The first thing to remember this morning was to send birthday wishes to my aunt who is 85 today. We then left Laramie on the relatively short portion of the Lincoln Highway which is on US30. It heads into the prairie where cattle and elk were grazing. We had the Laramie Mountains to the right and the railway and Medicine Bow Mountains to the left. Signs informed us that we were on the Sand Creek Massacre Trail. I had to look this up and discovered that it was a massacre in the American Indian Wars on November 29, 1864, when 70 Colorado militia attacked and destroyed a village of Cheyenne and Arapaho, killing and mutilating around 70–163 Native Americans, about two-thirds of whom were women and children.
One bizarre sight was seagulls so far inland. This does happen in the UK but we are never too far away from the coast, I did not expect to see some in Wyoming. I also spotted a heron perched on a rock beside a pool and a prairie falcon sitting on a fence post. Leaving Elk Mountain behind, the road all too soon joins the interstate and the Lincoln Highway route is I80 for the rest of the state aside from a few short stretches in towns along the route. It also reduces photographic opportunities. West of Rawlins we crossed the Continental Divide at 7000ft and the road runs just south of the Great Divide Basin. The names of towns reflect the passing landscape: Red Desert, Table Rock and Point of Rocks. We crossed the Continental Divide for the last time (6390ft) and descended past large quarries and rocky outcrops down to Green River where we had a good coffee. The river takes second place to the rocks surrounding the town. The only place in Wyoming I have seen a Lincoln Highway marker was at the museum but of course it was closed on Sunday.
Back on the interstate the Wasatch Mountains appeared on the horizon. Near Granger, R30 leaves the Lincoln Highway having been with it since Philadelphia. It heads towards Grand Teton and Yellowstone which I would love to visit but we don’t have time for that on this trip. A small oasis just off I80 at Evanston is Bear River State Park. We had our picnic lunch here and had a short wander by the river but could not explore it fully as we had many more miles to do. I did learn that Wyoming has 31 varieties of willow which chimed with my experience in Australia when I tried to differentiate between the different gum trees before discovering that there are hundreds of eucalyptus varieties and giving up. The strong wind meant flower and plant photography was not possible.
The Utah state line is understated with none of the ‘Welcome to……’ notices seen elsewhere. As we are in the mountains all the first exits have ‘no services’ but gradually we head further into the state. Red rock appears and Weber Canyon is shared with the railway and Sunday kayakers on the river. Signs reminded us that we are again sharing our route with the Oregon & California Trails and the Pony Express. We eventually found our hotel. Most of the surrounding restaurants were closed but an Irish Pub was open and provided dinner. The wind has brought cloud and rain to the mountains but we hope it clears for tomorrows exploration of the Salt Lake.
Tag: Medicine Bow Mountains
Over the mountains to Wyoming
As we left Boulder yesterday morning, several cyclists and climbers were also getting away. I had hoped to see Boulder Canyon Falls but they were closed due to a high risk of rockfall. Instead we had a break at Barker Lake in Nederland where I watched fish jumping and swallows diving for insects as it was too windy for flower photography. The plentiful insects also fed on me. Ducks were feeding with their ducklings and another bird on the water was too far away to identify even with binoculars. We had coffee in the hippyesque Happy Trails Café and relaxed on the comfortable seating there. It has the first restroom I have been in which has a skeleton lounging in a bath and a moose toilet roll holder.
We continued on the Peak to Peak Highway and just north of Raymond had the first emergency braking for a moose running across the road. Something akin to the Elk Test that Scandinavian car manufacturers put their vehicles through. Twelve years ago in Victoria, Australia I had the iconic Australian experience of a kangaroo jumping over the fence and across the freeway in front of me.
As we approached Estes Park the traffic got heavier and the Chapel on the Rock near Camp St Malo was also busy with visitors. The wind had brought clouds in and very soon we had a thunderstorm. We spent the night in Estes Park to be ready for an early start in the Rocky Mountains National Park this morning. I had read all sorts of horror stories in guide books and the Park’s website about heavy traffic in the high season but we were treated to a fairly quiet run on the Trail Ridge Road – the USA’s highest continuous paved road. Its highest point is around 3,500m. I had not been at such alpine altitudes and seen glaciers since my trip to the Himalaya in 2010.
We saw some wildlife; several elk, a raven and had a close encounter with a Yellow-Bellied Marmot. The road goes over the Milner Pass and crosses the Continental Divide. This zig-zags around in these parts and we crossed it later and will do again in Wyoming. We walked a small section of the Colorado Trail in the shade of the forest as it was starting to get hot and then descended into Grand Lake for coffee. The grass was growing around the snowmobiles here and boating was the big activity. Heading south to just outside Granby, we were back with the railway briefly and for once saw a passenger train. R125 passes into ranching country and heads north alongside the Willow Creek and through the Arapahoe National Forest where like elsewhere in Colorado, they have lost a lot of trees to a beetle infestation.
We crossed the Continental Divide again over the Willow Creek Pass and descending, could see the smoke of fires behind the north end of the Gore Range off to our left. Heading towards Laramie, the road winds through small communities in the Medicine Bow Mountains where the town hall is a hut and on into the town where we will rejoin the Lincoln Highway tomorrow.