Rockin’ In The Rockies - 2013

As we drove north from Nebraska to the Black Hills area of South Dakota, it was obvious that drought conditions had abated somewhat since our last visit.  The emerald green prairie seemed particularly lush under bright blue skies and it would be easy to become hypnotized by the undulating grass.  It was good to be home.

Our first stop was Sturgis for a rally.  Not THE rally that Sturgis is most famous for, but the Full Timers Chapter rally, a gathering of friends old and new.  We ate, played games, had happy hours, then ate some more.  The highlight of the rally was a bus trip to Deadwood, arranged by the rally hosts.  Our driver, Alkali Ike, made note of the fact that he had plenty of back-up drivers aboard in case he needed help but I’m not sure all that many of them would be as skillful as he in negotiating the tight turns through the Mt. Moriah Cemetery.  Nor could they provide the steady stream of Ole and Lena jokes.  Mt. Moriah is the final resting place of many of Deadwood’s most famous (or infamous) citizens including Wild Bill Hickok and Calamity Jane.  Hickok was gunned down as he was enjoying a friendly game of cards at a local saloon.  And Jane likely drank herself to death. 

After the rally was over we had an extra day before relocating so we made the short drive to Rapid City.  Darlene, Sally and I went in one car and Mike, Jack and Howie went in another and we met in downtown Rapid for a visit to one of the most wondrous stores of all time, Prairie Edge.  The store offers a splendid array of Native American arts and crafts. There is also the not-to-be-missed cast paper sculptures done by a husband and wife team of artists, Patty and Allen Eckman.  Check this blog posting for some excellent photos.  The level of detail is hard to believe.  The store also offers an excellent selection of books and music and even non-beaders will appreciate the array of glass beads on display in apothecary jars – it’s a work of art by itself.  After oohing and aahing our way around the store, we headed off to a quilt show at the enormous Rushmore Plaza Civic Center where we did even more oohing and aahing.  Then it was back downtown for a quick lunch at The Firehouse Brewing Co. 

We bade a temporary good-bye to our full-timing friends and headed up the hill to our home park, Rushmore Shadows.  Our stay there over-lapped by one day with Rose and John’s and we took the opportunity to drive out to Box Elder for a tour of the South Dakota Air and Space Museum.  The museum has an excellent collection of planes, including a B-1 bomber.  Although it was a bit pricey, we took the  bus tour of Ellsworth Air Force Base which included a visit to a Minuteman Missile site.  The base itself is enormous and quite elegant by military standards.  There’s even a golf course – given the velocity of South Dakota breezes, you can probably get some pretty long drives at that course.

After John and Rose’s departure, we had to buckle down and get some “housekeeping” chores attended to.  One of the first things on the agenda was to run out to pick up our mail at our mail forwarding service in Box Elder.  The facility is quite new and Don gave us a guided tour.  There’s even a small campground and motel-style room so clients can be “at home” in comfort.

Full Timers can’t go long without dining out.  Dinner at The Firehouse Brewing Co.  for their all-you-can-eat spareribs seemed like a good idea so we rounded up Russ and Janet and met up with Mike, Darlene, Jack and Sally for a night on the town.  Well, not a night exactly, more like an early evening.  The restaurant was quite busy and the downtown streets bustling so it would seem that Rapid City is healthy and happy.  And that delights us because it is one of our favorite places.  Big enough to have whatever you’re looking for and small enough to feel comfortable.

Of course no visit to the Black Hills would be complete without a trip (or more) to Custer State Park.  Armed with power bars and a camera, we ventured off on the wildlife loop where we saw several herds of bison.  It appears that there was a bumper crop of babies this year.  We also came across a band of bachelor bison grazing quite near the road.  One large fellow was enjoying a dust bath on the shoulder of the road and chose to stand up just as we passed reminding us once again that adult bison are bigger than a Saturn.  Also, they smell a little funky. 

Further on we came upon a small herd burros.  They are not indigenous to the area but are the progeny of pack animals turned loose by a now-defunct hiking outfitter.  They seemed quite placid, even the new mothers, and allowed the tourists to walk among them.  Tourists are sometimes not the brightest of beings and seem to forget that wild animals are not Disney characters.  They may act benign but….

