Devils Tower National Monument
Barb and Bob pulled out this morning and invited us to see them in Illinois and Florida if we were ever in their area.
We were heading to Devils Tower today (finally!). Barb and Bob had told us about a shortcut we should take. it's a dirt/gravel road approximately 8-10 miles in length and about 15 miles shorter than the alternative. Even though we had a bit of rain last night, we thought we'd try it.
We got about 6 miles. Not too bad, a little soft in spots, but you just had to keep moving. That was working out fine, until we ran into a herd of cattle, complete with running and jumping calves, all over one particularly soft section of the road. Not wanting to go on and risk having to stop and get stuck, we made the decision to turn around, go back, and take the longer route to Devils Tower.
Devils Tower was the first national monument proclaimed in our country.
We took the 1.3 mile hike around the tower, enabling us to see it from all sides.
It was a nice walk with intermittent shading provided by the Ponderosa Pines. The bark on these trees is very interesting, many thin layers, shaped like modern puzzle pieces stacked one on top of the other. The tower was neat to see, and seeing it up close in person, you can understand the legend of many Indian people of a great bear clawing at it's surface. We did happen to see one rock climber today, but he was too far up the tower for us to get a good picture of him.
After our hike around the tower, we drove over to the parks campground. We hadn't been sure if we would have been able to get our 40' motorhome in there. After driving thru it, we saw plenty of sites where we could have fit. We also saw more Escapees and we briefly chatted with a few of them before continuing on our way.
Our next stop was "Prairie Dog Town" in the park. It's basically a large meadow with numerous prairie dog mounds.
We were heading to Devils Tower today (finally!). Barb and Bob had told us about a shortcut we should take. it's a dirt/gravel road approximately 8-10 miles in length and about 15 miles shorter than the alternative. Even though we had a bit of rain last night, we thought we'd try it.
We got about 6 miles. Not too bad, a little soft in spots, but you just had to keep moving. That was working out fine, until we ran into a herd of cattle, complete with running and jumping calves, all over one particularly soft section of the road. Not wanting to go on and risk having to stop and get stuck, we made the decision to turn around, go back, and take the longer route to Devils Tower.
Devils Tower was the first national monument proclaimed in our country.
We took the 1.3 mile hike around the tower, enabling us to see it from all sides.
It was a nice walk with intermittent shading provided by the Ponderosa Pines. The bark on these trees is very interesting, many thin layers, shaped like modern puzzle pieces stacked one on top of the other. The tower was neat to see, and seeing it up close in person, you can understand the legend of many Indian people of a great bear clawing at it's surface. We did happen to see one rock climber today, but he was too far up the tower for us to get a good picture of him.
After our hike around the tower, we drove over to the parks campground. We hadn't been sure if we would have been able to get our 40' motorhome in there. After driving thru it, we saw plenty of sites where we could have fit. We also saw more Escapees and we briefly chatted with a few of them before continuing on our way.
Our next stop was "Prairie Dog Town" in the park. It's basically a large meadow with numerous prairie dog mounds.
They were cute and quite talkative as Shelly snapped some pictures.
posted by Bobby and Shelly Evans @ 9:07 PM
0 Comments
Links to this post
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
Links to this post:
Create a Link
<< Home