The day began a bit chilly. The plan is to motor west on route 66, er, I mean 16 through the Big Horn mountains, across the high sierra of Wyoming into the Rockies and Yellowstone Park.
The ride through the mountains west of Buffalo started nice and ended up magnificent. This has to be one of the most beautiful rides in the USA. The cliffs and valleys and rivers and scenery was amazing. The road was nice and curved and well maintained. We kept stopping at pull offs and exclaiming "Wow, Praise the Lord!". Truly a great road.
The far side of the mountains broke into high plains at a little town called Ten Sleep. There we stopped for brunch at the "Crazy Woman Cafe". We saw no crazy woman there but there was a very efficient, driven waitress who had us fed in no time. Breakfast was great!
From Ten Sleep we continued west into the town of Worland for gas and discussion on what route to proceed on towards Cody and then Yellowstone Park. Part of the discussion included how to get rid of Larry's car and trailer. Lloyd knew someone in the town of Powell who said he could park his rig. That was north up US16. Some of us however noticed an interesting state hwy straight west across the high plains that looked as it may be less traveled. So, we split up, half went up with Larry to ditch his car, half down and across on the afore mentioned state highways.
The state hwys proved very nice with great scenery and little traffic. The northern route guys took a little longer because of the car/trailer situation buy Larry was onto two wheels in no time at all. Both routes brought us to Cody and then it was straight west to Yellowstone. The southern group made it a hour or so earlier than the northern group.
The road across from Cody to the Park was a very nice road as well. Starting with the Buffalo Bill Reseviour on the left side of town to the high cliffs and mountains shortly there after. The scenery was, again, awesome.
Someone at the gas station in Cody had told us that there have been on-going forest fires in the area which have at times closed the road. But today the wind was straight out of the west so there was no reason for concern. We did see much smoke billowing from some of the mountains in the distance. Also an encampment for the fire fighters was set up along side the road.
We got to the Park entrance and paid our fees of $20 dollars per motorcycle. Then we needed to travel to the center of the park and find our campsite at Bay Bridge Campground which was near the shores of beautiful Yellowstone Park. The travel around Yellowstone looks like no big deal but in actuality it always seems to take longer than expected. The roads are curved, (which is a good thing), the traffic often heavy, often stopped because of animals in the road or to the side causing tourists to stop and take pictures and the speed limit is only 45 MPH. But we (the south, state hwy group) eventually got to our camp site at or around 6:00 PM. My (Wayne's) daughter, Sara, was there already as well as Steve who had left before us and had already spent time in the Grand Tetons. Sara was passing through from her home in Portland Oregon to visit friends and family in MN. I was very happy to see her and she me.
Sara and I decided to head off to see Old Faithful yet that evening and get some supper even though it would mean we'd be returning after dark. We got there just as the geyser was sceduled to blow so we saw that without much waiting. The restaurant at the Inn was full and taking reservations at 9:45 PM. We decided to settle with a couple of sandwiches from the deli. When we got back, it was indeed dark but Steve had a camp fire going and many more Fossils had found their way to our encampment. Jeff, Rod, Keith R and Brian from the Tetons. The northern route crew from Powell and Cody. Also joining us for the first time was our "cheesehead" Fossils Mark and Les. We were quite the force in the camp!
It had been a long day, many of us drifted off to their respective tents. A few watched the ambers die in the fire ring but most were to bed at or around midnight. Thus ending Day 4 in this great Fossil trip.
(personal note from the Blog author: we had no internet service in the Park. I am writing this blog re day four at the end of day 6 in Red Lodge Montana. It is now past midnight. I will continue to try and catch up tomorrow, perhaps I can find a WiFi in Cody, otherwise at the motel in Lovel. Whatever, I willpost a couple of pictures and hit the sack.... type some more soon! In the mean time click on the video I uploaded earlier to get a taste of ridin in-group in Yellowstone) Wayne.
