Tour de Wyoming   2003

 

                                                                                          By  Laurie Allshouse

 

     Thursday, July 17, we headed to Wyoming for our first state ride outside of Oklahoma.  We drove through Kansas this trip, instead of the usual Amarillo to Raton, NM route, and it actually took less time.  We spotted Alloway’s Restaurant west of Hays, Kansas near Ellis and wondered if it was owned by any of our relatives.  We left home at 6:20 a.m. and pulled into Wheatland, WY at 6:30 p.m.

 

Here is the Wyoming State line, it should say.
Entering "God's Country"

 

 

Laurie spent a lot of time here with her grandmother in this house in Wheatland, Wyoming. 
The house has had some additions, including a three car garage.

 


 

This is a picture of the lake at Glendo, Wyoming

 

 

This is a picture of a "Jackalope" on a hill outside of Douglas, Wyoming,
 Douglas is the Jackalope capitol of the world.  They were everywhere this year.
You have to watch closely for them in the early morning as they come out just after sunrise.
I worked with a guy named Jim King,  He shot one during hunting season in 1988 and had it recorded  in the Boone and Crocket book.
 My other good friend Mr. Bob " Bull Dog" Williams had the great title of being the Jackalope jerky distributor for the Central Region.

 

 

Here is Laurie out side of the world famous Yellowstone Drug Store in beautiful downtown Shoshoni, Wyoming.
 We always stop for the best malts.

 

We arrived in Riverton about 10:30 a.m. on Friday morning.  Our room wasn’t ready so we drove some area roads to scout out a route for our Saturday morning ride with Leonard.  We swung by the motel one more time and spotted Leonard pulling out.  He got there about 11:30.  We went to lunch at Taco John’s and then drove out to Sinks Canyon.  The roaring creek comes down this canyon and disappears into an underground cave.  Several miles further down the road, the original water plus some more comes out at what is called the Rise.  Tests have been run and the water takes several hours to come out.  No one knows where the water disappears to inside the mountain or the path it takes before coming out.

     We hadn’t heard from Mother and Jacob, her grandson, by 6:00 so we started to leave to eat and here they showed up.  We went across the street to the Broker.  It wasn’t very good.  There was a car and motorcycle show in town that started with a street burning and parade.  The cars would burn their tires to make one pass on the street before starting the parade.  We walked around after eating and ran into a loaded cycle tourist.  He was from Fort Worth and would cycle one state a year.  This year he started in Steamboat Junction, CO and rode to Billings, MT.  After Cody, he was going over Dead Indian Pass to ride to Billings.  It was about 8:00 p.m. and he was riding on to Shoshoni  (22 miles) before calling it a night.

                                                  

Click thumbnail for larger view of photo. Captions below

 

In the city park was a wooden mountain man

Behind me was a wooden bear.

The Sinks Canyon; the water goes into the side of this mountain and comes back out down the road about 2 miles.

I was here back in the mid 70's , It hasn't changed much.

The creek going into the Sinks.

A closer view of the mouth. It was about 70 degrees here and it was 90+ degrees in Riverton.

This is how clear the water is here. It comes right off the mountains above here.

This tells about how and why the water flows this way.

More info

Leonard and Laurie standing by the rail overlooking the creek

We are going to the visiter center to look around.

Here is where the water comes out of the mountain side.

Here is the fish that you can feed. You can't do any fishing here though. Maybe these fish are the same exact ones that I fed in the 70's.

What a great habitat if you are a fish!

Leonard and Laurie looking at the fish below.

Supper at the Broker, it was alright.

The start of a small town parade with motorcycles, Mostly all Harleys.

The start of the old car section of the parade.

This old Chevy brought back some memories

My dad had an old 49 Ford pickup like the brown one here. I am sure ours didn't run near as fast though.

A "pink" 56 Ford.

A 57 Ford in front and a 59 Ford

Boy, this truck sounded like it would go.

A pink 56 Crown Vic Ford car. Pam Harris in Cody had one of these when my dad worked for Harris Construction.

This is a bar stool with a steering wheel & pedals. I feel it could come in useful during happy hour.

Here the girl on the back of a motorcycle has to get a hotdog in her mouth while riding under the bar. They had a hot dog hooked to a string that was dangling. I had to watch to understand what the heck was going on. One young lady got the hotdog everytime. What talent you can find in the small towns of Wyoming!

 

 

 

 

Saturday

    Saturday morning the Three Musketeers (Jim, Leonard and I) headed out at 6 a.m. for a little pre-tour ride.  It was nice and cool.  We headed towards Lander and discovered a bike trail running along the highway.  We rode it to the end and then headed back to take a loop ride on Arapahoe Road.  We spotted 22 hot air balloons and as we rode back into Riverton, we joined the chase cars following the balloons.  A bike makes a great chase vehicle.  We saw one balloon land and take on a new tank of fuel before lifting into the skies again.

                                                   

 Click thumbnail for larger view of photo. Captions below

 

We were riding south of Riverton and I saw one lone Hot Air Ballon in the air.

We stopped so Laurie and Leonard could see it.

15 minutes later the sky was getting full of ballons

laurie and Leonard

They are getting closer

We are just watching the beauty of the morning in Wonderful Wyoming.

We head back to town so we could get closer. We were balloon chasing in Riverton.

These are sitting down

This one changed gas bottles and went back up for more cruising. What a nice morning to be home in Wyoming.

 

Now to the start of the Tour