The Adventures of Platy and the Gang
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2003 Volume 11
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2003 Volume 11
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Everything we read in advance said that it is almost impossible to find a camping space in Yellowstone Park unless you get there at 8:00 in the morning and wait in line.
We decided to stay at a campground halfway between Cody and the park and commute daily. We were wrong!! The first day we drove the 30 miles to get to the gate. We didn't realize that it is another 30 miles to get to anything in the park. We also saw a board showing the status of the campgrounds. Only one had filled and it was the one with electric hook-ups.
The other 10 weren't full. The campgrounds that take reservations weren't booked up. We drove to Bridge Bay CG and asked if we could get reservations for two days later and were told "no problem". Since the temperature was in the 40's at night we wouldn't need AC so dry camping with no hookups was no problem. It sure beats driving an extra 120 miles a day.
We stayed for four days over a weekend and the campground was never more than half full.
We passed this rock formation on the way to the Park. It has a 'hoo-doo' on top. That's an unexplainable rock formation. Erosion has left this rock precariously balanced on a pile of smaller rocks.
They say that the drive from Cody to Yellowstone is the "most scenic 50 miles in the U.S."
We ended up spending 4 days in exploring the park. We checked out the mud pots,
Mammoth Hot Springs, waterfalls,
and of course Old Faithful.
There were buffalo everywhere.
Even in the campground.
We even saw Yogi. We were driving down the road when he came out from the side. We stopped to take a picture and I thought he was going to come over to the window. He walked right in front of the car, went to the other side and ate some flowers and went up the hill.
We left Yellowstone and headed south into the Tetons. We did the scenic drive and stopped at the Visitors Center at Coulter Bay. They have an exceptional Indian Arts Museum and we got there just in time for a guided tour. After the tour there was a Cherokee artist doing paintings and selling her work. We bought a print of a buffalo she had done and then got into a conversation about our travels and Judy's hiking. She said she enjoyed our stories so much that she gave Judy an Indian blessing to hang on her pack for luck. We have it hanging in the RV for now. Her name is DG House.
We spent the night at a National Forest campground on Fremont Lake north of Pinedale, WY. It is the 7th deepest lake in the U.S. at over 600 ft deep. The arrow shows where the campground is.
We stayed in Rawlins, WY for a couple of days to do laundry and to visit the prison there.
It was opened in 1901 with no electricity or running water and inadequate heating. It closed in 1981 and didn't have hot water in the cell block until 1978. No wonder they had many escape attempts.
One guy did his time, was released and immediately went to town and killed the only person he knew, a lady who delivered cookies to the prisoners. When the other prisoners found out, they tied a rope around his neck and threw him off the 4th floor walkway.
He pleaded to say a prayer. They said OK, "say it on your way down". He grabbed the 3rd floor railing so they took him back and did it again. This time his neck broke. This wasn't a nice place..
www.wyomingfrontierprison.org
Judy tried to shut me in but the tour guide said she couldn't leave me there.
She also was looking at this room. The last guy was executed here in 1965.
On our way to Missouri to bike the Katy Trail we traveled through Nebraska. Nebraska is normally not too exciting but they had a heat wave while we were there. It reached 106 degrees. Needless to say we didn't stop at many places.
We did stop at the Great Platte River Road Archway Monument. You can't miss it. It spans I-80 and is 80 feet high. You walk through
life-size displays wearing a headset that narrates exploits of the pioneers who passed by here. The Oregon, Mormon, and California Trails, The Pony Express, and The Transcontinental Telegraph and Railroad all passed by here in the 1800's. In the 1900's there was the Lincoln Highway and now Interstate 80, the Union Pacific Railroad, and the Transcontinental fiber-optic phone lines. For in the middle of nowhere this sure is a busy place. By the way Judy never did help the lady push the wagon...
In St. Joseph, MO we stopped at a museum we had read about on our way west.
Nationally recognized as "one of the 50 most unusual Museums in the country" the Glore Psychiatric Museum uses full-sized replicas, interactive displays, audio-visuals, artifacts, documents and photos to illustrate how mental illness has been portrayed
and treated for the past 7,500 years. The Museum also chronicles the 127-year history of what was once known as the "State Lunatic Asylum No.2". The Glore Museum opened in 1968 and has heen featured on Ripley's Believe It Or Not! TV show, the Discovery Health
Channel, the Learning Channel, PBS, "The Savvy Traveler", Fox Newsnet, and Jimmy Buffet's "Radio Margaritaville" station in Orlando, Florida.
For most of the past 500 years, psychiatic treatment has been based on the assumption that the human brain was a simple one-dimensional organ. Early treatment devices. like the reproductions displayed produced just enough limited success to continue in use. Blistering, restraining, bleeding, dousing, stomping; and spinning had the preferred effect of shocking the person back to a sence of reality.
By the beginning of the 20th century. there was 'scientific' evidence that recently developed fever cabinets, hydrotherapy, phrenology, convulsive therapy, and psychosurgery would produce desired results.
Additional exhibits include early lab and pharmacy equipment and examples of 19th century restraints and tranquilizers.
We are now headed to Sedalia, Missouri so that we can start biking the Kady Trail.
If it's not too
HOT
.