Day 11 - Wild West Saga

The weather has been absolutely gorgeous as is the scenery.  It is funny, we keep seeing the same areas but each time it is different because of the animals or the sun or the wind or all of the above.

Yesterday was a "slow" day for us as we went to church in West Yellowstone.  It is only 14 miles away but takes about 30 - 40 minutes to drive depending on the number of animals one sees on the side of the road or in the meadows.  This church only has a priest the 1st & 3rd of the month.  The other Sunday's a Nun presides over a Communion Service.  In mid-October they will start having services in the basement as it is easier to heat.

We drove through some of the side roads to where we viewed many of the geological features... truely amazing.

Day 10 - Wild West Saga

Another beautiful day!  It started out a little cool (30 degrees) but quickliy rose to the 70's.  We spent the day taking various drives at the south end of the park and yes we wound up at Old Faithful.  We had to wait about an hour to see her go off but it was worth it. 

We also saw lots of animals... Elk cows, Bison (or Buffalo depending on what you want to call them) and a Coyote.  Unfortunately pictures don't do the park or the animals justice.  It is really very beautiful here.

We went to a " Ranger Presentation" last night on the earth-quake that took place at Lake Hedgen in 1959.  It was very powerful (7.5 on the richter scale) and damaged every road into and through the park.  There were 28 people who lost their lives with 13 still under the rubble.  It also changed the completion of many areas.  One example was along the river and mountain side where rock sheared off 1700' high, slide down into the river and 400' up the other side... tremendous forces.

We are off to explore more areas today and will update this site whenever we get internet.

Take care y'all.

Day 9 - Wild West Saga

Another great day! We left Dick and Sidne’s place around 9:00 AM and headed to Red Lodge to do some grocery shopping, fill our water tanks and empty our holding tanks. We finally hit the road about 10:00 AM headed towards Yellowstone National Park.

We drove over the Beartooth Highway and the scenery was gorgeous. We had temperatures ranging from a high of 69 to a low of 42 but the sun shone the whole time. The Aspen have started to change to a golden color and when mixed in with the green of the pine trees it was very striking. We took our time and drove about 35 MPH… you couldn’t go much faster as some of the switch-backs were so sharp we could only go 15 MPH. We saw some Bison and an Elk cow and probably could have seen more if we wanted to stop which was difficult with the trailer. We will drive around the next week in order to see more animals.

We also stopped at some hot-springs called Beryl Spring. It is really interesting to see the water bubble and the steam raise up. Of course there is also a very strong smell of sulfur in the air which we could have done without.

Next it was on to our campsite in Madison Jct. which, has a very nice campground with lots of spaces but not too close to each other. It is also conveniently located so we can travel to all the areas in search of wild-life and Old Faithful.

Day 8 - Wild West Saga

What can I say?  It has been another beautiful day for both weather and activities.  This AM Dick and I went to see if the critters had gotten into the dead cow but they have not found it yet... strange but it won't be long.
 

Then we went to visit with Harris, a local rancher, as he was "laid up" because he had cut his leg just above his knee with a chain saw.  We found him driving around on his Quad do various jobs so we went back to the house where we had a coffee with him.
 

 I will digress a little as yesterday when we went to visit Wally & Rett, we stopped by the site of the Smith Mine disaster.  There is not much left only a few buildings and a plaque commemorating the men who died here (be sure to click on the plaque to read it).  Apparently there is still a lot of coal in Montana that may or may not be mined in the future.

 
This PM we went for a ride with Astonishing Arda joining us on Dandy.  She has not been on a horse for about 5 years but looked and rode like it was yesterday.  The trail we rode took us through some open fields and some of the Aspen Woods.  The Aspen are starting to change color so it was very beautiful especially when looking across the meadows and mountains.  Arda did great!

 
We finished up the day with another pot-luck supper and a camp fire.  What more could one ask for...

 
And of course there was lots of time for Wrangler Dave to practice roping.

 
Tomorrow we are off to Yellowstone park for a week so I am not sure when I will be able to post again.

