Chrome on the Range : Grand Junction, Colorado
Glenwood Springs WAS a little smoky and west of town some the hills along I-70 are burned. The Coal Seam fire seems to be under control - we didn;t go near it, but there's no visible smoke column. WE're traveling the valley of the Colorado river - Grand Junction is the junction of the Colorado and the Gunnison - but when they name the town the Colorado was called the Grand.
"Chrome on the Range" is (at least) two things: this scuplture and the buffalo burger at the Rockslide Pub and Restaurant. That's what I had, Bobbie had the Ginger lemon Chiicken _ both were good. I did get razzed by the waitress for having rice with my burger (instead of fries). I tried a Big Bear Stout and a Rabbit Ears Amber but preferred the Brewer's special MaiBock.
The downtowwn pedestrian mall does have a lot of nice sculpture, and the local NPR station operates out of a storefront.
We didn't go to any wineries but I did pick up a bottle of raspberry flavored mead at a liquor store. Rocky Mountain Meadery is next door in Palisade.
On the way out of town we drove through the
Colorado National Monument. This is the start of what becomes the Grand Canyon in the sense that it is the same general geologic formation and the same river. Like Bryce, I found it more enjoyable than the Grand Canyon simply because it is smaller.
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Dinosaur National Monument: Vernal, Utah
We are off the interstate and except for a small piece near Rock Springs, Wyoming
won't return until the journey home from Casper. Dinosaur , Colorado is a very
small town (although there is a Dinosaur Baptitst Church) so we are heading to
Utah to stay In Vernal.
The hotel is next door to the
Utah Field House.
The Field House has some nice dino bones inside and a garden full of fleshed out ones outside. One (a small pterodactyl type-thing called rhinorhyncus) we couldn't find until one of the staff pointed it out to us.
At
Dinosaur National Monument
a small bus takes you from the parking lot to the quarry where a large section of bones in the ground are exposed. The park ranger in her talk also mentioned endangered fish in the Colorado and Green rivers: I never knew there were 8 pound minnows.
On the recommendation of a gentleman whos was camping out with a bunch of Boy Scouts we took a side trip
to Split Mountain campgrounds - a nice view of the Green River coming thru the
mountains and while walking a couple of modern-day dinosaurs: some small lizards.
Vernal has the Western Heritage Museum which is a little bigger but reminds me of the one in Golden. Lots of arrowheads, and pictures of all the sheriffs of Uintah County: starting with Lycurgus Johnson.
We went part way on a 120 mile side trip called Red Cloud Loop - on a rock about 11 miles out of Vernal someone painted "Remember the Maine" and a flag. It's been kept up.
The Win On Chinese buffet was our favorite restaurant. Friday night is seafood - yum.
Leaving Vernal for Lander we go across Flaming Gorge Dam. We're on U.S.191 , mostly east of the gorge - the "scenic route" looks to be a lot longer and we're headed for Lander. Signs along the road inform you of the archeological period the adjacent rocks expose.
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Cowfish: Lander , Wyoming
What's the pelican doing here? En route from Lander to Thermopolis we saw a flock of seven of them flying north west.
The brewpub I found on the Web (the
Lander Bar and Gannet Grill ) is right on the edge of town and practically next door
to the
Pronghorn Hotel! We have been feeling vegetably deprived so I had a Mad Greek salad,
Bobbie had a Mean Green salad and we also had a Hummus Platter - this was delightful and I tried a Pale Ale and a
Brown. The Popo Agie microbrewery is no more , but the
Snake River folks bought the facilities
and added a restaurant called
Cowfish
- next door to the Lander Bar. For dinner
I had a Porter ( the best of the four I tried (the ESB is pretty good tho.) and a wonderful
trout and very good fish tacos.
The house salad is good and the bread is also yummy.
Across Main Street from the hotel is a river walk along the Popo Agie. An elementary school had made a small marsh and installed a bat hous. Bats can eat 1200 mosquitos per hour!
Leaving Lander for Thermopolis: through the Wind River (Shoshone and Arapahoe) Indian
Reservation and Wind River Canyon.
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Murder at the Spa : Thermopolis, Wyoming
No, no-one got murdered. But the hotel felt like the perfect setting for an Agatha Christie novel: it's a refurbished 1900 hotel now run by Quality Inns and Suites. They were quite nice and let us check in early.
So off to the
Wyoming Dinosaur Center. This is a very nice museum with quite a collection
of fossils from all over the world. Also a couple of locals named "Stan" and "Morris".
The neatest thing about this center is you can take a bus to a live dig - we declined.
Lunch at
Las Fuentes
- excellent Mexican food. Dinner at the Safari Club at the Holiday Inn.
The bar has more dead animals per square inch than I've ever seen - this
picture is just a small sample from the hotel web page.
I had a nice buffalo stew, Bobbie had a salad - and the salad bar is good.
A friend joined us for dinner and after dinner
drove us out to look for the local buffalo herd - we had not found them earlier
in the day - and we found them this time.
We also walked around Hot Springs State Park. The Swinging Bridge (it does swing - both up and down and side to side) goes out to an island in the Big Horn river - go down the steps and there's a place where the hot spring empties into the river.
The other place we visited was Hot Springs County Museum and Cultural Center; it's a good regional museum, although I didn't care for some of the taxidermy. One claim to fame is the bar from the Hole in the Wall saloon. Our friend had taught a class in the old school house in late spring and said at that time it was still pretty cold.
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"Twenty-four arrows" : Casper, Wyoming
We picked Casper as about half way between Thermopolis and home. From a pure distance point of view that's off a bit, but even with a 65 speed limit and roads which look straight and flat enough that you should be able to see the Dakotas, it's about right from a time point of view. We saw pronghorn anetlopesalong the road. No jackalopes.
Casper, Wyoming was supposed to be Casp
According to survivor accounts, Collins had an arrow sticking out of his forehead, the reins in his teeth, and a pistol in each hand. His body was found several days later with twenty-four arrows in it.They couldn't name the fort Fort Collins because there already was one in Colorado - named after his father.
from Quick Facts about Casper, Wyoming
We got here early enough to go to lunch at Dragon Wall,an excellent Chinese buffet. Dinner ended up being the hors d'oeuvres at the "manager's reception" put on by the hotel. After dinner we went for a walk at Fort Caspar. There are also some nice downtown parks. Unfortunately the downtown microbrewery had apparently bugged out a week earlier. So to help get thru the night I got some Moose Juice Stout.
On the way home, just south of Douglas, we did take a 10 mile side trip to see Ayres Natural Bridge, one of the few natural bridges that still has water runiing under it. It is in a very nice little county park with some camping.
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