The Year of Months

 I lived in Kemmerer, Wyoming in 1978, working in a coal mine. Back then, when you entered the state, the sign said "Welcome to BIG Wonderful Wyoming!" It is a big, big state, and much of it is wonderful. I have fond memories of the place. Now, my oldest brother lives there with his wife, (Not in Kemmerer, but in Lander, which seems to be much more civilized) and it was just great to see them. Ah, but the sign. Now it looks like this: Let's zoom in a little: Personally, I liked the old sign better. A lot of Wyoming looks like this: That is a loading silo for the US's second biggest coal mine - Black Thunder, originally owned by ARCO, now by Arch Coal. Different mine, different technique than the one I worked it. But just incredibly huge. You drive through the mine and it just goes on forever. But there is a lot of this, too: We stopped at the Tourist Bureau in Casper to get some state maps (yes, we have been using hardcopy maps, our atlas, as well as The Google Lady o

 Google has not regretted out Blogger, but some of the things they do to it make me think that they want to. For example, they have now switched the order in which photos are posted, so these are all in reverse chronological order. So here we go! A herd of bison in the Custer State Park. You can get up close and personal They are something to see. Makes you think it was 150 years ago. They also have burros that were "set free" about 50 years ago Here are "The Needles" or "The Cathedral" just beautiful And even more beauty! The Black Hills I guess this is a point, but then again, from whom did the Lakota steal them from? This monument seems so appropriate for this point in time. The end of our hike You can see how a tree root digs into, and breaks the schist rocks here Amazing On our hike

 

 The Badlands are really something to see. Soft rock, hard rock, everything is eroding. Quite a thing Oddly beautiful And Prairie Dogs, too. And buffalo After the Badlands, we went on a very short hike. Only one mile Back by sunset.