We were marking time in the Black Hills until it was time to proceed on to Gillette, Wyoming for FMCA’s 50th Anniversary Celebration at the 88th Family Reunion and Motorhome Showcase which was held at the enormous Cam-Plex.  When we got parked, it seemed we were miles away from the center of activities but the buses ran frequently and it was easy enough to get around…until some new bus routes were introduced and we ended up in sections that didn’t seem all that familiar.  Once all the rigs were in place, we probably comprised one of the top ten cities in Wyoming and all the coaches start to look alike after awhile.  The grand finale, at least for us, turned out not to be the Marty Stuart concert but rather a monumental thunderstorm with tornado warnings and 60 mph winds.  Howie was stranded at the nice stout event center while I rode out the storm in the coach.  The NOAA radio kept squawking about finding shelter in basements of sturdy buildings while the best I could do was to pull in the slides.  The wind was not only strong enough to blow the hair off a frog, it was strong enough to blow the doors off a Prevost (or so the rumor mill said).  But then the sun came out and my blood pressure returned to normal.

The rally was a reunion of some of our favorite folks.  Rose and John were there, of course.  Then Linda and Don pulled in; we haven’t seen them in several years and we were glad to be able to share a couple of happy hours with them.  Unfortunately they were battling the what-broke-this-time syndrome and had to struggle along without their generator.  Our coach got designated as “party central” for the Full Timers’ happy hour because we had the biggest site, sandwiched as we were between two rows of horse stalls.  Roger and Cathy arrived in time to join us one evening but then had to leave early so we didn’t really get to spend enough time with them.  We’re hoping to have more time together this winter to really kick back and catch up on each others’ lives.

And then it came time to leave Cam-Plex.  Remember that big ol’ rainstorm I mentioned earlier?  Well, it wasn’t the first to hit Gillette and so the ground wasn’t all that interested in absorbing water.  Many coaches found themselves unable to move, drive wheels sinking deeper and deeper into the mud.  Gillette doesn’t have a lot of tow trucks and folks were getting mighty frustrated to be unable to hit the road once the convention was over.   Randy and Lonna got towed out forward a short distance to the road but Russ and Janet had to be towed backward across a pretty wide stretch of mud.  We were fortunate and were able to get out under our own power and depart on schedule because we faced a long dull 13 mile drive to the next rally site in Rozet.

Rozet, population 25, more than doubled in size once the 3-T’s Chapter hit town.  We got settled in at All Seasons RV Park and proceeded to do what we do best….eat.  After noshing on goodies at Happy Hour, we carpooled to Rozet’s only restaurant, a bar and grill next to the post office.  They had opened just for us, it being Sunday,  and prepared a buffet of fried chicken and fish with vegetable sides and a brownie sundae for dessert.  The décor was Roadhouse Modern with cute signage and a jukebox featuring Brenda Lee and Ricky Nelson.  A time warp now and then is refreshing, especially as we get older and find today’s world a bit oppressive.

The rally only lasts two days which is all for the best because we eat too much.  It was a bright day, not too breezy, when we shared goodbye hugs with our fellow chow hounds and hit the road to Sheridan.  It would be our first visit to that small city and we had just four days to do it justice.

Our next stop was at Peter D’s RV Park in Sheridan, Wyoming.  We selected this campground because of favorable on-line reviews by other RVers and the owner’s obvious wry humor…his ad in The Trailer Life Directory declares that “Peter D’s RV Park has nutritional value…if you don’t stay there, Pete don’t eat”.  Upon arrival we were gifted with a bag of spinach fresh-picked from the garden in the middle of the campground and enough tourist information to keep us busy for several days.  Sheridan thinks of itself as cowboy territory and there is certainly plenty of wide open spaces all around it but it is also a bustling small city of 17,000+ with interesting non-franchise shops, nice restaurants and with the Big Horn Mountains as a back-drop.  It’s urbane without being urban.

Several different sources had insisted we pay a visit to Trail End, a state historic site, so we made that our very first stop in Sheridan.  This stunning Flemish-style home was built by a self-made cattle baron named William Kendrick who wandered up from Texas as a teenager and ended up as governor of the state and eventually a U.S. Senator.  Trail End sits on nearly four acres and affords a wonderful view of the Big Horns.  It was also a house ahead of its time and features elevators, a central vacuum system, a PBX system for in-house communications and other such amenities that were not generally available in the early 1900s when the house was built.

