Day 16, Wyoming

Julie, Danny Jonathan, Caroline, Bob, Dick

Yesterday’s blog was posted before the best event of the day, dinner with cousins Jonathan and Caroline.  The Walnut Brew Pub was a perfect place to spend a few hours catching up on old and new times.  New stuff, fascinating – Jonathan, wife Julie and son Danny (son James away in college) have participated for years with the Rocky Mountain Revels, a nation wide group dedicated to celebrating the shortest day of the year (Dec 22ish) in some country theme.  Google it if you’re interested.

Caroline is a vet, with hew own business, the Traveling Vet, a mobile service that has served her very well in the area North of Denver for many years, a specialty she recognized as a need early in her practice.  On the spectacular side, she is the lead Vet in the Alaska Iditarod dog sled race.  And has managed to capture positions in equivalent races in Russia and South Africa of all places.  Incredible, and she does it intermixing with her vet business to keep her local customers happy.

In our childhood lives, we talked of things we remember as children together.  Those times were few and fleeting, and faint of memory.  It’s so nice to be reconnected again

In a big, empty land, still it's someone's home

The drive, was much better than yesterday!! Both cousins said there was some snow on Trail Ridge.  We’d already decided it was too cold at altitude to cross the Rockies, so we had decided on a detour North, around the great mountains.  Morning departure was cool, but partly sunny, growing to totally sunny as the day progressed.  Screaming up the freeway out of Boulder, a blue and a silver projectile, shoulder to shoulder with fanatic iron cages rushing to offices and places unknown, was a vigorous way to start the day.

  The rest of the day was a grinding drive across Wyoming.  I’ll call it a bonus as Wyoming was not on the original plan.  Despite it’s solitary lonesomeness, it’s a vast and beautiful land in it’s own right.  Three hundred plus miles today, all sunshine like it should be, ended in Rock Springs, WY.  We both love the feel of he bikes, the smells and the sensations, but it feels so good when the wheels stop turning at the end of a day.

Two coyotes walked into a bar...

It was a day of greatness in this great land, reminiscent of six years ago, cruising through Iowa.  On that trip, touched by the drive through the heartland, Little Joe and I sang “God Bless America” until our voices gave out.  Today, the same patriotic feeling engulfed us, scanning the prairies of this great land.  We sang one of Joe’s favorites, “Bury me not on the lone prairie”.  I love it too, and I think I’ll commit it to a violin lesson when I resume in October.  Joe’s such a card.  He got to telling ‘coyote’ jokes and, well, we don’t have time or space here.

Two

Oh bury me not, on the lone prairie, where the ..

3800 miles to date. Tomorrow, on to Utah.  Dick’s still with me.  He decided at Boulder to continue to Ogden to visit a classmate he hasn’t seen since the ancient 60’s.  Then he’ll turn south and east for San Antonio.  He made me feel good today.  Contemplating a trip of this magnitude, especially a couple of years ago with serious health issues, was inconceivable.  When it finally became achievable early this year, it was not without intrepidation that Dick committed to go.  I remember the same feeling six years, ago, first long haul trip on a motorcycle.  What if…. Etc.  We stood on the prairies of Wyoming today and he commented “I can’t believe we’re here” and “It’s so great to be beyond the fear and concern, to be able to do such things.”  Makes my heart happy.