Hoodoos and Other Fascinating Rocks

We were driving down the road when suddenly off on our left was this strange formation
of rocks that look similar to pictures I've seen of the South Dakota badlands.
This picture does not the depth of this.

Joe overlooking the formations which also contain hoodoos.

This picture shows what hoodoos are...In the middle of the picture is a pile of rocks that
almost look like a mushroom.  Hoodoos are those rocks on top of a column that protects
it from wind and water erosion.  They may eventually fall off.

This interpretive sign was at the location.  Hard to believe that some of these rocks came all the way
from Idaho or Utah.

This was either someone's old abandoned home or an old schoolhouse.

Interesting Stops Coming Home From Cody

Then we made it to Meeteesee, Wyoming.  Meeteetse is an old western town located just 32 miles south of Cody.  Founded in the 1890's, the word Meeteetse is an old Shoshone Indian word for "meeting place." The town retains much of its original character with wooden boardwalks, wooden watering troughs, hitching rails and many old buildings from the turn of the century.

Forget Buffalo Bill, Butch Cassidy, Billy the Kid, and countless men and women of notoriety who helped define the mythology of the American West. Meeteetse had its own brand of mythmaker: Poker Nell, Bronco Nell, Laughing Smith, Swede Pete, Airplane Jerry, Greasy Bill, Checkbook Charlie, and Shorty the Crock to name a few.

By 1906, the town had seven saloons, one store, two banks, and two hotels. There were several other bars scattered over the area. At the forks of the Greybull and Wood Rivers was a popular bar called the "Bucket of Blood." The town had a reputation as a "wild and woolly" town until fairly recently. For the first time churches now outnumber saloons.

The Meeteetse area is rich in history with the expansive Pitchfork Ranch, famous as one the west's true cattle empires. It was the first cattle ranching operation of the Big Horn Basin, established in 1879 by Otto Franc. By 1900, thousands of cattle grazed along the Greybull River and Wood River Valleys. Although first discovered on the John Hogg Ranch, the Pitchfork is also well known for the fact the last known colony of an endangered species thought to be extinct, the Black Footed Ferret, was found on its grasslands.Noted outlaw Butch Cassidy lived in Meeteetse. In 1886, he signed a petition for the new bridge, and in 1894, he was arrested in front of the Cowboy Bar.

One section of the wooden boardwalk is covered with various brands from area ranches.

The Beartooth Mountains

The mountains and the snow kept getting closer until the road eventually took us on top of the mountain and we were above the snow.  The melted snow lakes and the amount of snow was unbelievable as well as the surrounding scenery.  Notice the rainbow forming in the background of the last picture.

So There We Were In Bear Country...

...in the mountains where there were lots and lots of signs that said be "Bear Aware".  Joe's kinda napping and dozing off on occasion, when suddenly I see this BIG BROWN thing coming down the road.  I think it's a bear!  After all, we are in bear country and in all the traveling we've done, I've never seen a bear in the wild.  So, here is my/our big chance.  I start taking pictures through the windshield, while yelling at Joe to "look, look" before it's gone.  Picture No. 1...





Picture No. 2...it's getting closer and closer.

And then the bear gets closer when I suddently realize it's a lone buffalo - a bison just strolling down the road like it's out for a Sunday stroll.  I totally stop the car, hoping it's a safe distance, when it walks past the car.  Joe could have reached out and touched it if he'd a mind too or the buffalo could have turned around and gored the car.  Try explaining that to my Allstate Insurance dude, huh? 

This thing was at least 10 feet tall and 20 feet long and could have popped his head inside the sunroof.  Well, maybe that's a slight exaggeration, but that's what it looked like

We had to turn the car around and go back for another look since you don't see that kinda thing just every day. No, Dorothy we certainly aren't in Georgia anymore!

The Beartooth Highway

The Beartooth Highway is a 68-mile travel corridor where the road rises to 10, 947 feet at Beartooth Pass in Wyoming and has been awarded the National Scenic Byways "All-American Road" status.  I can see why!  This is one of the most incredible stretches of road that I've ever had the privilege to drive on and experience sheer unbelievable beauty. 

Heading From Cody, Wyoming Into Montana

Heading north out of Cody to Montana

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Heading west on the Chief Joseph Scenie Byway.   Summer 1877 brought tragedy to the Nez Perce (or, in their language, Ni-Mii-puu).  Many of their tribe had been removed from homelands to a reservation. Now the U.S. Army was ordered to put the remaining Nez Perce there. These bands objected because they had not sold their land to the U.S. government nor signed a treaty. Nez Perce leaders decided to lead their people in search of a new home. The trek of more than 800 people and 2,000 horses was to be peaceful. But warriors killed Idaho settlers as revenge for earlier murders, which caused the Army to chase the Nez Perce.  Their trek became a flight marked by skirmishes and battles, the last of which stopped them more than 1,000 miles away from their homeland and less than 40 miles from safety in Canada. 