When we are in touring mode we seldom break for lunch but on this occasion we stopped by Kendrick Park for an ice cream cone and to watch the locals enjoying a day of warmth and sunshine.  The park features several wood sculptures such as this leaping fish; the sound of a chainsaw led us to the artist busily at work on another sculpture.  Folks were wading in Goose Creek, kids were catching minnows (or maybe tadpoles) and many of the tables and benches were occupied by people just enjoying the pleasant setting and nice weather.  Refreshed by our ice cream cones, we headed off to check out the downtown commercial area where we wandered in and out of interesting shops, including King’s Saddlery which supplies rope to those who know rope.  No self-respecting cowboy (or so we’ve been told) would venture out without a Don King rope on his saddle.  Like Rapid City, Sheridan boasts artwork on nearly every corner of downtown.  Most of the statuary makes sense for the area but this big boy, known as The Boss, seemed just a little out of place. 

Our final stop for the day was the Sheridan County Museum, housed in a brand-new log structure and featuring an interactive display which explains The Battle of the Rosebud.  There were several dioramas that were mind-blowing in their detail and artistry.  As proof, one boasted a blue ribbon from the state fair.  And there may be more ribbons in store – hiding behind white sheets is a soon-to-be-unveiled diorama of the Rosebud battle.  I have a hunch it will be a dandy.  The museum has a “front porch” which stretches the entire length of the building and affords a good view of the mountains.  In nice weather it would be a grand spot for an almost-outdoor reception.  In any weather it’s a grand place to ponder yonder.

One of the more interesting stories about Sheridan is it’s involvement in an attempt to secede from the state of Wyoming.  During the Great Depression every area seemed to be getting federal funds except the section from Yellowstone on the west to the Black Hills on the east, from Billings to the north to Buffalo on the south.  Petitions were signed and the state of Absaroka was born.  License plates were made, a Miss Absaroka was selected and a governor appointed himself to represent the new state.  The whole movement sort of petered out when the U.S. entered WWII and the Depression was eventually over.  What remains is a slight disagreement on how to pronounce the word Absaroka.  Some say ab-SORK-a and other say ab-suh-RO-ka.

Another must-see in the area is the Bradford Brinton Memorial and Museum in the nearby town of Big Horn.  To say that this museum is off the beaten path is to make an understatement – it’s a fair drive down a gravel road.  Mr. Brinton made his money in the farm implement industry (Case) and purchased the Quarter Circle A Ranch as a “gentleman’s ranch” in 1923, added acreage and buildings and ended up with an exquisite facility in which to house his collection of artwork.  Upon his death the house passed to his sister who in the terms of her will opened it to the public in the 1960s.  The art collection leans heavily on Frederick Remington’s magazine illustrations with a hefty dose of Charlie Russell thrown in.  A small collection of Native American beadwork, pottery and basketry is displayed in an out-building which also houses the admissions desk and a small gift shop.  The remainder of the display items are in the main house, hanging on walls or sitting on shelves in much the same way Brinton must have displayed them when he was “at home”.  There is also a sizeable collection of nudes, including a Picasso, which doesn’t quite fit with Brinton’s interest in Western art.  Except for one piece, these are displayed separately in the servants’ quarters.

The setting for the ranch is lovely.  Cottonwoods dating to the late 1800s shade the lawn area and on the day of our visit were distributing their cotton with a vengeance.  The resemblance to snow is disconcerting, especially when you can see the snow-capped Big Horns at the same time you are sniffing the peonies and roses.  This has to be one of the prettiest places on earth which may explain why Big Horn, Wyoming (population 490) sports some mighty regal residences, two polo clubs and once played host to Queen Elizabeth.  The town’s motto could be “Big bucks in Big Horns” but it isn’t.

