Tag Archives: USARoadtrip11

roadtrip, travel, USA

Cowboys & coal

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Our brief wander around Main St, Sheridan (Wyoming), while looking for dinner was enough for us to want to come & check it out while shops were open.  Checked out of the motel this morning, we went & had a closer look.  The first store that was open that looked like it stocked American made cowboy boots that Valerie wanted was Kings – & what a store.  With a relatively small frontage, it just kept getting bigger & bigger the more you explored.  If the main shop wasn’t filled with enough western paraphernalia (which it was), you crossed the alley out the back to the rope workshop.  There were scores of saddles, stirrups & all sorts of other things that were also very expensive.  Along the walls of course there were many trophy heads, I expected to see the North American ones – I didn’t expect to see heads of many of the animals I saw in Africa eighteen months ago: Cape buffalo, impala, antelope, zebra &, strangest of all, a stuffed giraffe.

I got chatting to one of the guys working on the ropes – there were so many coils hanging up on racks.  Most of their sales go to professional cowboys that work on the rodeo circuit & working farms.  Naturally, coils of rope were a whole lot more complicated than they seem & Mike was happy to chat as he worked.  Through yet another door was the museum part of the shop (it’s not many shops I’ve been in that have museums attached).  This place was staggering, along with many more (& I mean hundreds) antique saddles, there were rifles, pistols, carriages, a really impressive collection of old handtools & even a pair of trousers John Wayne wore in Red River.  I know quite a few people that would have been even more impressed than I was – & that’s saying something, it was a crazy place.

Valerie having bought herself a pair of boots, we were back out on to Main St. Sheridan is a really nice little town & there were all sorts of sculptures up & down the street. The one that caused me to double-take last night when driving past was this rhino – completely out of place in small town west-USA.

Parts of the structures surrounding Main St were also quite nice.

We were aiming for Rapid City in SW South Dakota & preferring to stay off the interstate as much as possible, we headed east on Route 14 through a rural area.  This was well worth it as we went through some more spectacular farmland that was surrounded by hills & the beginnings of mesa & buttes.  Clearmont was reputed to have 125 people living there, but we think we saw more turkeys roaming the streets than that.  Near the railroad there were a number of grain silos like this.

As the valley started to open up in to larger plains tiny little industrial facilities near the side of the road seemed to pop up.  I was guessing something to do with petrochemicals as we’d seen a few derricks in Montana.  Apparently they are wells for extracting coal-bed methane & there are over seven thousand of these little plants contributing to what is the third largest source of natural gas for the USA.  Further down the road it became apparent that we would start to see why there are so many huge trains running around the tracks in this part of the world.  We’ve tried counting wagons, but usually end up losing count at 130.  The Powder River Basin through which we were driving is the largest coal mining region in the USA – satisfying about two-fifths of the country’s coal appetite.  We lunched in Gillette, a mining town which is the least inspiring & interesting place we’ve been to yet.

With no other sensible option we were back on I-90 east to & over the Black Hills.  It was so odd to see forests of trees as we went over (apparently how the hills got their name – they look black from afar, compared to the bare plains).  Leaving the red interstate of Wyoming we were on to less well maintained roads in South Dakota.  As well as bumpy, they’ve but thin grooves about an inch apart down the entire road.  For some reason, this makes the Outback  feel as though the tires are slightly deflated & oval.  You wobble all over the place & it’s a scaled back feeling of being in a plane going through turbulence – you get pushed every which way with no rhyme or reason.  Here in Rapid City we have scored our nicest room yet for the cheapest price ($40) – this interweb thingy sure is a handy invention, if you can be bothered to be slightly organised.  Tomorrow we are off to the Badlands (another National Park) & hopefully a missile site & an air & space museum.

family, friends, history, roadtrip, travel, USA

Family Stories

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Another unseasonably rainy day here in Montana, a good opportunity to do some laundry & get a haircut while the car is being checked out – got to love those Check Engine lights. Apparently a Check “Check Engine Light” Light would have been redundant, as for some reason the engine is misfiring a little. No big deal, at least I hope so, & I suppose if the car had to be in the shop for a day it’s good that it happened here in Billings where we can get chores done.

