Teton National Park

On the way here we crossed the continental divide 3 times. We stopped by a small lake that drained into both the Atlantic and the Pacific via the Snake River. We continued along the Snake River through the John D Rockefeller Memorial Parkway. Rockefeller wanted the area saved as a park, but the government did not want it and was opposed by the farmers so he formed a company that bought the land secretly. The government still did not want it, but later changed its mind. (Does a government have a mind?)

The Teton Range rises abruptly from Lake Jackson which is a moraine lake (Teton is Indian for breast) and the relatively flat land on the other side of the lake. Lake Jackson is at 2,064 m (6,772 ft) and the Grand Teton peak is 4,131 m (13,770 ft) with near vertical walls down to the water. These snow capped mountains rising above the quiet waters of Lake Jackson was the most spectacular scene in our trip so far. We had lunch sitting on the outside seats at the Lake Jackson Lodge while enjoying the view across the lake.

The Paramount Pictures logo features the Grand Teton.

We saw a herd of Elks near here.

We spent the night at Jackson Hole. This area is a winter refuge for the Elks which drop their horns in winter and boy scouts and others collect and sell them. Jackson Hole has 4 arches of Elk horns over the entrances to its central gardens. There were beautiful flower baskets along the shop fronts.

We crossed and recrossed the Snake River and through Salt River Pass on our way to the south of Idaho (this is an invented name). Idaho is known for potatoes, silver and mining and the southern part is a lava plain. Then into Utah and up from Bear Lake to the 2,400 m Bear Pass where we saw humming birds at the restaurant's humming bird feeder.

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