We’d been warned that the Fort Phil Kearny State Historic Site was less than interesting….not much to see but plenty to imagine.  ‘Tis true but getting there afforded us the opportunity to see some of interesting terrain, hills and dales dotted with herds of beef cattle and horses, an occasional ranch house or barn.  If you want to know where the deer and the antelope play, this is the place.  We saw plenty of both.  Our final stop before heading back to Sheridan was at an overlook at the Fetterman Massacre Site.  Marked with a stone monolith, this is where Fetterman and his troops were set upon by a coalition of Plains tribes as they provided protection for a group of lumberman cutting wood for the soldiers stationed at Fort Phil Kearny.  This was considered to be the single most decisive Indian victory until they whomped up on  ol’ Yellow Hair at Little Big Horn.

And now it’s time to saddle up and move on to Cody and Yellowstone.

Springtime In The Rockies

As the temperatures began to climb, many of the plants, native and otherwise, of the desert began to bloom.  Except for a couple of old and fairly tired rose bushes, we don’t have any interesting plants in our yard but we have neighbors who do and so we got to enjoy the spring-time extravaganza without the hassle of ownership.  We aren’t yet familiar with the names of most of the plants, everything is still “a cactus” whether it is or not.  Here’s a photo of a neighbor’s cactus – the large white trumpet-shaped blooms only lasted a few days but were magnificent to see (and smell) for that brief period.  The next stage was vaguely pornographic and the final stage left the furry brown withered blossoms scattered about looking like so many dead mice.

This next photo is one Rochelle took with her camera phone (or is it a phone camera?).  Our best guess is that the tree is a Joshua (or at least some sort of yucca relative).  The flower stalks shot up almost overnight and then the heavy silk ivory flowers began to open, giving the entire plant the appearance of an ornate candelabra, something that might have once graced Liberace’s piano.

It wasn’t long before the thermometer was creeping up into triple digits and we decided to head uphill toward cooler weather.  Just the short drive to the Verde Valley found us enjoying considerably cooler weather.  The highlight of our stay was a visit to a not-yet-open-to-the-public museum, The Copper Art Museum in Clarkdale.  Our friend Pat arranged for us to tag along with the Anasazi Chapter for their tour of the museum and we are so grateful to have been included.  As best we can gather, the museum is the brainchild of one man and his daughter as a means of displaying a growing collection of objects made of copper.  He selected Clarkdale as the home for his museum because of the town’s beginnings as “a company town” for the United Verde Copper Company.  The old high school provides a wonderful space to display his ever-growing collection of copper items.  There is a sizeable display of spent artillery shells, embossed with all manner of artistic motifs, large architectural elements such as cornices and ceilings, statues both large and small, and a wonderful array of kitchen equipment including a lobster pot large enough to accommodate Moby Dick.  My favorite was a white porcelain stove with glowing copper knobs and handles; it made a person want to whip up a tasty meal or two.

According to the owner/curator/tour guide the museum is currently open for group tours by appointment and will be open to individuals on a regular basis by September.  For those visiting the mining town of Jerome, the museum will be a wonderful add-on to a day (or more)  of exploring Arizona’s copper mining history.  And Clarkdale itself is worth a look-see.  The town was built to the specifications set forth by William A. Clark who purchased the United Verde Mine in 1888.  He wanted his 7000 employees to live someplace less chock-a-block than Jerome and so Clarkdale was born.  The smelter which dominated the town had the capacity to produce 4.5 million pounds of copper monthly which made Mr. Clark an extremely rich man – he apparently had so many business holdings that he couldn’t  begin to name them all from memory.

Of course a stop in Albuquerque was required so I could resupply my stash of beads at one of my favorite shops, Bead Obsession.  They have a wonderful selection of delicas and Japanese seed beads and it’s so difficult to confine one’s purchases to just those colors needed for specific projects.  I spent lavishly and consider it a birthday present to myself.  Howie felt he deserved a treat, too, so on a bright clear day he took himself off to the Sandia Peak Tramway for the trip up the mountain.  The air quality was such that the overview of the city was a bit hazy and that’s probably the case most of the time.  Except for those of us with vertigo, the tram ride is a not-to-be-missed adventure.