I was surprised to see a oil refinery in the middle of fields beside I-90 last night, apparently Montana is one of the bigger oil producing states in the country. Also, we saw three big fuselages (I assume of 737s en route to/from Seattle) on railcars last night as we pulled in to town. That’s something I’ve never seen before.

So with the gloomy weather & uncertainty while waiting for the car verdict, I was pleased to see a very sweet post from Megan this morning. She even managed to get a nice picture of Finn & me the morning we left.

I think I’d be hassled if I didn’t also mention the amusing photo of me & her early one morning twenty-five odd years ago. But if you want to see that you’ll have to go to Megan’s page & read the entry – she takes better photos than me & writes a whole lot less wordily.

Update – after occupying ourselves in Billings all day, we got the car back.  It was just a timing issue – so with new plugs & leads the engine is firing as it should.  Also took the opportunity to patch a small hole in the exhaust & replace a CV boot – car is now much quieter.  Nice to get all this out of the way on another very rainy day.  JR’s was a great workshop, a self-proclaimed Subaru guru (that rhymes nicely) & JR did everything possible to get us back on the road that day & gave us tips as to where to stay next along the I-90.

The persistent rain continued as we travelled south-east towards Wyoming.  Pleasingly, the battle site of Little Bighorn (somewhere I never thought I’d ever go) was a short hop from the interstate.  We managed to get there just before the Visitor Center closed & had a look around before braving the wind & rain to look over the area of Custer’s Last Stand.  I think that battle sites are best viewed when the weather is so bleak – it doesn’t come close to the horrors that must have happened there, but it does turn it in to something less than a walk in the park.

I was surprised to learn that the battle was in June 1876, for some reason I expected it to be earlier than that.  The Lakota & Cheyenne managed to comprehensively win this famous battle, but lost the war.  As we continued towards our overnight stop of Sheridan, the miles & miles of beautiful rolling countryside continued – we began to understand why the local tribes fought so hard to keep their nomadic way of life, it really is a spectacular area – even if it was raining a lot.

Already, this short distance in to Wyoming everything is much more western – the main street looks fantastic, we shall have to explore it in the morning before heading to South Dakota.

family, national park, roadtrip, snow, travel, USA

Yellowstone & Inescapable Winter

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Our last two days have been spent in Yellowstone National Park.  The drive up the Yellowstone River valley from the interstate to the park was quite interesting with plenty of snowy mountains to look at on the edge of a wide valley floor with still more irrigation.  As the valley narrowed closer to the park there were some interesting, sheer rock faces.  We got our annual park pass, which is a steal at $80 when one considers how many parks we are going to visit in the next three months.

With the weather forecasters warning of a lot of snow to fall (about a foot), we were pleased with just a little light drizzle in Mammoth Hot Springs (near the northern entrance).  There was a little geothermal activity here, so we pottered around the boardwalks for an hour.  Having spent so much time in Rotorua (NZ), I wasn’t overly impressed by most of it – but there were some pretty cool little features.

At least the slight whiffs of hydrogen sulphide reminded me of home.  This was the best of the area.

After noon we took the drive east towards the northeast entrance, as that was supposed to be the best route to take for spotting wildlife.  Bison (buffalo – same thing, with bison being the more scientific name apparently) were exceedingly easy to find.  With their big shaggy coats & rather small horns, Valerie seems to have decided that they look cuddly.  I’m not so sure about that – they can run pretty fast, jump higher than you’d expect & have been known to gore humans that aggravate them.

Still, we saw a lot of them.  Elk weren’t quite as plentiful, but having lived in Canmore I wasn’t so fussed (same goes for the bighorn sheep).  Best sighting of the afternoon was three wolves around a carcass – we watched for quite some time as two of them fought the other, the howls were impressive & intriguing to hear close up.  After crossing the river, they proceeded to walk along the other side of the road – so we continued to get a good look at them.  We saw a few grizzlies as we got further up the valley.  The first pair we got a good look at from about a hundred metres away as they meandered their way to the valley floor eating as they went.  We never quite made it to the NE gate, because as we climbed it got snowier & snowier & there was less chance of spotting any animals.

