Day 20 -- Where the deer and the antelope roam . . .

July 9, 2005

ROUTE: Casper to Lusk, WY

DISTANCE: 108 miles

WINDS: Headwinds all day

WEATHER: Hot at start, hotter (101F) at finish

TERRAIN: High rolling plains; no shade, several miles long, gradual climbs

TOTAL CLIMBING: 2,860 feet

RIDE OVERVIEW: Whatta day! I was supposed to be in the van all day providing SAG, but Karen let me ride the first 30 miles to SS#1 and then she took to the road with Mike, who was Sweep, and I climbed into the van. Good thing, too, as I'm the type who would overheat in a walk-in-cooler, and the day heated up to over 100F. The sun was unmerciful. There is little shade on these high plains, but what there is, is found. Today I saw horses crowded into the shade of a billboard,  antelope on the shaded sides of draws, and riders favoring the shaded side of White and Box at SSs.

It was already toasty with the wind out of the southeast when we departed Casper on a nice frontage road that paralleled I-25 for the first 30 miles. Then we got on the interstate for about 14 miles and finished the last 50 miles on one of the loneliest stretches of road around . . . SH 18/20.  The only break in the scenery riders had after leaving the interstate were the coal trains that came by about every 15 minutes. The trains out here have anywhere from 100-150 cars and fill up the horizon when they pass by.  You can spend all afternoon counting the cars on a passing train . . . one was parked waiting for another to pass and I measured it with my bike computer at 1.6 miles long. They move very slowly when going east, some with three engines in front and one in back to help them up the long, shallow grades.  They're really friendly and always toot at us as they pass. 

The railroad followed a large part of our route on the day we rode into Casper, too. On that day, a RR worker from Nebraska pulled up to SS#3 and practically drooled with envy over what we were doing. He was a cyclist and had "2 years, 2 days" 'til retirement when he would have the time to go on a x-country bike tour. I gave him one of the ABB catalogs.

Riders passed through the small town of Douglas, home of one of the largest jackalopes.  Actually, it's just a statue to honor the mythical animal.  It stands about 8 feet tall and overlooks jackalope park. A jackalope is a jackrabbit with antlers . . . probably spent too much time on the prairie with the antelope.  I guess they have a lot of these elusive little critters around here.  They are very wily, even the statues are wily because several riders missed seeing the statue even though it was 12 feet from the bike lane. Every once in a while, we'll see little antlers sticking above the sagebrush as they spend the heat of the day in the shade.  I've never seen one as roadkill though . . . they must be pretty fast, unlike the numerous roadkilled rabbits we saw today who seemed to be a "hare" too slow.

The terrain today was dry, and rolling.  Again we are in a vast area where you can see forever. . . you don't see much, but you can see a long way.  We're starting to get into the grassland area that's a little more interesting than the desert, but we still ride for miles without seeing a living soul outside of a passing car occasionally. If souls are scarce, antelope and cottontails are not. I stopped by one field and counted 30 rabbits gamboling about in the sagebrush. Antelope grazed everywhere on both sides of the road. Three stepped directly in front of the van, and when I applied the brakes, all things shifted abruptly to the front. We  passed through one prairie dog colony and all the dogs shrilled out their alarm whistle: "Biiiiiii-cyclists!  Biiiiiii-cyclists!"  I was surprised to see an oil well or two on our route today, too.  

Douglas was the only town that had services, and many of the riders stopped there for lunch. Many riders also stopped in Shawnee and talked to the post mistress, Amy, who'd been there for 35 years. She told us that the town population was 3. We cycled through another town (Lost Springs) that had a population of only 1, at least that's what the sign said, but judging from the size of the bar in this town, I'd say they needed to update their population count. The local bar was a very large two-story building. . . for 1 person?  This area adds new meaning to "small town America."

After we got to town, we found it full of revelers . . . there was a frontier days celebration going on complete with parade and reenactment of times gone by--such as the Cheyenne-Deadwood stagecoach route during the Black Hills Gold rush. A local character who epitomizes that era was Mother Featherlegs, a red headed woman who wore red pantalets--ruffled drawers that tied at the ankle and flapped in the wind as she rode. An admirer said that she looked just like a feather-legged chicken, and the name stuck. She and her cohort, Dangerous Dick Davis ran a saloon and brothel out of their cabin southwest of Lusk. It was a favorite gathering place for those on the wrong side of the law. Her local fame soared in 1879 when she was discovered shot dead at her spring . . .with the missing Dangerous Dick's footprints all around. She was rumored to have a lot of money hidden away. Whether it was stolen by her murderer or still awaits to be found depends on whose story you believe. Either way, she is remembered fondly by residents. A marker stands at the site of her cabin and her famous pantalets have had adventures of their own. Stolen from the historic site in 1964, they graced a Deadwood saloon until 1990, when a determined posse of Lusk residents raided the saloon and got the pantalets back. The parade included a red-headed Mother Featherlegs as well as cowboys, