Day 13

Sunday 13th May 2007<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

 

Things are really hotting up now: 92F outside, in fact.  That’s because we have careered past Salt Lake City, which was experienced as a mass of freeway exits mysteriously signed “10600 No” etc, roadworks and frenetic traffic, and Provo, where we left the southbound I-15 for the quieter reaches of the East-bound US Highway 6, heading South East for Monument Valley and other spectacular sights and sites before we swing back West to the Grand Canyon.   We’re in yet another Super 8 Motel, this time at Green River, Utah, where they apparently have a grand Melon Festival every September.  Seems odd in the middle of a desert but then this is somewhat of an oasis, with the muddy Green River flowing through.  To get here, we have driven down the spectacular Price River Canyon and along a busy single lane highway across serious desert landscape, flanked by classic stripy buttes that, in Westerns, always feature the silhouettes of some hostile Apaches.  We’ve seen no hostiles on this trip but a few bloated road-kills, probably white-tailed deer, that haven’t been cleaned up by the vultures, ravens or coyotes.  The only live animal we spotted was one lonely cow grazing away. For musical accompaniment, we have mostly been featuring Mr Bill’s Wildest Rides, those ones that came on imitation vinyl CDs, which included Roy’s Zaney Janey as we climbed up out of Bear Lake Valley towards Logan Canyon.   A compilation of women’s names, beginning with Joni Mitchell’s Amelia nearly got played all the way through twice.  When radio reception allowed, we had an interlude of Mary’s iPod, with some good long Van Morrison tracks, two David Gilmour tracks, some classical music, a Solid Air and an Over the Hill from John Martyn and a Green Man from Roy. We completed out journey here with a Playlist CD from one of the music mags, so a good variety.  But I run ahead of myself …

 

Yesterday’s report ended abruptly without any description of our musical adventures: forgive me – I ran out of steam and it was about 1:00am.  Anyway, Junior Mack’s Live Adventures was the last CD played yesterday and we finished it off this morning, following our breakfast in the company of an aged Swiss couple, the man working hard at expanding his international vocabulary.  He was confounded by the American pronunciation of Montpelier (Mont-peel-ee-er) rather than the French version that we know and love.  The desk clerk explained that the town, a stopping off point on the Oregon Trail, used to be named after the creek on which it stood but an investor insisted on naming it after his own home town, Montpelier in Vermont.  That too is pronounced the American way, though I bet it was named after the town in France (or if not, perhaps the district in Cheltenham?).  This led to a general discussion of such matters, including the Tetons (American pronunciation Tee-tons), whereas they were named by French trappers with a short e: meaning “breasts”.  In New York, a colleague pronounced Pret a Manger “manger” as in “dog in a manger”.  She was surprised when I told her it was French, and what it meant and how it should be pronounced.  There must be hundreds of similar examples I have noted on my travels but I’ve got(ten!) so used to them I can’t remember them.

 

We set off south on US 89, skirting the beautiful turquoise blue Bear Lake and entering Utah as we did so.  We stopped at a garage there to clean the windscreen and stock up on provisions and then headed on, eventually leaving the valley to climb the hills into the Cache National Forest (God knows how they pronounce that!) and stop at a viewpoint overlooking the lake and the fertile valley around it.  Then onwards and upwards, over 7,000 feet, before descending with the Logan River down its canyon towards Logan City.  This was another breathtaking drive (especially for Mary, whose asthma has started reacting to something, be it thinner air, pine forests or sulphorous hot springs – we don’t know for sure), descending in sweeps and curves beneath craggy cliffs, alongside the tumbling river, amid cottonwoods, pines, birch and willows.  It must have gone on for 30 miles before delivering us into another broad valley that is flanked by snow-capped mountains.  In Logan, I was pleased to spot signs to the Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge at the head of the Great Salt Lake.  Imagine my disappointment to find it closed because it was Sunday… Grrr.  Nevertheless we got splendid views of White Faced Ibis (like Glossy Ibis but with paler faces and bills) and Yellow-headed Blackbirds.  Mary also saw some meadowlarks, with their bright yellow bellies.

 

After this disappointment, we joined the southbound I-15 and headed pell-mell past the Salt Lake conglomeration.  It was not possible to tell where one city ended and another started, particularly with the obscure signage, but again, it went on and on for mile after mile of undistinguished architecture, outof town malls and roadworks.  Any temptation I had previously experienced that Salt Lake City might be interesting evaporated.  As Mary had drifted off to sleep, I of course resisted the urge to wake her up as I just wanted to keep driving, even though I had said we might stop there for a look around. I carried on past it all until I spotted the exit for the east-bound US Highway 6.  We then followed this down another huge canyon, alongside the Union Pacific Railroad (I think), down the Price River, to a small rest area at the bottom of the canyon, where we had a late lunch of yesterday’s leftover chicken and crisps, followed by a muffin and an apple.  The restrooms had disconcertingly low cubicle walls, so anyone so inclined could lean over and see what you were up to.  I don’t think anyone did though…

 

As we ate our lunch we were entertained by a flock of about 20 starling-like birds that we diagnosed as Brown-headed Cowbirds and possibly a couple of Bronze Cowbirds, although our new American bird book was not explicit about whether or not we would find these in this area. We also spotted a small squirrel like creature that looked and posed like a prairie-dog, chirruping and wagging its little tail at the same time.  We thought it probably wasn’t a prairie dog though, as it was all alone.  We did take a picture of it, but as it was in shadow it may still be impossible to diagnose it.  This part of our drive was also in the Valley of the Dinosaurs and apparently there are lots of archeological digs around where they have found plenty of evidence of them.

