Travel Log Continued - not quite finished.

I don't know about you but I am getting tired of writing this thing. I should finish it though.

When I last left this project we were in the southern Bighorhn Mountains of northern Wyoming. The Bighorns run north and south at about the middle of Wyoming and just slightly up into Montana. There are two highways that cross them from east to west. In the south US 16 leaves Buffalo Wyoming and runs over the peaks and down the other side to Ten Sleeps and then into the Bighorn Basin. This was where we first attempted towing in the mountains. I have previous posts about camping at Middle Fork Campground in the Bighorn National Forest and the pictures are here.

There will be more about the northern route through the Bighorns, US 14 and US 14A when we return to the Bighorns at the northern, steeper end of the range.

On leaving the southern part of the mountains we traveled down to Ten sleep and then paralleled the mountains north to Grey Bull where where we headed west through the Bighorn Basin here on US 14 headed for Cody. At Grey Bull there is a large collection of old WWII aircraft mostly bombers and tankers that were until recently used for fire fighting. Again we were down at low enough altitude for it to be hot. Husband wanted to get to some mountains in Montana but most of them were a long way to the west and north, far from where we were to pick Duncan up in about 10 days. It was suggested to us by a couple we met, who were also camping in an Airstream at Middle Fork, that the Buffalo Bill Cody Museum in Cody Wyoming was worth a couple of days time. Then we could go straight up US 212 into the Beartooth mountains and into Montana. This US 212 is the same highway we took across the Indian reservation in South Dakota.

We found a full hookup campground within walking distance of the museum and settled in for a couple of days. We spent a day and a half in the museum, did several loads of laundry, went shopping at the local Wal-Mart, and took time to drive back east to Lovell to visit Duncan just a week before we were to pick him up. In Lovell we found the Queen Bee candy company. They make the most divine honey praline candy and organic chocolate bon-bons. All organic and made from the Bighorn basin honey. Much of the basin is irrigated to raise Alfalfa hay and as a result lots of wonderful alfalfa honey. The bee hives are the oddest arrangement I have ever seen. We kept seeing them as we drove through the Basin and were completely puzzled by them until we finally stopped and took a closer look at them. Sure enough my eventual suspicions were verified by seeing honey bees flying in and out of the open boxes.

If you look at a map of Wyoming and Montana, Yellowstone National Park jumps out at you. Hard up against the east side of Yellowstone are the Beartooth Mountains. US 212 runs through Red Lodge over the Beartooth Pass and then down the other side and into the east entrance of Yellowstone Park. U.S. 212 (pictures here) has been written about as the most beautiful highway in America. It was beautiful and a good bit scary to drive in parts. That was the farthest west we ventured this year, to the Beartooth West summit at 10,547 feet. Then we turned around and went back to our campground at Greenough Lake (pictures here). We stayed from August 1 - 5. This is the only place we met bears. One came into camp a couple of times. One night he visited us and stood up on both sides of "White One" to take a look in. Thankfully he only walked past the trailer. There are strictly enforced guidelines for campers in place to prevent the invitation of bears and the possibility of their habituation to people. "A FED BEAR IS A DEAD BEAR" were signs all over the campgrounds. We were told that two had been shot earlier in the summer because they had become habituated to invading campgrounds and breaking into cabins. Like the Bighorn Mountains these mountains also had Alpine Meadow tops that we walked upon but here there were more mountains visible with rocky peaks, more like what you think of when you think of western mountains. From the summit we could look west into the Yellowstone. And like Middle Fork Campground in the Bighorns we had a very nice river running through the campground behind the campsite.

From the campground at Greenough Lake we drove 8 miles up the valley on a "road" that paralleled US 212 part way, but along beside the busy river. It was little better than a two track though amazingly heavily used. Much of it was more rocks than dirt. It ended at a large improved parking lot which was at the foot of a walking trail up the mountain to a pair of small fishing lakes. We then spent three hours climbing up that trail but never reached the lakes. Even so we had wonderful vistas looking back down the valley and climbed to where the trail crossed the river on a lovely foot bridge. Here again the hand labor involved in hauling and building is to be commended. There are pictures of this trail also in the Beartooth album.

Our next stop was the last National Forest Campground of this month long trip. The northern Bighorns, Medicine Circle, picking up Duncan, and the return home will be the last installment of this travel log. I have yet to create the album for the Cody Museum and the Northern Bighorns.