June 3, 2015

Got a good start this morning and made good time. We only had 149 miles to go and even with a few stops we were at Devils Tower in NE Wyoming by noon.

We have never been to this part of the state before, so we were looking forward to driving through here. Very much like western Nebraska, eastern Wyoming is rolling hills and is mostly pasture land. Lots of cattle and also saw lots of Antelope. Wyoming is more rocky and has sink holes exposing red clay.

We had great weather today, sunny to partly cloudy with temps that hovered around 70 - 75 with a nice breeze. However, we now have rain headed our way...again...and radar shows that there is a couple of small thunder storms embedded in the rain. The area we drove through today doesn't seem to have had as much rain effects as Nebraska had. The streams and rivers seem to be running at more normal levels...as seen through the eyes of a tourist who has never been here before. So...I wouldn't take that to the bank if I were you.

Devils Tower is fascinating to me. We have seen many rock formations in our travels all over the U.S., but none like this. Rock is generally rounded, the Tower is long ribbon like rock, almost reminds me of dreads. You can see where some of these ribbons of rock have fallen, and behind the fallen is another ribbon, so it appears that the Tower is the same all the way through! 

As we got closer to the Tower, the landscape changed pretty quickly from rolling plains to mountains with 7% grades. Good news, the truck pulled the grades like a dream, no alarms, no weird codes, just a smooth turbo clicking through the gears like it was designed to do!!! We are very pleased!!

At the base of the Tower in a large flat grassy area is a huge Prairie Dog settlement. We have seen these before, but the timing is great as the babies are out! Running, rolling and imitating Mom and Dad. Throwing their little heads back and screeching as loud as they can. I can't hear them, but that's what Phil says they are doing. Anyway you look at it they are just so cute and we sat and watched them play for awhile.