 

The road led us past some mine-workings and through a small town that began with H and then through Price itself, where we refueled and re-cleaned the windscreen, before heading across the desert, past the buttes previously described, and spilling us onto the I-70 East.  Here we spotted the sign to the Green River Super 8 and made our earlier than usual stop for the night, thinking we might go out and explore the nature reserve/recreation area we had spotted coming in, but I got embroiled in my chess games and this blog and by the time I came up for air it was getting dark and supper time.

 

When we went out to the car just before 8.00 pm it was telling us it was 104 degrees, some big difference from this morning as we left the snow covered mountain areas in just about 60 degrees.  All we can say is thank you who ever inventing air conditioning. This place does not offer much in the way of food outlets, so we ended up in a café/Mexican restaurant that looked a little ropey, but appeared to be about our only choice.  And, as they say, do not be deceived by appearances.  They served us with an excellent Tilapia plate (some sort of meaty white fish) for me and a pair of Chicken Tostadas for Bob, along with some refried beans, salad, rice, tortillas and so on.  Because it is Sunday we could not get any wine (the restaurant was another that did not serve anything other than beers), so we have just popped to the local garage shop and are contenting ourselves with a Busch Beer which tastes vaguely like lage

Day 12

 <?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

Saturday 12th May 2007

 

Mary had another bad night, so we were late up, despite chambermaids regularly knocking our door from 8:00 onwards, till I belatedly put out the Do Not Disturb sign.  For one our bed wasn’t really big enough and the room was too warm, even with the window open.  There was a heater but no air-conditioning.  There was also a small fan in a closet that we didn’t deign to deploy.  After breakfasting in the General Store café across the way, on fruit salads and a disgraceful hot cinnamon roll, we eventually hit the road again at midday.  This time we took it easy, with regular and frequent stops to admire points of interest such as the Kepler Cascade and Lewis Falls, where I saw something that originally looked like a bushy tailed baboon.   I decided it was probably a wolverine or close relative. We headed South out of Yellowstone Park and along the JD Rockefeller Highway into Grand Teton NP, following the Snake River valley alongside the Teton Range, which were spectacular in their coats of snow and glaciers.  Jackson and Jenny Lakes provided excellent views and there were frequent “Turnouts”, with informative notices about the geology of the range and the wildlife, which was mostly notable by its absence (ie we didn’t see a bear, elk or moose all day and only spotted one bison).  At the Southern end of the Grand Teton NP is Jackson Hole, a lush valley caused by the same tectonic shifts that are causing the Tetons to rise (the “restless teenagers of the Rockies”, as one board described them).  Jackson, Wyoming, is a charming little town retaining its 19th century wooden architecture and atmosphere, with plentiful historical notices explaining its past and present.  Its local corvids were ravens, which were in full throaty cry as they flittered around the town square.  At all four entrances to their little park there were elk antler arches.  Apparently they shed these at the end of the season and local scouts go around collecting them and selling them, and then people make arches out of them (we saw some evidence of this as we drove past peoples houses later in the day).

 

After a brief wander around this town, we set off down US Route 89, down the Snake River Canyon, which offered many more spectacular views of the teeming river and the tall canyon walls – much greener than I had imagined it.  Given its full name “The Grand Canyon of the Snake River” according to my map, it was surprisingly ordinary but nevertheless beautiful.  It eventually emerged from the canyon into a flood plain where it is joined by the Salt River and where Palisades Lake lies beneath the Palisade mountains – less spectacular than the Tetons but snowy all the same.  At the top end of the reservoir, there was a bird hide, covering the marshes and willow scrub around the Salt River.  I finally got out my telescope and we enjoyed good views of a Great Blue Heron, some Pelicans, Cinnamon Teal, Canada Geese, Red-Winged Blackbirds, martins, willow flycatchers etc.  The notice by the hide stated that Bald Eagles and Ospreys nested there but we didn’t see any until we drove further south, when I spotted an osprey in a nest on top of a telegraph pole.  A bit further on, another osprey was eating a fish atop another pole.  The Salt River flowed on through a lush green valley called Star valley, according to all the adverts we passed.  We followed it for nearly all its length, rising about 400 feet in theprocess, though this was not noticeable except by reference to the town welcome signs that proudly state population and elevation above sea level: these were all above 6,000 feet and rising.   Temperature was between 70 and 76 most of the time.