Led by Chief Joseph more than 800 men, women and children composing five Indian bands refused to be placed on a reservation. In a running battle that covered 1,300 miles, the Nez Perce successfully, but fatefully, outfought and outran U.S. troops commanded by General Oliver D. Howard. 

The Nez Perce plan was to seek help from their Crow allies in eastern Montana. Unfortunately the Crow refused to aid the Nez Perce forcing them to continue their flight north toward Canada. Only about 40 miles from the safety of the Canadian border and just north of the Bear Paw Mountains, the Nez Perce paused to rest and regroup before making their final trek to safety.

Unbeknownst to the Nez Perce, Colonel Nelson A. Miles, with 400 men from the Tongue River Cantonment near what is today Miles City, Montana, had been dispatched to intercept them. Coming from the east, the Indian scouts, who were deployed to the south to scout for General Howard, did not learn of the threat until it was too late. Thus began the five day Battle of the Bear Paws – the last battle the Nez Perce were to fight and the end of their dream of remaining free.

The view just went on and on and on forever.

Looking down from Dead Indian Summit.

At an elevation of 8,060 feet, Dead Indian Summit Overlook, a paved turnout at the high point of the Byway, provides a spectacular panorama of the Absaroka and Beartooth mountains. The 220-degree view from this point is among the most dramatic in the West.  Various legends claim the origin of this famous Wyoming placename. Most versions of the legends agree that a skirmish between early prospectors or the U.S. Army and a party of Bannock Indians occurred here in 1878. One of the Bannocks died and was left at the summit.   A totally different version says one of the mountain peaks off in the distance looks like the profile of a Native American.

Panoramic views of the Absaroka Mountains and the mouth of Sunlight Basin.

Looking back up at Dead Indian's Summit.

Cody, Wyoming

Someone's travel bus covered in wood.
Hmmm.

The main objective of this daycation was to do some exploring in Cody.  It was the first time I'd been to that part of the state and I was excited to see the museum and the cemetery and the old town.  However, by the time we finally arrived in Cody it was almost 5:00 and too late to visit the museum or anything else on a Saturday afternoon.  Incorporated in 1901, Cody is located 52 miles from Yellowstone National Park's east entrance. Cody was founded by Colonel William F. "Buffalo Bill" Cody who passed through the region in the 1870s. He was so impressed by the development possibilities from irrigation, rich soil, grand scenery, hunting and proximity to Yellowstone Park that he returned in the mid-1890s to start a town. He brought with him men whose names are still on street signs in Cody's downtown area: Beck, Alger, Rumsey, Bleistein and Salsbury.

Our home away from home.

Could you tell it was the week of bike week in
Sturgis and that Cody was a main route to
travel there?

Motorcycles lined up in downtown Cody.

I Brake For The Brown Signs

Anyone who rides with me while we're out exploring or on a daycation knows that I brake for the brown signs.  The brown signs signify that something of historical importance is about to come up shortly.  I love the brown signs.  It's amazing the things you can learn and the things I would never have known.  These are examples of some of those signs...

Established in the 1890’s by Tom Lanchberry to accommodate passengers and horses on the Red Lodge to Fort Washakie run, Eagle’s Nest Station, one-half mile north, operated until early in the century when railway expansion limited it’s usefulness. Stout four and six-horse teams, under salty drivers, pulling tough, coach-type wagons, were changed every 15 to 20 miles. Stages traveled 60 to 80 miles a day, tying together cattle ranches and army posts. One dollar a night for supper, bed and breakfast was the usual charge to dust-covered passengers on the long rough route from Montana’s Northern Pacific to the Union Pacific railroad in southern Wyoming.

On September 10th 1880, Victor Arland and John F. Corbett set up the first mercantile establishment in the Big Horn Basin on the Indian Trace that follows Trail Creek. Looking to the cattlemen for business, they moved to Cottonwood Creek in1883, then to Meeteetse Creek in 1884 where Arland, their final trading post, was established.

Corbett, doing the freighting from Billings for company enterprises, set up a way station in the river bottom where the freight road crossed the Stinking Water River—later renamed the Shoshone. A bridge, the first of five to span the river at this point, was constructed in 1883 at a cost of $5,000 raised by subscription from cattlemen, the Northern Pacific Railroad and Billings merchants.

Accommodations provided were a small store, a saloon and overnight lodging. The post office was established in 1885 with Corbett the postmaster. It was a gathering place and social center long before Cody came into existence twelve years later.

Corbett died in bed at his Meeteetse home December 15, 1910. His partner, Arland, went to his reward in more traditional style—dying with his boots on. In December, 1889, a shot fired through a saloon window in Red Lodge, Montana, killed him while he is playing poker.

The name of Corbett lingers on but the need for “Corbett’s Shebang” in the river bottom ended with the arrival of the railroad in November 1901.