Wyoming - Day 18 - 300 miles southwest to Lyman

Lyman KOA, Lyman

Saturday, 18 September 2021

Unusually, yesterday afternoon there was an entire herd of antelope across the street from the Casper KOA, mostly around the Baptist church.  This morning, we saw a few more.  Made walking the dogs a chancy operation.

today's route

A very strong crosswind caused problems before we were even out of Casper today and never let up.

I left town on WY-220, which was accompanied by the North Platte River for quite a way.  I could see that we were driving north and west around the Laramie Mountains that end at Casper - and these are real mountains.  Among them are Casper Mountain at 7,904', Muddy Mountain at 8,255' (some name for an 8,000' pile of rock), and Laramie Peak at 10,272'.

A highway sign said, "Turn Headlights on for Safety - Next 10 miles."  (Why only the next 10 miles?  There's nothing out here but land.  And antelope.)

The scenery here looked a little like west Texas but with more mountains and closer mountains.  As we went on I could see that we were almost surrounded by mountains.  For a while it was the Laramie Mountains on one side and the Rattlesnake Range on the other.  After South Pass it was the Green Mountains on one side and the Seminoe Mountains on the other.  The view I had traveling at 65 mph must have hit the early folks traveling these trails at a walking pace even more forcibly.  

We passed scattered farmhouses, some with huge stacks of square bales of hay (for the cows I guess, though I never saw the cows) and fields of crops.  

I saw a lot of anti-abortion signs, including one with a cute picture of a baby just barely able to push itself up and the message, "What about my right of choice."  I've seen that one several times and my reaction is rapidly becoming pretty strong.

I ran into one construction zone that included miles of road work and a pilot car.  It really was miles.

I saw a mama and baby antelope grazing right by the road.

The rounded hills gave way to rugged hills as I traveled southwest.

Just before 9:00 we got to Independence Rock.

Independence Rock Historic Site

It's a good thing I studied Google Street View, I guess it's called, so I knew what the rock looked like and I knew what the turnoff looked like.  Otherwise I might not have found it, even though it's right by the road.  First off, the highway dept. only bothered to put up a sign noting a rest area right before the turn for the rest area, so I was going slowly enough to make the turn only because I recognized it.  Secondly, Independence Rock is practically tiny compared with the surrounding mountains.  It's a granite rock only 130' high - which yeah is high but nothing compared with what's around it.  It just happens to be out by itself a little way.

Independence Rock is famous around here as the "Register of the Desert" because of the hundreds of names of those passing by carved into its surface.  The earliest is dated 1824.  Its name came from William Sublette who led the first wagon train across this route and held an Independence Day celebration here in 1830.  I found a Wyoming Parks Dept. page with a photo of a wagon train encamped near the rock and an explanation of the history.   https://wyoparks.wyo.gov/independence-rock

And here's my photo of the rock.

Independence Rock

I took the rock photo from a bridge to a trail that led to the rock itself, so people could go see the names carved in it.  I took this next photo from the other side of that bridge, to show some of the nearby mountains.

The state posted some informational signs nearby.

Glad to see someone's finally paying attention.

And they had a lot of information left by accounts from the travelers themselves.

life in camp

death on the trail

relations with Indians

more about traveling

These next were titled "The Prairie Wagon: Nineteenth Century Mobile Home."

the wagons

This rest area didn't have dog pens like some of them do but instead insisted we dog owners take our pets to the designated dog run.  This is what it looked like:

In case you can't tell, every square inch was covered in prickly plants.
Not only did I not take my dogs there, but nobody else did either.
We all walked them around the parking areas.
Do you suppose the State of Wyoming doesn't like dogs?

And there was one more informational marker:

Back on the road

A short way farther along, I came first to a sign directing me to the Devil's Gate State Historic Site.  Apparently the Bureau of Land Management is now responsible for this area, but I had a hard time finding out from their website just what this place is.  Instead, I got a detailed explanation from the Wyoming history website I've consulted before.  It includes Indian legends and deaths of travelers and vibrant trading posts - pretty much the gamut.   https://www.wyohistory.org/devils-gate

And a stone's throw away from the turn for that place I found a sign for the Martin's Cove National Historic Place, which is actually mentioned in that Devil's Gate site, only this place has a darker history, and a fascinating present courtesy of the ACLU (it's true).  Here's the Wikipedia page.   https://en.wikipedia.org/Martins-Cove

And further information about Mormon activities in the region popped up just a few miles later with Ranch 66 Missionary Village.  The name came from the ranch being 66 miles from Casper, and the missionary part came from it being where missionaries live while working at Martin's Cove during the summer.  (Note the Martin's Cove page said the Mormons were prohibited from proselytizing to visitors.  Interesting situation.)

I crossed the Continental Divide again, this one at 6,720'.  I saw lots of snow fences, a herd of antelope almost lost among the scrub in a field, and 1 cow apparently alone in a vast field of scrubland.