 

Eventually the road left Star Valley, climbing up into Bridger National Forest, providing a spectacular view back over the valley and then we crossed into Idaho and descended through several canyons and valleys, alongside small creeks such as Salt Creek and Water Creek.  Much of this terrain reminded me of the A7 along the borders between Edinburgh and Carlisle: big grassy hills and wooded ravines, with the road winding through the bottom of the valley.  We encountered more roadworks where it appeared that one of the hills had slid over the road, and then came into Montpelier, where we found another Super 8, whose car park contained two enormous transporters carrying the seal-wrapped top and bottom halves of a luxury yacht.  The trucks were from Dallas, the escort vehicles from Illinois, California, South Dakota and Texas.  If the trucks are going to try proceeding N up the 89 tomorrow they’ll have serious difficulty.

 

We ate in the Montpelier Grill, where we were served by an 18 year old girl who is about to travel to London.  She didn’t use the word “awesome” once, which was something of a record for our servers.  I did, however, use it appropriately earlier today for some of the views we had of the Tetons.  No wine was available, but we settled for Coors (made from natural Rocky Mountain Water in Golden, Colorado, according to the bottle) for me and Apple Smirnoff for Mary.  She had the chicken platter and I had another buffalo burger.

 

Day 11

Thursday 10th May 2007<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

 

Mary had a bad night last night, not helped by the fact that I was sweating like a pig… enough of the personal details and on to the travelogue.  We first successfully followed the receptionist’s directions to the local post office, where we were able to dispatch our birthday greetings to our granddaughter who will be 6 next week.  We also sent printed versions of the blogs to our mothers, neither of whom is quite up to modern technology.  Printing them was a hassle, thanks to Mary’s innovation of embedding pictures in the documents, and the fact that the motel only had an older version of word and no colour cartridges in the colour printer. The first 3 pictureless blogs were all 40KB or less.  Blog 4 was 4.4MB and Blog 5 2.8MB.  Once converted to earlier versions of Word, they bloated to 70MB and 41MB respectively.  No wonder Sara, our daughter, complained of slow downloads after Mary emailed them to her.  Anyway, I’m putting a stop to that nonsense, but not for the blogs sent to our daughters as they want the pictures and anyway Mary has final editorial say over what I write and vice versa.  The written word will have to be good enough for everyone else until I can find out how to let you have the pictures as well.

 

Now, wherewas I? Oh yes, the staff at the post office were much friendlier and more helpful than the New York ones, but they still told us off for not putting a return address on our envelope.  What exactly would have been the point?  We’re not returning to New York and a return address in England would have been useless.  In the mean time we’re constantly on the move.

 

Anyway, onwards to the West we went, dropping in at “Fort Hays” where they have moved the set for Ft Hays, where several scenes from Dances with Wolves were set.  Apparently it had been filmed some 16 miles away, and the production company had left the scenery where it was, on private land.  Someone had then purchased it all, dismantled it and taken it to its new location.  It is said the Kevin Costner is a stickler for authenticity and they even had to find square nails to put everything together. We then checked out Hill City and then headed North through the Black Hills (via the inevitable roadworks that we keep stumbling upon – this time having to follow a safety car through them) to Deadwood City, scene of Wild Bill Hickock’s demise, shot through the back of the head by Jack McCall, who was acquitted by a hastily convened miners’ court on the grounds that Hickock had killed his brother.  He was subsequently found guilty by a more formal court elsewhere.

 

We had a fascinating 40 minutes reading the material and watching a video in the visitors’ centre, which of course attempted to debunk all the wild west myths and build up the image of a worthy Victorian middle class that has persisted to this day, financing the town’s restoration by legalising gambling and subventing all gambling taxes to the Deadwood Restoration Society.  They also questioned the relationship between Wild Bill and Calamity Jane: apparently she hardly knew him even though she claimed that they had a sexual relationship. They also said she was nowhere near as attractive as any of the actresses that had portrayed her.   We then had a snack in a casino, which was allegedly where Jack McCall had been arrested, (chicken strips for Mary, “Buffalo Burger” for me) and bored ourselves stupid trying to spend a dollar on a fruit machine.  As soon as we thought we’d nearly lost it the bugger went and won nearly all our money back so we had to persevere till it was all lost.

 

Mission accomplished, we headed for Tatanka the place Kevin Costner is supposed to have set up that honors the long gone bison, and also houses a display of the clothes worn in his various films both by him and his co-stars.  Unfortunately it doesn’t open till May 27 – Memorial Day.  Never mind, back through Deadwood we went and took the road through Lead to the Spearfish Canyon, which was a delightful descending drive by a babbling brook (or “creek” as the Americans would have it), down a winding canyon of ever deepening impressiveness, light granite and limestone rocks in rugged display, offset by dark green ponderosa pines and pale green birches, under a mostly bright blue sky.  In a couple of places, man has dammed the stream creating small ponds and then dry river beds for long stretches – rather sad.  Eventually the canyon opens out and softens into a vale where the town of Spearfish nestles and our road rejoined the Interstate 90.