Day 7 - Wild West Saga

Well another great day.  We didn't do a whole lot of activities today but we had fun.  We went to the other side of Red Lodge to the main ranch that Dick works for.  The owners, Wally and Rett, are really nice people who invited us in for a coffee and wound up giving (I would say loan but Arda is not going to give it back) Arda a cup of brown sugar and a cup of flour.  You will never guess why!  :-)

When we got back to Dick & Sidne's place I picked half a bucket of apples so Arda could make an apple crisp for dessert... yes she is really cooking up a storm!  We have been having pot-luck with Dick and Sid and tonight we had walleye, wild/brown rice, corn-bread that Dick cooked in a Dutch Oven and cole-slaw.  We ate too much but it sure was good.

This is a totem pole that Dick and Sidne carved themselves.  They made this in Wisconsin over a 3 day period when they went to some Indian people who were teaching people how to do this.  This sits at their cabin and unfortnately the picture does not do it justice as you can't see the detail carvings. 

Here is Arda sitting on the quad during her trip up the mountain yesterday... never fear, Astonishing Arda stayed on the mountain trails and did not drive on the highway.

After supper Arda and Sid went for a 2 mile walk while Dick and I rode out to the east pasture to count the cows.  We found a dead cow (3-year old) that had not been dead too long.  We could not see how she died but there were no bullet holes or arrows  in her (it is bow season here).  I guess the bear's and other wild critters will have a feast tonight.

We all arrived back at camp about the same time and as we unsaddled, Arda & Sid made coffe and we had that with the apple crisp... yea, Wrangler Dave needed something more to eat - NOT!

Well off to the shower and an early night.

Day 6 - Wild West Saga

Today was another great day.  Dick Overturf is the "irrigation person" for a large ranch and he had a small job to do with his back-hoe.  We drove over to the creek where a lot of debris had started to plug it up.  The back-hoe made short work of the "dam".

While Dick and I were "working", Arda and Sidne went for a walk (2 miles) and then went to town to do a few chores.

After lunch Arda and Sidne took the quad and went up to their cabin which sits on 80 acres in some very beautiful country.  They stopped at a pond where the sun, wind and the water movement just sparkled.  The picture doesn't do it justice.

Dick and I took a couple of horses (Dandy & Dancer) and rode about 6 miles (about 4 hours) through the mountains.  Dick saw a bear and Dancer spooked at every shadow along the way but he will get over this. 

We also stopped at their cabin in the mountains where Dick has hand-cut the logs for the outside.  It is pretty isolated so they use solar power and have set up their own hydro generation plant.

Tonight we had pot-luck with Dick and Sidne.  They brought fried chicken and home grown turnip which along with Arda's sweet potatoes and brocolli salad made for an excellent meal.  What more can one ask for?

Not sure what we are doing tomorrow but I am sure it will have something to do with horses.

Day 5 - Wild West Saga

Well we left Sheridan this AM... a little late I might add but then who is monitoring us - HA!

A lot of the trees have started to turn and the drive to Red Lodge was rather pretty. We stopped in Hardin MT at an information place and museum. They had some pretty neat buildings, tools, equipment, etc. from around the early 1900's. Life must have been really hard for the settlers of this time. They sure didn't have much and worked really hard to eek out an living.

Next stop was the laundrymat in Red Lodge so we had some clean clothes. It is not like you can carry tons of clothes with you on the road. We also had to stop and dump the holding tanks and add some more water... pretty exciting stuff eh?

We arrived at Sidne's & Dick's place around 4:00 PM. Sidne cooked us a great Mexican dinner and then she and Arda went back to Red Lodge to see a film called Mama Mia from the broadway show of the same name. Arda really enjoyed the movie and would now like to see the play.

Dick and I went for a short ride to check on some cattle.

It is tough life but someone has to do it. I will try to get some pictures of this area for our next posting.

By the way it is official now... We lost my bike seat and the pumps off each bike. My bike also looks as if it has been through a war. I guess it is time to investigate a new bike rack.

That's all from Wrangler Dave and Astonishing Arda... good night.