Just past Lamont, elev. 6,622', I found another one of those headlight signs (I saw several today).  This one was noteworthy because of the typo:

   "Turn Headlights on for Saftey - Next 10 Miles."

I don't remember ever seeing a highway sign with a typo.

Earlier today I was on the Sand Creek Massacre Trail.  After turning on US-287, a sign told me I was on the Chief Washakie Trail.  He's that chief I mentioned in an earlier post who seemed so admirable.

I crossed the Continental Divide yet again, elev. 7,174'.  Oddly, I've been seeing lots of sandy soil.

And then I came to Rawlins, pop. 9,259 and elev. 6,755'.  We all needed a break, and I found the county courthouse on our route so we stopped there for a walk and some lunch.

Carbon County Courthouse

We walked around the block, so I was able to see some unusual details here.

Those are Bighorn Sheep.

This sign that says "Welcome to Rawlins" on the left
notes a town event on the right: "Cow Plop and Chicken Drop" on August 13
with tickets available at the Chamber of Commerce.

This steer detail is on the opposite side of the building
from the sheep.

On the steer side, part of the building was closed to visitors.

A sign on the door reads: Private Home.

What's odd is that this "private home" is part of the county courthouse building.  Who do you suppose lives there?

I saw 2 other noteworthy sights as we walked around the block.

At the top of the building, the words read:
1909, Masonic Temple.

What I found odd about this coroner's office is
the slogan: Be Their Voice.
Does this coroner envision himself as another
Dr. Donald Mallard (NCIS)?

Gasoline was $3.69/gallon here.  It was $3.39 in Casper.

From here I took I-80 west.  The speed limit was 80 mph but there was a continuing very strong crosswind and that, combined with a high hill, made it hard for me to even get up to 60 mph.  When I finally made it to 65, I found that I couldn't go faster because the wind made the RV shudder too much, especially when I got caught in the backwash from passing tractor-trailers.  I figured that all the other drivers likely hated me, but I've learned what isn't safe in this thing and there're 2 lanes on our side of the divided road, and at least I was going a steady predictable speed, all making it easier to pass me.

And still again I crossed the Continental Divide, elev. 7,000'.

Then I came to a sign saying "Strong Wind Possible - Next 5 Miles."  I was already having trouble just keeping the RV in my lane with the crosswind we already had.  Extra wind speeds didn't sound good.

I got behind a truck with 2 signs on the back.  The sign on the left said, "John 3:16."  The sign on the right said:

               CAUTION

               ←         →

             Truck Makes

               Wide Ass

                  Turns

I saw herds of cows and antelope in the same field.

I spent some time driving under a rain cloud, but with blue sky to the right and to the left.  We had intermittent sprinkles the rest of the drive.

I-80 is a major corridor and I'd forgotten how many semis are on the road.  I saw a whole lot of them today.

And back across the Continental Divide: elev. 6,930'

I saw a highway sign warning: Road May Be Icy - Next 5 Miles.  This sign was a flip-up sign that had been flipped down.  That meant to me that nighttime temps are near freezing these days.

The scenery here was Western desert/grazing land: scrub, no crops, and not even many cows visible.

I was having a hard time keeping awake, which is dangerous anywhere, let alone on a major highway, so we stopped at the Bitter Creek rest area.  That turned out to be a mistake in most ways because there were so many stickers the dogs didn't want to get off the pavement, plus the very strong wind kept blowing sand in our eyes.  But it achieved the intended purpose of waking me up, which was a good thing because up next was 17 miles of construction.

From here the flat land stopped and I was now seeing hills and buttes and valleys between them.  The highway skirted the towns of Rock Springs and Green River, and by then I was wondering what are those rock formations I was seeing.  Turns out other people also think they're noteworthy.  They have names such as Castle Rock and The Palisades and Pilot Butte.  I found this Tour Wyoming web page that has some pictures and explains some of what makes them special.   https://www.tourwyoming.com/rock-formations

I passed what the map said was a town called Little America, and the Wikipedia page says it's a census-designated place with a population of 68.  The town was named for a motel that was opened there with that name, and it later developed into a chain of travel facilities.  I'd been seeing billboards for miles advertising its various facilities - so many they reminded me of the casino billboards in Louisiana.  But when I passed it, I thought it looked more like a theme park, a Disneyland town, and wondered if it were a real town.  Wikipedia says it is, but it didn't look like somewhere I wanted to go, and it did look like somewhere they'd be charging high prices.

As I continued the drive (it was really a long drive today), I thought that this was rugged, isolated country.  And I thought, if a militia was training out here, who'd know?  Curious, I looked it up and learned that Wyoming, along with all 49 other states, prohibits private military units from operating outside state authority.  That law doesn't mean these folks aren't there, but it does mean they're not acting legally.  Weird thought.

There were so many snow fences along the north side of the highway I could hardly believe it.  I guess the landscape - the flat land with so many mountains nearby - and the nearly constant wind combine to shove even more snow along here than the area itself might receive.

After 7½ hours, we made it to the Lyman KOA, and I was pooped.