We followed that for a few miles through quite pleasant green grassland, broken by low hills and low red sandstone cliffs or bluffs, then turned off once more to investigate the Vore Buffalo Jump, which turned out to be a small hole in the ground into which ancient American Indian hunters used to drive herds of buffalo, thus achieving a huge return on investment of effort as they could kill lots of bison at one time and used every part of the dead beasts to improve their lives.  The site was used for hunting by several tribes until about 1800, when it became obsolete, as they acquired the horse around that time (wild ponies, introduced by the Spanish, having migrated north across the plains) and this provided scope for better hunting techniques.

 

From there, we penetrated deeper into the Wyoming countryside, through the delightful Bell Fourche valley, to the Devil’s Tower, or, as various Indian tribes had called it, the Bear’s Lodge, an enormous great rock, sticking out of the plain with no apparent rhyme or reason, made of red granite or sandstone, coated in what appear to be lichens and sulphur, giving it varied colours.  It also has a tubular structure.  Its surface is corrugated and each corrugation seems to be a separate column of stone that, every now and then breaks off and tumbles down to the scree of boulders below.  We also managed to photograph an interesting part of the rock that looked like a face. There were lots of rock doves, martins, turkey vultures and robins in evidence, plus a few other species I didn’t manage to recognise or diagnose.  Before we got to it, though, we had to drive carefully past a prairie dog town, where the “little fellows” (as the National Park attendant denoted them) stood and watched us drive past.  The sentries were much more concerned by the vultures than the cars.

 

Now our thoughts were turning to bedtime and food, so we setConnie to guide us to Buffalo, Wyoming, but after a long drive south on US14 and then a further stretch West on I90, we acknowledged the setting of the sun and pulled in at a Super 8 in Gillette, Wyoming.  Our initial impressions of this city are dire: there is an open-cast coal mine nearby and an enormous cement works.   The car park of the motel was completely populated with 4x4 pickup trucks and a gaggle of good ole boys, but we pulled in anyway and got ourselves a good ground-floor room in this establishment, owned by Khan Enterprises Inc.

 

We went out for a meal, stopping off in a liquor store in case we had to put up with another “family restaurant”, which always seem to be alcohol free, and bought a couple of bottles of plonk: the very same Rex Goliath 47 lb Rooster Cabernet Sauvignon, that cost me $14.99 plus sales tax in one New York wine shop and $10.99 in another just down the road, cost only $7.19 plus tax here.  With this insurance policy in place, we started investigating places to eat.  Granny’s Kitchen, opposite, which has been recommended by the lady in the liquor shop, was a dump.  We actually looked inside but no waitress or waiter appeared to welcome us and the whole appearance was bleak, so we legged it and headed up 2nd Ave to Douglas, where we’d been advised there were a couple of decent places.  As we began to despair of finding anywhere, we lit upon the Prime Rib Restaurant and Blue Martini Wine Bar and chanced our arm there.  From the outside it didn’t look good but it claimed a few local awards … It turned out to have a comprehensive wine list that went on for several pages and included several bottles for over $1,000: indeed at least three cost $1,400.  We settled for the Wild Horse Paso Robles Cabernet Sauvignon for a mere $27.  Perfectly potable it proved too, accompanying a starter of mushrooms stuffed with crabmeat and cheese, followed by a fillet steak topped with black peppercorns and mango chutney for Bob and a halibut steak for Mary.  The steak was a bit overdone for “medium rare” but only marginally so and was wonderfully tender, if a bit over-powered by the sauce.  The vegetables, baby carrots and cauliflower, were excellent: still crisp, with not a trace of sogginess.  In line with past diners at the restaurant we signed the label on our bottle of wine to be displayed amongst the many others around the restaurant. Our waitress had recently moved here from Denver to be with her fiancé: not a choice I think she’ll find easy to palate, but I could be wrong.  Maybe there is a vigorous cultural scene in Gillette but it is not nearly as visible as in Sioux Falls or Rapid City, where at least the towns had some pretensions towards street art and architecture.  Here there seems to be nothing worth keeping…

 

Well goodness knows what has gone wrong

Not sure what is going on here, but I appear to have added the same day more than once.  Have deleted one day, but left the two with comments. 

 

Thank you to those who have visited my blog and those who have commented

Day 10

Thursday 10th May 2007<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

 

Mary had a bad night last night, not helped by the fact that I was sweating like a pig… enough of the personal details and on to the travelogue.  We first successfully followed the receptionist’s directions to the local post office, where we were able to dispatch our birthday greetings to our granddaughter who will be 6 next week.  We also sent printed versions of the blogs to our mothers, neither of whom is quite up to modern technology.  Printing them was a hassle, thanks to Mary’s innovation of embedding pictures in the documents, and the fact that the motel only had an older version of word and no colour cartridges in the colour printer. The first 3 pictureless blogs were all 40KB or less.  Blog 4 was 4.4MB and Blog 5 2.8MB.  Once converted to earlier versions of Word, they bloated to 70MB and 41MB respectively.  No wonder Sara, our daughter, complained of slow downloads after Mary emailed them to her.  Anyway, I’m putting a stop to that nonsense, but not for the blogs sent to our daughters as they want the pictures and anyway Mary has final editorial say over what I write and vice versa.  The written word will have to be good enough for everyone else until I can find out how to let you have the pictures as well.