We took a different route to the park today, this time driving up the Gallatin River valley to West Yellowstone.  This valley was a lot closer in than yesterday’s, with more traffic coming from somewhere.  It was a beautiful drive, despite (or perhaps, because of) the cloud & drizzle.  Entering the park, we headed straight for Old Faithful.  About halfway there, the rain started to turn to snain (snow-rain) & then it was puking snow on us – big, wet heavy flakes.  This continued as we went in to the comprehensive & grand new Visitor Center & then quickly went back outside to the wet as Old Faithful was due to go off again in ten minutes.  We waited patiently, getting snowed on more & more, & finally the geyser blew.

Perhaps it was the general gloom of the day, but it didn’t seem overly impressive – I’d back Pohutu in Rotorua in a fight.  Still, it was neat to see it & it’s quite incredible that it is such a regular occurrence.  I would have like to stayed up that way a bit longer to wander around some of other activity, but the snow & icy walkways were prohibitive.  We did manage to lunch opposite another small, but still interesting, geyser a little way from the masses.  Dropping altitude, we left the snow behind & went & walked around the Norris Geyser Basin.  Although we had to climb over a lot of snow where the boardwalks were too far from the warm ground, it was nice to stretch the legs.  Some of the pools were brilliant colours & this little detour was well worthwhile.

Heading east & then south we made for Yellowstone Lake.  As we climbed & went through various meadows beside the river, it was astonishing how much snow there still was.  I though it was pretty bad around the Canadian Rockies, but this was something else.  It’ll be well in to the summer before this all melts.   The highlight of this little bit was seeing two otters playing in the river & then in the snow on the bank – they were frolicking around & having a great time.  The lake is much bigger than I expected – one big white blanket.

Returning towards Canyon Village, we snuck a quick look at the Lower Falls – these & the soft looking rock on the side of the canyon (running out of adjectives now – how can I keep this up for three months?) were also impressive (what a cop out).

Some of the canyon wall crumbled while we watched & fell in to the river (which I suppose is better than having your castle walls burning down & falling in to a swamp).

Distance travelled: 1100 km (two days – 419 + 681)
Best road sign (caution):  ROUGH SPOT AHEAD (now road signs give life prophecies?)

roadtrip, travel, USA

Capitol & Missouri headwaters

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With a lazy start to the day sorting out Valerie’s borrowed cell phone at AT&T, we ambled up to Montana’s Capitol building.  There was a reasonably sized crowd outside for a walk/run for MS with a country band making a lot of noise for a Saturday morning.  We eventually found a way in to the Capitol & wandered its empty corridors for a while taking it all in – for such a small (in population) state, Montana’s is pretty neat.

Avoiding the Interstate, we headed south up the Missouri passing a whole lot more irrigated farmland & many horses (Valerie is quite taken with the wide variety of colours of horses here, compared with back home).  It even rained on us a little – I’m still not completely used to water falling out of the sky as a liquid again.  Unable to avoid the Interstate any longer, it wasn’t long before we dived off it to check out Headwaters State Park.  This is where the Jefferson, Madison & Gallatin rivers meet to form the Missouri – the longest river in North America.

As Lewis & Clark camped nearby & one of the aims of their famous journey was to find the source of the Missouri, the park was heavy on Lewis & Clark history.  I didn’t mind this too much as all I previously knew about them was that they went exploring out west & feature heavily in The Farside.  There was also a little interesting history & remaining ruins of two failed towns – Gallatin I & Gallatin II.

Note the unwieldy fence – these are ubiquitous here.

It was a short hop to Bozeman where we have the luxury of staying two nights in a row.  Accommodation was a little hard to come by as was graduation day for Montana State University.  On the plus side, the rather nice Main Street was alive & we enjoyed a great pizza meal in a full & loud restaurant.

Distance traveled: 184 km
Best meal: The Thai pizza, of course.