Headin' to Denver - Jun 2006

We made our way to Denver from Yellowstone via Cody, Wyoming where we stayed for a couple of nights. We parked at the Ponderosa RV Park in Cody and got two fairly nice sites side-by-side. It was an okay park with some grass and shade trees and it was close to town, but the sites (at least in our section) were pretty close together. And NO, we did not stay in the tee pee -- we just thought it was a very colorful "prop" for a photo op. We enjoyed touring the town and can highly recommend a restaurant in Cody called the Rib & Chop House -- their ribs were wonderful and the chicken fried steak was absolutely the best I've ever eaten. We did not return to the Buffalo Bill Museum as we had been there last year, but can also highly recommend it as a neat place to visit.

After leaving Cody, we traveled a short distance to Thermopolis, WY with the goal of enjoying a nice, hot soak in some mineral pools. We stayed at the Country Campin' RV Park and it was ok for an overnight stay. There was a miniature horse farm next to the park and there were several little ones out grazing in the pasture and they were friendly and would come over to the fence to get petted. This one was especially friendly and so beautiful that I had to take his picture. He was no more than about 3' tall. The only complaint about the RV park was the numerous, hungry mosquitos that were teeming all around the nearby creek. We all came away with welts despite heavy applications of repellent.

That afternoon, we made an excursion to Hot Springs State Park where they have two mineral hot spring pools (indoor & outdoor) that are free to the public. The characteristic rotten-egg smell of the sulfurous indoor pool was a bit too much for us so we opted to soak in the outdoor pool. Even though the day was very warm, the 104° mineral water felt good and we thoroughly enjoyed a relaxing soak at the shaded end of the pool.

We left Thermopolis and headed to Wheatland, WY to stay at the city park that had several free (donations accepted) water/electric RV sites. Well, what an awful two nights we had there. The camping was free, but as the old saying goes -- you get what you pay for. The park itself was nice -- large, plenty of green grass, lots of trees and a small creek running through it. The downside was that it was across the street from the railroad tracks and every night between 11 and 12 pm, a huge cargo train would roll through and blast it's horn about 20 times for at least 20 seconds each time as it passed all the little streets in town. Then, between 5 and 6 am, the same thing would happen. There would be no sleeping through that eardrum-splitting blast that's for sure. There must also have been some track shifting and/or railroad car changes as we also heard very loud clanking and banging noises during the midnight run. As if that wasn't enough, the park was the only place in town where fireworks (and firecrackers) were legal, so all day and night on both Saturday and Sunday we had to listen to firecrackers exploding. It was irritating at best and downright aggravating at 1:00 in the morning. To top things off, my Mom got a horrible case of gastroenteritis and was sick for two days (the only reason we stayed two nights there.) We had to take her to the Wheatland emergency room on Sunday morning where she received a couple of pints of i.v. fluids. Thank goodness she was back on her feet after a couple of days of rest and lots of chicken soup. Anyway, to paraphrase a song -- we were all happy to see Wheatland in our rear view mirror.