Wyoming

We crossed the corners of Wyoming through the entire roadtrip except for Yellowstone where we spent three days. The north east corner of Wyoming has two key attractions. The Little Bighorn Battlefield and Devil’s Tower.

Devils Tower stands out like ‘dog’s balls’ (as a good Aussie would say). You can see it for miles, it stands big and tall on the landscape.  Another President Theodore Roosevelt legacy, he proclaimed Devils Tower the first national monument under his new Antiquities Act. Wyoming was now the home of the first national park (Yellowstone) and national monument. I sucked at geology in high school but the short story is that about 50 million years ago, molten magma was forced into sedimentary rocks above it and cooled underground As it cooled, it contracted and fractured into columns. Over millions of years, erosion of the sedimentary rock exposed Devils Tower. The tower is 867 feet (264m) high and the area on top is 1.5 acres. It's pretty huge basically. We walked the trail around the tower and you see the different rock formations in the rock. Rock climbers take to like bees to honey and this is a sacred site to Indians who often have ceremonies at the tower. 

Several Indian tribes tell a similar legend as follows:

Eight children were there at play, seven sisters and their brother. Suddenly the boy was struck dumb, he trembled and began to run upon his hands and feet. His fingers became claws, and his body was covered with fur. Directly there was a bear where the boy had been. The sisters were terrified, they ran, and the bear after them. They came to the stump of a great tree, and the tree spoke to them. It bade them to climb upon it, and as they did so it began to rise into the air. The bear came to kill them, but they were just beyond its reach. It reared against the tree and scored the bark all around with its claws. The seven sisters were borne into the sky and they became the stars of the Pleiades.

 

At the entrance to the park, there is an area that is home to Praire Dogs. These little fellas are very cute. They make little screeching barking noises when threats are around. They use a different pitch or bark for different threats. 

 

We also visited the Little Bighorn Battlefield. We knew nothing on arrival but left with a better understanding and appreciation of the battle and the Indians. This was the final battle of General Custer - Custer's Last Stand. I cannot do the history justice in this blog but the express version is that on 25 June 1876, the battle took place. In recent years, the various Inidan tribes lived on the lands around Wyoming, Montana and more south. They lived off the buffalo. As the buffalo died, the tribes moved to new buffalo grounds. However the US was growing and pioneers were moving West encroaching on Indian lands. The US Government and Indians signed a treat where the Indians could live on a reservation near North Dakota. The Indians didn't like this and some chiefs lived off the reservation and continued to live their ways in their culture. The US Government didn't like this and suffice to say, several battles took place. Thus the names of Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull come to fame. 

The battle of Little Bighorn took place on the Little Bighorn River. General Custer and his soldiers came to defeat the Indians (Dakota, Lakota, Nakota tribes) once and for all and force them back to the reservation. We drove around the battlefield reading the tour guide to learn the series of events that unfolded. We also watched a video in the visitor centre which as excellent in explaining the history and the battle. Ultimately, the Indians outnumbered the soldiers and Custer suffered his final defeat. On the hill where he died, he and his soldiers were circled by Indians and realising this was the end, they each shot themselves. This was Custer's Last Stand. There is a memorial (laid in 1881) on the hill for the soldiers of the 7th Calvary under Custer (about 220 men). The other two regiments lost about 100. The Indians lost no more than 100. Over the battlefield there are headstones where soldiers were found. Recently, headstones for Indians have been laid.

 

In 1988, in response to a lack of recognition of the Native American participation in the Battle of Little Bighorn, a metal plaque was placed on the 7th Calvary memorial at Last Stand Hill. In 2003 (over 100 years after the US Army memorial was laid), the Indian Memorial was dedicated. The relevancy and significance of this memorial is further highlighted as it is the only national memorial to the Native American experience mandated by Congress and constructed with Federal Funds.

We enjoyed seeing this memorial and having been to Crazy Horse the previous day, it further broadened our knowledge of the American Indians. And now I know the meaning behind Custer's Last Stand. 

South Dakota

We got an early start from Denver, driving upwards through Colorado, crossing the corner of Wyoming over to South Dakota. It was a long drive, the scenery was flat and grassy but rock formations gradually appeared as we crossed into Wyoming. I kinda expected to see Road Runner and Coyote appear somewhere along the way as the scenery looked like that from the cartoon. We needed a coffee break and decided to stop at a tiny town and find a diner. We’ve found it hard to find that typical US diner with the waitress in a checkered apron who serves you coffee and pie. Well, sadly this was not that type of diner but it was certainly full of local-yocals with a typical diner menu. Wasn’t the greatest food but it filled a gap in our tummy.