 

Now, where was I? Oh yes, the staff at the post office were much friendlier and more helpful than the New York ones, but they still told us off for not putting a return address on our envelope.  What exactly would have been the point?  We’re not returning to New York and a return address in England would have been useless.  In the mean time we’re constantly on the move.

 

Anyway, onwards to the West we went, dropping in at “Fort Hays” where they have moved the set for Ft Hays, where several scenes from Dances with Wolves were set.  Apparently it had been filmed some 16 miles away, and the production company had left the scenery where it was, on private land.  Someone had then purchased it all, dismantled it and taken it to its new location.  It is said the Kevin Costner is a stickler for authenticity and they even had to find square nails to put everything together. We then checked out Hill City and then headed North through the Black Hills (via the inevitable roadworks that we keep stumbling upon – this time having to follow a safety car through them) to Deadwood City, scene of Wild Bill Hickock’s demise, shot through the back of the head by Jack McCall, who was acquitted by a hastily convened miners’ court on the grounds that Hickock had killed his brother.  He was subsequently found guilty by a more formal court elsewhere.

 

We had a fascinating 40 minutes reading the material and watching a video in the visitors’ centre, which of course attempted to debunk all the wild west myths and build up the image of a worthy Victorian middle class that has persisted to this day, financing the town’s restoration by legalising gambling and subventing all gambling taxes to the Deadwood Restoration Society.  They also questioned the relationship between Wild Bill and Calamity Jane: apparently she hardly knew him even though she claimed that they had a sexual relationship. They also said she was nowhere near as attractive as any of the actresses that had portrayed her.   We then had a snack in a casino, which was allegedly where Jack McCall had been arrested, (chicken strips for Mary, “Buffalo Burger” for me) and bored ourselves stupid trying to spend a dollar on a fruit machine.  As soon as we thought we’d nearly lost it the bugger went and won nearly all our money back so we had to persevere till it was all lost.

 

Mission accomplished, we headed for Tatanka the place Kevin Costner is supposed to have set up that honors the long gone bison, and also houses a display of the clothes worn in his various films both by him and his co-stars.  Unfortunately it doesn’t open till May 27 – Memorial Day.  Never mind, back through Deadwood we went and took the road through Lead to the Spearfish Canyon, which was a delightful descending drive by a babbling brook (or “creek” as the Americans would have it), down a winding canyon of ever deepening impressiveness, light granite and limestone rocks in rugged display, offset by dark green ponderosa pines and pale green birches, under a mostly bright blue sky.  In a couple of places, man has dammed the stream creating small ponds and then dry river beds for long stretches – rather sad.  Eventually the canyon opens out and softens into a vale where the town of Spearfish nestles and our road rejoined the Interstate 90.

We followed that for a few miles through quite pleasant green grassland, broken by low hills and low red sandstone cliffs or bluffs, then turned off once more to investigate the Vore Buffalo Jump, which turned out to be a small hole in the ground into which ancient American Indian hunters used todrive herds of buffalo, thus achieving a huge return on investment of effort as they could kill lots of bison at one time and used every part of the dead beasts to improve their lives.  The site was used for hunting by several tribes until about 1800, when it became obsolete, as they acquired the horse around that time (wild ponies, introduced by the Spanish, having migrated north across the plains) and this provided scope for better hunting techniques.

 

From there, we penetrated deeper into the Wyoming countryside, through the delightful Bell Fourche valley, to the Devil’s Tower, or, as various Indian tribes had called it, the Bear’s Lodge, an enormous great rock, sticking out of the plain with no apparent rhyme or reason, made of red granite or sandstone, coated in what appear to be lichens and sulphur, giving it varied colours.  It also has a tubular structure.  Its surface is corrugated and each corrugation seems to be a separate column of stone that, every now and then breaks off and tumbles down to the scree of boulders below.  We also managed to photograph an interesting part of the rock that looked like a face. There were lots of rock doves, martins, turkey vultures and robins in evidence, plus a few other species I didn’t manage to recognise or diagnose.  Before we got to it, though, we had to drive carefully past a prairie dog town, where the “little fellows” (as the National Park attendant denoted them) stood and watched us drive past.  The sentries were much more concerned by the vultures than the cars.

 

Now our thoughts were turning to bedtime and food, so we set Connie to guide us to Buffalo, Wyoming, but after a long drive south on US14 and then a further stretch West on I90, we acknowledged the setting of the sun and pulled in at a Super 8 in Gillette, Wyoming.  Our initial impressions of this city are dire: there is an open-cast coal mine nearby and an enormous cement works.   The car park of the motel was completely populated with 4x4 pickup trucks and a gaggle of good ole boys, but we pulled in anyway and got ourselves a good ground-floor room in this establishment, owned by Khan Enterprises Inc.