While camped at Tijeras, Howie thought he recognized the folks moving into a site quite near us. He was so right.  We first met Betty and Bob (and their dog Belle) in Georgia back in 2009, spent a few days camping with them in western Pennsylvania later that same year and haven’t seen them since.  But we have kept in touch sporadically by email so knew they had abandoned plans to head to Alaska this summer and were heading “back East” to attend to some family matters.  We just never expected to bump into them in Tijeras!  Our visits to the area only over-lapped by one day but we took advantage of the unexpected meeting to drive north on The Turquoise Trail to the funky little towns of Madrid and Carillos where artisans peddle their wares from the front porches of old mining shacks.  Betty and Bob had never visited Tinkertown and so we made a stop there on our way home.  One of the featured displays at Tinkertown is the mechanical fortune-teller, Esmeralda, who once resided at Riverview Amusement Park in Chicago.  Betty had many childhood encounters with Esmeralda and her memories were not good ones.  As a child she found Esmeralda mean-looking and threatening.  Negative memories aside, Betty bought up all the Esmeralda-themed postcards to send to her siblings.  She couldn’t resist the temptation to say “Look who I found!”

Working our way northward, we decided to stop before climbing up to Raton Pass, not after.  We had rather low expectations for the town and had planned only one full day in the area.  It was a mistake not to have scheduled more time!  We had to skip several of the area’s attractions but we did have the opportunity to spend time at The Raton Museum which turned out to be an absolute gem.  The curator, Roger Sanchez, offered to give us a guided tour and we jumped at the chance – having a guide is always preferable because they have interesting tidbits which never make it to the storyboards.  Roger warned us that the tour would take an hour and a half.  And he wasn’t kidding.  But there can’t be any better way to spend that amount of time.  In addition to the area’s historical importance as a stop on the Santa Fe trail, as a railhead for the shipment of coal from nearby mines and some range war action, the museum has received some wonderful collections from private donors:  a collection of hatpins which are miniature works of art, a display of mechanical toys and a marvelous collection of dolls, including a Shirley Temple doll which has never been removed from its box.  Roger is justifiably proud of “his” museum and his enthusiasm is contagious. 

Except for Amtrak, the railroad now bypasses Raton (in favor of an easier flatter route) and the cars whiz by on the Interstate headed for bigger towns both north and south  but travelers who skip Raton are missing out on an opportunity to visit a bit of Americana that is fast disappearing. 

As we were preparing to leave Raton the next morning we couldn’t help but notice a stream of motorcycles exiting the Interstate.  We were hoping we weren’t going to get in their way.  And vice versa.  Once we started up the highway we began to see cars parked on over-passes or along the shoulders, everybody waving small American flags and we thought we’d found ourselves in the middle of a military funeral procession.  We were about halfway up the pass when a group of cycles passed us and they were followed by a van decked out in shrink-wrap advising this was the “Run To The Wall”, a caravan going from L.A. to Washington, D.C. paying homage to the nation’s military along the way.  A check of the Internet showed the bikers were taking several different routes across the country and we didn’t see any heavy concentrations of bikes after Trinidad, Colorado.  We hope they all had a safe journey.

We made a four-day stop in Greeley, Colorado.  The campground in Loveland where we had stayed previously had gotten some really bad reviews of late and so we opted for a different spot.  It was pretty awful, too, and we won’t stop there again.  Luckily, on short notice we were able to get together with Gary and Phyllis for lunch and a chit-chat before they had to head off to attend to various grandparent-y things.  Gary and Howie lived across the street from each other as kids back home in Indiana so there is always lots of catching up to do when they get together. 

Our next stop was Cheyenne where we tucked in for several days to avoid traveling over the Memorial Day weekend.  We had pretty much “done” Cheyenne on a previous visit so we took this opportunity to head west on I-80 to see a bit of Laramie.  We thought we had already toured all the territorial prisons still open to visitors but apparently not.  We’d missed Wyoming!  Shame on us.  Before reaching Laramie, the highway climbs to  8640’ where there is a rest area/museum/visitors center devoted to the subject of U.S. 30, the so-called Lincoln Highway. Believe it or not, the Lincoln Highway was a privately funded project.   I-80 and U.S. 30 share the roadway along this portion but you can still see where the old U.S. 30 reached its highest point when it was the only “highway” in the area.  It’s a lovely spot scented with pine, snow-capped mountains to the south, birds singing and still a nip in the air at that altitude.