We arrived at our destination for the night – Keystone, South Dakota. There are many attractions in this area including Custer National Park but the Black Hills is home to Mt Rushmore National Memorial and the Crazy Horse Memorial.

Crazy Horse was a native American war leader of the Lakota tribe. He fought against the US Federal Government to fight against encroachments on the territories and way of life of the Lakota people. He led a war party to victory at the Battle of Little Bighorn in 1876 against General Custer. However, later the following year, he surrendered to US troops under General Crook in 1877. He was fatally stabbed in the back by a soldier while allegedly resisting imprisonment. He ranks against the most notable and iconic of native American tribal members. Thanks to wiki for that summary. The Crazy Horse memorial is a long, long, long term mission that aims to protect and preserve the culture, tradition and living heritage of the North American Indians. The sculpture itself is impressive but the memorial aims to develop an education and research facility, medical training centre for American Indians and an Indian University. The sculpture was started by Korczak Ziolkowski. In 1939, the Lakota Chief asked Korcak to carve a sculpture to pay tribute to a man of legend and culture that should not be forgotten. The dream was realized and greatly expanded to the mission explained above. 

Korczak and his wife had 10 children and the whole family continue to manage this non-profit organisation today even after Korczak and his wife have since died. The sculpture is in pegmatite granite, his face is 27m in height when completed, the entire sculpture will be 171m high and 195m long. The photo to the side shows the complete original carving of Crazy Horse and his horse (compare to the sculpture in the background).  You can see the sculpture has a long way to completion as they are currently working on his arm and horse. I haven’t found any info to indicate when they expect the sculpture to be completed. It was great to see this sculpture and the museum was full of Indian tribal history and artefacts but we didn’t learn anything about Crazy Horse himself. There was a short movie about the sculptor and his family and the overall mission but, we were a little disappointed with the lack of info on the legend himself. We didn’t spend a lot of time there but I’m glad we saw it.

Next stop was the famous Mt. Rushmore where the four US Presidents are carved into the rock. This sculpture is much smaller than Crazy Horse (will be) but it’s still very impressive. The visitor centre is well established and you could walk around the base of the sculpture to see it a little closer and at different angles. It was late afternoon and a thunderstorm was brewing. We made it back to the visitor centre just when the rain and hail pelted down. So we were stuck in the gift shop with 100 other people (mostly stinky farting annoying loud school teenagers). The four Presidents are, from left to right, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln. There was chatter amongst the visitors about ‘imagine Trump being carved up there’. Crikey, what a dreadful thought. But Batman made an appearance and it is certainly appropriate that those striking pointed ears should be carved there next to George. We enjoyed seeing Mt Rushmore and it certainly is an icon of American landmarks.

We stayed in the local town called Keystone which was like a mix of old time shops and small amusement park attractions. We had a burger at a local place called Grizzly’s Burgers – I had a Buffalo burger but it tasted just like a beef burger.

The next day we drove through a number of towns including Deadwood and Sundance on our way up to Montana. Deadwood is like this town from the days of the old West with lots of gambling houses and the look and feel of the day. Sundance was tiny, like about 1200 population tiny. We stopped here for a coffee. The trip advisor reviews (all four of them) were all good and it was ok for a morning wake up coffee.

The Sundance Kid (Butch Cassidy's sidekick) was named after this town and there is a little statue in town of the man himself.

Our trip is going well and it's not too busy despite being summer and almost school holidays. There are lots of Harley Davidson riders and the ever popular RV and camper van  We can tell the wealth of the retiree by the type of camper van they have. You either have the Winnebago type, the RV that tows a 4WD, the SUV truck with cabin on the back or the massive 4WD cabin thing on steroids. The countryside is amazing to look at and Deb's chief passenger job is animal spotting when not sleeping or tapping to her dubious selection of music. Haven't seen too many animals yet but we expect to see more as we cross into Yellowstone. Deb has been watching bear and elk videos on youtube and we will be buying bear spray at our first stop in the park !!!