Day 2, 3 & 4 - The Wild West Saga

Well, day 2 got a lot better than day 1. In fact we had a very nice drive (if you call driving on the interstate looking at corn fields a nice drive). At least it was uneventful. We stopped at our favorite camp ground (Wally-Mart) in Lexington NEB.

Day 3 was also a good travel day. We were able to make good time and even got off the interstate. We stopped along the roadside at a memorial marker for Chimney Rock where we had a picnic lunch. Astonishing Arda just loves picnics and we even took our chairs out so we could sit and watch the trains go by. Chimney rock was a major landmark for those traveling west as it marked the end of the plains and the beginning of the mountains. It was also one of the early Pony Express Rider stations.

We stayed the night in Casper WY (yes again at our favorite camp-ground) where we met up with an old friend from Texas... Fronie Hendren. It has been over 20 years since we last saw the Hendrens and unfortunately Charlie passed away a couple of years ago. He was one of the finest people you could ever meet. We had dinner with Fronie and caught up on "old times". It was good seeing her again.

The next morning we were off again to Buck Brannaman's ranch just outside Sheridan WY where we would spend the next 2 days at a ranch roping contest.

Unfortunately Wrangler Dave was a little rusty and did not get past the first round on the first day. Since I had not roped nor rode for a while, my back was a little (maybe a lot) stiff on Sunday so I did not ride or rope. I spent the day watching the other ropers who were really good and hopefully I learned a little bit - I guess time will tell.

We pulled out of Brannaman's Sunday evening and went to Sheridan to our favorite campground. Tomorrow we will leave for Red Lodge to meet up with our friends Sidne and Dick Overturf.

Till the next time I get internet...

Day 1 - Off to the Wild Wild West!

Quite a day…

This trip started off on the wrong foot and only got worse. We could not leave until UPS delivered a “controller” for the auxiliary fuel tank I installed in my truck. It arrived about 10:00 AM and we still had to stop to get propane as we were totally out. Finally we got on the road about 11:15 AM. It was a beautiful drive but then things kinda fell apart…

We were making good time until we hit highway 94… It was closed due flooding. We were diverted to 80 which also happened to be closed. The next diversion was to 69 and you guessed it… it was closed too. We started to follow some detour signs but they just quit in the middle of who knows where. Our GPS still hasn’t recovered from all the “recalculations”. After many twists and turns, we made our way to highway 20 and followed that for a good distance until we could finally get back on 80. All in all it took us over 2.5 hours to go through Indiana… are we having fun yet?

The next little incident was that the controller we waited for did not work properly so I was unable to transfer fuel from the auxiliary tank to the truck fuel tank. So there I sat with 45 gallons of fuel that I could not use. The original controller did not work correctly (that is why we waited for the 2nd one) but at least it pumped fuel continuously. So I switched back to the original and have yet a 3rd one on the way which I will get when we return.

At one of our stops we noticed that Wrangler Dave had lost his seat… his bicycle seat that is. Apparently with all the bouncing around (our bike rack tends to bounce anyway) the bikes were lose and I guess Arda’s bike and mine collided so now someone may have a very nice, new bike seat. The bouncing also put a lot of scratches on my bike and broke Arda’s mirror. I retied the bikes and the rack so they will be more stable.

Then we had fridge problems. It kept getting a ‘gas check light’ so we called the RV dealer. We purged the gas lines as instructed but to no avail. That night when we stopped at Wally-Mart, another miracle - it worked! Wrangler Dave fixes another one – NOT! When we put the slide in the next morning, the gas check light came on again. Well, we figured out that when the slide goes in, it pinches the gas line, hence the check light. We will have to see what we can do to correct this.

We finally quit driving around 7:30PM at Wally-Mart in Moline Il. We were both very tired but we had one more surprise waiting for us. When the “entertainment” slide-out was put out, low and behold there was a big black grease stain on the carpet (it wasn’t there when we bought the trailer) and the carpet was soaking wet. Another item added to our list for the RV Dealer.

I am sure tomorrow will be much better… By the way, this is our new RV & truck...

Time for bed… ride ‘em cowboy?