 

Then we made the downhill run into Laramie and quickly located the Wyoming Territorial Prison Park.  We like to avail ourselves of guided tours, if available, but learned that we had missed the morning tour and that the afternoon tour was several hours off.  So we set off on our self-guided tour, poking our noses into the warden’s home which serves as the first tour stop.  It seemed quite luxurious for a frontier abode.  As soon as we entered the handsome cream and red stone building which was the main portion of the prison, we heard voices and realized we’d caught up with the tour group.  So we hurried along and made ourselves part of the pack.  There were a number of bad boys who graced the cells and their photos continue to glare down from the walls.  The most famous inmate was none other than Butch Cassidy and he was incarcerated there long before he became famous.  At that time he was nothing but a plain ol’ horse thief.  This photo was taken after he became famous; the Sundance Kid is on the far left and Butch is on the far right.  Nice looking young men, aren’t they?  They even look a little like Newman and Redford.

The prison was able to bring in a little spending money thanks to a broom-making factory on the premises.  The convicts were quite good at their craft and the prison supplied brooms to several companies on “the outside”.  The broom factory is still in operation but the brooms are now made by volunteers and sold in the prison’s gift shop for well above what you might expect to pay for a corn broom.  If I recall, the regulation-sized broom sells for $35, credit cards accepted.  There are several other buildings in the park, unrelated to the prison, including a church which was moved to Laramie from Rock Springs and the remains of a frontier-themed amusement park. 

Laramie is home to the University of Wyoming.  Graduation had already occurred and so the campus was pretty much deserted.  I’m not sure if this is the cowboy and bucking horse which appears on Wyoming license plates.  If it is, nobody is sure who the cowboy was but the horse’s name in Steamboat.  Wyoming is one state which has its priorities straight.

 

Our next stop was Gering, Nebraska for a look-see at Scotts Bluff National Historic Monument and the nearby Chimney Rock National Historic Site.  Our campground, owned by the city of Gering, was very nice with wide grassy spaces between parking pads, cable t.v. and wi-fi.  All the comforts of home, along with a fine view of the bluffs just to the west of us.  Several disturbing weather patterns were brewing and it was quite an experience watching the sunlight come and go on the bluffs, the clouds shifting and swirling.  According to The Weather Channel, tornadoes were possible to the north of Scottsbluff but we survived the night with just some screeching winds and jiggling about.  (I quickly added Dramamine to my shopping list!)  The weather reports indicated that afternoon storms were possible for the entire length of our stay so we got moving fairly early on Wednesday for a tour of Scotts Bluff NHS.  A short film at the visitors center gave us an overall view of the site, then we took off on the 1.8 mile drive to the top of the bluff.  We did a few short walking trails which afford panoramic views of Scottsbluff in one direction and Gering in the other.  Originally various Plains tribes used the river valley to get to their seasonal hunting grounds.  Then this area is where the Mormon, California and Oregon Trails converged, funneling the pioneers along the Platte River.  It later gained fame as a Pony Express route. 

Chimney Rock is a few miles east of Gering and is said to be the most recognizable rock formation along the Oregon Trail.  After miles and miles and more miles of flat and empty grassland, imagine spotting this unique monolith in the distance.  We watched a brief film, checked out the gift shop and admired the rock from the safety of our car…the U.S. Parks service did not chintz on the number of “Beware of rattlesnakes” signs – they were everywhere. It was much too cold for them to be out and about but why tempt fate.  There is something about Chimney Rock which reminds me of The Alamo…it’s what gets talked about but is actually dwarfed by its surroundings.

On our way back to Gering we made a quick stop at the North Platte Valley Historical Museum.  In addition to the museum proper, there’s a sod house and a log house on the property.  Talk about cramped quarters…the two-room log house was occupied by a man, his wife and their four sons.  But the space did boast this wonderful bathtub in the kitchen.  Running water was available, thanks to a hand pump in the kitchen sink, and could be heated by the kerosene heater on the tub.  I never thought to inquire how the tub got emptied once the weekly baths were done. 

We are about to launch into a trifecta of RV rallies so it may well be quite some time before we get around to making another posting.