Colorado

We continued our travels to touch all 50 US states and flew to Denver, the capital of Colorado for the start of our next road trip. This place dates back to Old West days and is the entry point for some of the best outdoor activities like skiing, hiking, biking and camping as the Rocky Mountains are nearby. I’ve always wanted to see Colorado and hope to return to do a mountain bike trip at some stage. And, it’s called the Mile High city because, it’s elevation is 1.6km (one mile) above sea level making it the highest major city in the US. Our route map for the next 10 days is shown below. We are going to see Boulder, Mt. Rushmore, Crazy Horse and other American Indian monuments, the magical Yellowstone National Park, the Grand Tetons, Jckson Hole, through Idaho Falls and into Salt Lake City. Hopefully there will be lots of animals to see and spectacular views.

Denver is 4 hours flying direct from DC. It took ages to navigate through the airport, get our luggage and hire car so it was a long day to get here. We were tired so spent the rest of the afternoon casually exploring the city. It seems busy everywhere but not crazy like DC. I guess it’s summer and a weekend. We wandered around some local markets which is a festival that happens once a year. There were lots of artistic and interesting things to look at. We spotted a painting called ‘Ruby’ which was bright, huge, funny and really grabbed our attention. The artist, Mark Ludy, was a charismatic guy who loved that we loved Ruby. He said he once owned a café and Ruby used to go there (not sure if she’s real). His wife said she wanted a painting to hang above the sofa at home and after his first idea of a racing car, his wife said no, I want a picture of Ruby drinking coffee with red lipstick on the cup. And so he did. It’s just a great piece of artwork. It was reasonably expensive but after we chatted and laughed with the artist (Mark Ludy), he said he would pay the shipping cost back to DC which encouraged us to buy Ruby. He’s a published author of children's books and people were buying his books and getting him to sign them for their kids. This guy’s a bit famous I think but as Aussies, we tried not to look ignorant. Anyway, it was great buy but will certainly cramp our spending for the rest of the trip. Check his website http://www.markludy.com

Artist Mark Ludy and 'Ruby'

We drove around the mountains and the scenery was breathtaking. We visited Red Rocks Amphitheatre which is a natural amphitheatre that plays host to the biggest names in music. The red sandstone is 300 million years old and the venue is quite popular for locals to do their cardio workouts. I would love to see a concert there as the views and location are spectacular. There is a museum below with pictures and info of the musicians who have played there over the years - it's a long list of fabulous artists and performers. We also popped by Buffalo Bill's gravesite on Lookout Mountain. There is a little museum there but we didn't check it out.

Boulder is about half hour away from Denver and is definitely mountain bike heaven and the perfect place for the outdoor enthusiast. Denver was crawling with roadies but Boulder was for the mountain bikers. I was so envious of all the bikers I saw riding the trails and the views, my god, it really was heaven. We had lunch in Boulder at a super trendy little joint called Foolish Craig's Cafe. It was very popular and the food was pretty nice. We also grabbed a great coffee at The Cup which went down well. Boulder is home to a campus of the University of Colorado and the city had a really nice feel about it. Everybody wore a camelback and there were people doing hikes, walking, rock climbing or riding everywhere. We took a drive up to the main Lookout and it was a beautiful but windy drive up. There were cars parked along the climb where hikers had taken off on some trail. At the top, we couldn't get to the main view because a wedding was about to take place. But, there were plenty of other vantage points and lots of places to stop and take a photo.

One of the most striking landmarks is the Flatirons. These slanted, red-brown sandstone rocks are iconic and appear in many Boulder logos or artwork. We didn't have time to talk a walk to get a closer look but I could imagine how beautiful they look up close. These formations are also 300 million years old. They had an early name called The Crags but when pioneer women said they thought the rocks looked like flat, metal irons used to iron their clothes, the name Flatirons stuck. The photo doesn't do them justice but there were very impressive in real life.

We loved Colorado and I am keen to come back to do a mountain bike multi-day trip. The weather was warm for us and while the elevation is mile-high, I found my morning run quite enjoyable. I was envious of all the bike riders and could easily live here. I found myself enjoying a coffee in Boulder reading the outdoor adventure magazines and thinking I might just stay here. I saw a sticker that said 'My life is better than your vacation'. Well, life is pretty good for me so I could understand that.

Tomorrow we head off to South Dakota to check out those famous Presidents at Mt. Rushmore and explore some more famous national parks.