 

We went out for a meal, stopping off in a liquor store in case we had to put up with another “family restaurant”, which always seem to be alcohol free, and bought a couple of bottles of plonk: the very same Rex Goliath 47 lb Rooster Cabernet Sauvignon, that cost me $14.99 plus sales tax in one New York wine shop and $10.99 in another just down the road, cost only $7.19 plus tax here.  With this insurance policy in place, we started investigating places to eat.  Granny’s Kitchen, opposite, which has been recommended by the lady in the liquor shop, was a dump.  We actually looked inside but no waitress or waiter appeared to welcome us and the whole appearance was bleak, so we legged it and headed up 2nd Ave to Douglas, where we’d been advised there were a couple of decent places.  As we began to despair of finding anywhere, we lit upon the Prime Rib Restaurant and Blue Martini Wine Bar and chanced our arm there.  From the outside it didn’t look good but it claimed a few local awards … It turned out to have a comprehensive wine list that went on for several pages and included several bottles for over $1,000: indeed at least three cost $1,400.  We settled for the Wild Horse Paso Robles Cabernet Sauvignon for a mere $27.  Perfectly potable it proved too, accompanying a starter of mushrooms stuffed with crabmeat and cheese, followed by a fillet steak topped with black peppercorns and mango chutney for Bob and a halibut steak for Mary.  The steak was a bit overdone for “medium rare” but only marginally so and was wonderfully tender, if a bit over-powered by the sauce.  The vegetables, baby carrots and cauliflower, were excellent: still crisp, with not a trace of sogginess.  In line with past diners at the restaurant we signed the label on our bottle of wine to be displayed amongst the many others around the restaurant. Our waitress had recently moved here from Denver to be with her fiancé: not a choice I think she’ll find easy to palate, but I could be wrong.  Maybe there is a vigorous cultural scene in Gillette but it is not nearly as visible as in Sioux Falls or Rapid City, where at least the towns had some pretensions towards street art and architecture.  Here there seems to be nothing worth keeping…

Day 10

Thursday 10th May 2007<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

 

Mary had a bad night last night, not helped by the fact that I was sweating like a pig… enough of the personal details and on to the travelogue.  We first successfully followed the receptionist’s directions to the local post office, where we were able to dispatch our birthday greetings to our granddaughter who will be 6 next week.  We also sent printed versions of the blogs to our mothers, neither of whom is quite up to modern technology.  Printing them was a hassle, thanks to Mary’s innovation of embedding pictures in the documents, and the fact that the motel only had an older version of word and no colour cartridges in the colour printer. The first 3 pictureless blogs were all 40KB or less.  Blog 4 was 4.4MB and Blog 5 2.8MB.  Once converted to earlier versions of Word, they bloated to 70MB and 41MB respectively.  No wonder Sara, our daughter, complained of slow downloads after Mary emailed them to her.  Anyway, I’m putting a stop to that nonsense, but not for the blogs sent to our daughters as they want the pictures and anyway Mary has final editorial say over what I write and vice versa.  The written word will have to be good enough for everyone else until I can find out how to let you have the pictures as well.

 

Now, where was I? Oh yes, the staff at the post office were much friendlier and more helpful than the New York ones, but they still told us off for not putting a return address on our envelope.  What exactly would have been the point?  We’re not returning to New York and a return address in England would have been useless.  In the mean time we’re constantly on the move.

 

Anyway, onwards to the West we went, dropping in at “Fort Hays” where they have moved the set for Ft Hays, where several scenes from Dances with Wolves were set.  Apparently it had been filmed some 16 miles away, and the production company had left the scenery where it was, on private land.  Someone had then purchased it all, dismantled it and taken it to its new location.  It is said the Kevin Costner is a stickler for authenticity and they even had to find square nails to put everything together. We then checked out Hill City and then headed North through the Black Hills (via the inevitable roadworks that we keep stumbling upon – this time having to follow a safety car through them) to Deadwood City, scene of Wild Bill Hickock’s demise, shot through the back of the head by Jack McCall, who was acquitted by a hastily convened miners’ court on the grounds that Hickock had killed his brother.  He was subsequently found guilty by a more formal court elsewhere.

 

We had a fascinating 40 minutes reading the material and watching a video in the visitors’ centre, which of course attempted to debunk all the wild west myths and build up the image of a worthy Victorian middle class that has persisted to this day, financing the town’s restoration by legalising gambling and subventing all gambling taxes to the Deadwood Restoration Society.  They also questioned the relationshipbetween Wild Bill and Calamity Jane: apparently she hardly knew him even though she claimed that they had a sexual relationship. They also said she was nowhere near as attractive as any of the actresses that had portrayed her.   We then had a snack in a casino, which was allegedly where Jack McCall had been arrested, (chicken strips for Mary, “Buffalo Burger” for me) and bored ourselves stupid trying to spend a dollar on a fruit machine.  As soon as we thought we’d nearly lost it the bugger went and won nearly all our money back so we had to persevere till it was all lost.

 

Mission accomplished, we headed for Tatanka the place Kevin Costner is supposed to have set up that honors the long gone bison, and also houses a display of the clothes worn in his various films both by him and his co-stars.  Unfortunately it doesn’t open till May 27 – Memorial Day.  Never mind, back through Deadwood we went and took the road through Lead to the Spearfish Canyon, which was a delightful descending drive by a babbling brook (or “creek” as the Americans would have it), down a winding canyon of ever deepening impressiveness, light granite and limestone rocks in rugged display, offset by dark green ponderosa pines and pale green birches, under a mostly bright blue sky.  In a couple of places, man has dammed the stream creating small ponds and then dry river beds for long stretches – rather sad.  Eventually the canyon opens out and softens into a vale where the town of Spearfish nestles and our road rejoined the Interstate 90.

We followed that for a few miles through quite pleasant green grassland, broken by low hills and low red sandstone cliffs or bluffs, then turned off once more to investigate the Vore Buffalo Jump, which turned out to be a small hole in the ground into which ancient American Indian hunters used to drive herdsof buffalo, thus achieving a huge return on investment of effort as they could kill lots of bison at one time and used every part of the dead beasts to improve their lives.  The site was used for hunting by several tribes until about 1800, when it became obsolete, as they acquired the horse around that time (wild ponies, introduced by the Spanish, having migrated north across the plains) and this provided scope for better hunting techniques.

 

From there, we penetrated deeper into the Wyoming countryside, through the delightful Bell Fourche valley, to the Devil’s Tower, or, as various Indian tribes had called it, the Bear’s Lodge, an enormous great rock, sticking out of the plain with no apparent rhyme or reason, made of red granite or sandstone, coated in what appear to be lichens and sulphur, giving it varied colours.  It also has a tubular structure.  Its surface is corrugated and each corrugation seems to be a separate column of stone that, every now and then breaks off and tumbles down to the scree of boulders below.  We also managed to photograph an interesting part of the rock that looked like a face. There were lots of rock doves, martins, turkey vultures and robins in evidence, plus a few other species I didn’t manage to recognise or diagnose.  Before we got to it, though, we had to drive carefully past a prairie dog town, where the “little fellows” (as the National Park attendant denoted them) stood and watched us drive past.  The sentries were much more concerned by the vultures than the cars.

 

Now our thoughts were turning to bedtime and food, so we set Connie to guide us to Buffalo, Wyoming, but after a long drive south on US14 and then a further stretch West on I90, we acknowledged the setting of the sun and pulled in at a Super 8 in Gillette, Wyoming.  Our initial impressions of this city are dire: there is an open-cast coal mine nearby and an enormous cement works.   The car park of the motel was completely populated with 4x4 pickup trucks and a gaggle of good ole boys, but we pulled in anyway and got ourselves a good ground-floor room in this establishment, owned by Khan Enterprises Inc.

 

We went out for a meal, stopping off in a liquor store in case we had to put up with another “family restaurant”, which always seem to be alcohol free, and bought a couple of bottles of plonk: the very same Rex Goliath 47 lb Rooster Cabernet Sauvignon, that cost me $14.99 plus sales tax in one New York wine shop and $10.99 in another just down the road, cost only $7.19 plus tax here.  With this insurance policy in place, we started investigating places to eat.  Granny’s Kitchen, opposite, which has been recommended by the lady in the liquor shop, was a dump.  We actually looked inside but no waitress or waiter appeared to welcome us and the whole appearance was bleak, so we legged it and headed up 2nd Ave to Douglas, where we’d been advised there were a couple of decent places.  As we began to despair of finding anywhere, we lit upon the Prime Rib Restaurant and Blue Martini Wine Bar and chanced our arm there.  From the outside it didn’t look good but it claimed a few local awards … It turned out to have a comprehensive wine list that went on for several pages and included several bottles for over $1,000: indeed at least three cost $1,400.  We settled for the Wild Horse Paso Robles Cabernet Sauvignon for a mere $27.  Perfectly potable it proved too, accompanying a starter of mushrooms stuffed with crabmeat and cheese, followed by a fillet steak topped with black peppercorns and mango chutney for Bob and a halibut steak for Mary.  The steak was a bit overdone for “medium rare” but only marginally so and was wonderfully tender, if a bit over-powered by the sauce.  The vegetables, baby carrots and cauliflower, were excellent: still crisp, with not a trace of sogginess.  In line with past diners at the restaurant we signed the label on our bottle of wine to be displayed amongst the many others around the restaurant. Our waitress had recently moved here from Denver to be with her fiancé: not a choice I think she’ll find easy to palate, but I could be wrong.  Maybe there is a vigorous cultural scene in Gillette but it is not nearly as visible as in Sioux Falls or Rapid City, where at least the towns had some pretensions towards street art and architecture.  Here there seems to be nothing worth keeping…

Day 9

Wednesday 9th May 2007 <?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

 

Today was our first day devoted solely to sight-seeing.  After breakfast, we booked another night in this extremely cheap but well-appointed motel, one of the America’s Best Value Inn chain, and then set off in search of Mt Rushmore, of the four presidential heads.  This was found with no difficulty, given the extensive signage on the way, and through beautiful hilly country.  The dark green conifers that I presume lend the Black Hills their name were leavened by fresh green growth on deciduous trees and outcrops of rugged granite. 

 

 

The road winds attractively through 17 miles of such country before arriving at the fabled mountain, which has a new visitors’ center, packed with patriotic themes such as the reasons for the carving of the heads, the great deeds of the presidents represented and the sacrifices of those responsible for establishing and extending America’s role in promoting freedom throughout the world. 

 

The four presidents are Washington, who founded the country, Jefferson, who “had the foresight” to make the Louisiana Purchase, Teddy Roosevelt, who established the National Park system and otherwise promoted rugged individualism, and Abraham Lincoln, who restored unity to the Union.  They were very picturesque in the cloudless sky, and set in relief by the mid-day sun, especially their eyes, which were very cunningly carved.  There was a beautifully filmed but rather leadenly produced and narrated film about the other side of Mount Rushmore – the natural beauty of the Black Hills and the ecological importance thereof. Mary also watched what she told me was an interesting video on how the carvings came about and the work that went into them over a period of some 40 or so years.

 

A parade of pillars carrying the flags of every member state and territory, together with their dates of admittance to the Union, where relevant, leads to a viewing platform above an amphitheatre and exhibition center.  This provided several photo-opportunities.  We also hit the information center where we bought 2 DVDs and a book about Crazy Horse.  The DVDs were one about the Civil War and one about Mt Rushmore, Crazy Horse and the Black Hills.

 

After lunching on quite a good chilli for me and a rather inferior “chicken sandwich” for Mary, we left Rushmore and headed for Crazy Horse, stopping on the way to admire the profile of George Washington from a valley beside the mountain. 

 

 

Crazy Horse was another 17 miles into the Black Hills, towards Custer Forest.  This is a magnificent piece of work in progress, supported by a superb visitors’ center, consisting of exhibitions about Crazy Horse’s life and death, the lives of Sioux and other Plains Indians in general, and some of the other defenders of the Indian way of life such as Chief Joseph of the Nez Perce Indians of Idaho.  Similar to the Mt Rushmore exhibition, the Crazy Horse exhibition spends a lot of its capital on the tale of the sculptor who was invited to undertake the project by the tribal elders of the Lakota people.  He was a Polish American orphan, called Korczak Ziolkowski (visit http://www.crazyhorse.org/story/korczak.shtml for more information)  who had also worked for the lead sculptor of the Mt Rushmore carvings.  He began with virtually nothing ($174) and, with the eventual help of his wife and 10 children, the Sioux people and the generosity of donors, got as far as completing various models and blasting several thousand tons out of the mountain.  He died in 1982, 33 years after starting the project, in the initial stages on his own, and has been honoured by the Indians with the name Brave Heart, we think. Crazy Horse’s face was only completed by his family in 1998.  Now they’re working on blocking out the horse’s head and Crazy Horse’s  head feather (which will be 40 foot high).  The whole sculpture will be over 555 feet which will be taller than the Washington monument, which will make it the tallest memorial in America. It’s a grand tale of bloody-mindedness and devotion to a quasi-religious task in the face of almost insuperable problems.  They refuse to take any government funding and insist that their work remain a charitable act of faith toward the Indian peoples.

 

Some of the art on display was wonderful but we would have no way of getting it home safely with all our other stuff, so we didn’t buy any.  I did, however, have a pleasant chat with the Lakota author of a book about Crazy Horse, Ed McGaa, otherwise known as Man Eagle, and his daughter.  We ended up getting an extra pictographic autograph in the book and a warm handshake from this former Marine pilot.  Mary once more kindly paid for the book, as I was still cashless in the absence of any comforting acknowledgement from my bank of my communications concerning invalid transactions. We also took the bus tour to the bottom of the monument giving us another pictorial advantage, and also where we watched Marmots carvorting around and one sunning itself on the path.

 

Of course I had always fancied myself with an obedient partner so was pleased to be able to take this photo!!!

 

On the way home we popped into the Dances with Wolves (Fort Hayes) film set, but unfortunately the camera batteries had finally died after all the photos that had been taken, so we will try and re-visit there in the morning before we set off for pastures new.

 

Back down the mountains, in Rapid City, we stopped at a Wells Fargo drive-thru ATM and I risked my card once more.  This time it meekly coughed up my cash, so presumably whatever problem I’d had in Washington has now been resolved.

 

Today, our journeys were musicless, short as they were, through scenery that engaged us enough.  Yesterday, we were accompanied across S Dakota by John Martyn’s Grace and Danger, Bright Eyes’ Casadega, which fails to live up to its billing as Oberst’s answer to Blonde on Blonde, and SaRon Crenshaw’s Real Live in New York blues workouts, among other musical treats.  Having failed to negotiate the correct turn onto the I90 we ended up in Explorer Street and drove around a housing development of varying degrees of wealth and deprivation.

 

Tomorrow, we’ll head north to Deadwood for more tourist attractions (including Kevin Costner’s Tatanka) and maybe penetrate into Wyoming, destination Yellowstone – but that’s still some way away.  I expect that Mary’s iPod will rule the musical agenda once more.