A Jurassic Experience

The drive getting to Greybull, Wyoming was definitely not uneventful……

We made a looooong climb up the Bighorn Mountains and then you know the saying, “What goes up must come down.” And boy did we come down through a very white-knuckle-on-the-steering-wheel experience.

Now don’t get me wrong, I’ve driven some pretty nail-biting twists and curves before. Especially coming out of Death Valley. But this was definitely no picnic either. I really like to avoid steep grades and twisting roads but sometimes there isn’t much choice. And sometimes I don’t do my homework well.

I didn’t see this mountain pass listed on the  app I use to monitor them. And I failed to pull out my Mountain Directory book and take a peek. I looked afterwards and saw they actually refer to the pass as “Oh My God Hill”. And for good reason. I’m not sure if I took US-14 (I think that’s the one we took into Greybull) or US-14A. However this is the sign at the junction.

We managed to snake our way down the hairpin curves without flying off the edge (yes, it was that bad). The upside was the scenery in the mountains. It was a beautiful mountain pass that dumped us off in the middle of a little town known as Greybull, Wyoming.

There wasn’t much around for miles and miles and miles. But I wanted somewhere to rest our weary traveling souls for Mother’s Day weekend and a few days beyond. So Greybull it was. We stayed at a little KOA campground. I usually avoid them like the plague but there wasn’t much to be had.

They tend to be pretty expensive and the sites are usually tight. But most of the ones I’ve been to are very well maintained. And I didn’t want to take my chances in the middle of nowhere on Mother’s Day. There were only a couple of us in the campground. At times, we were the only ones.

But we found things to occupy ourselves

We were able to check out a stone school that was frequented by kids back in the day. It still had covered wagons in the front. It was pretty cool. We also took our adventurous selves down a dirt road to check out the Red Gulch Dinosaur Tracksite.

According to the posted information, the discovery at Red Gulch could change the current theories on the Middle Jurassic Period. It was surreal to be able to get down on the surface where all the dinosaur prints were preserved and walk around. There were so many footprints. We hiked a little bit and took in the pretty scenery.

We came across our first encounter with a rattlesnake in the wild. My daughter was running and nearly stepped on it, yikes! A follower identified it as a prairie rattlesnake. That sucker blended right in and rightly so. We quietly walked away and left it to finish sunning.

We also saw pronghorn antelope and lots and lots of cattle grazing on the BLM land. It was a real treat to spot all the babies.

Our first experience with food in Greybull wasn’t the best. It didn’t make for a good Mother’s Day dinner. But the pizza place in town was awesome.

Oh No!

It’s snowing, in summer! Yep folks, you read that right. We were all hitched up and ready to roll on out of Greybull.

One of the camp hosts asks, “Are you headed towards Yellowstone?”

I reply, “Why yes, we sure are.”

“Are you aware that all the roads heading into Yellowstone are closed?” He asks me.

“You’re kidding, right?” I reply with a chuckle.

He pulls me over to his computer and shows me the figure eight that makes up Yellowstone’s roads. They’re all red, red, red! I knew we were taking a chance coming pre-season. But heck, the rates were so much better at the campground and I was trying hard to miss the major onslaught of people the park draws.

I wrestled around with several ideas in order to formulate a new plan. I really didn’t want to hang out in Greybull any longer. So I figured we’d head a little further towards Yellowstone and get an hour or two ahead. That way, whenever the roads opened back up, we’d be ready to go.

And that’s what we did. We nestled into a beautiful state park called Buffalo Bill State Park in the little town of Cody, Wyoming. It was supposed to be a one night stay which turned into two because it snowed again!! We stayed all warm and toasty and watched the beautiful birds play outside our window. We also stocked up on groceries.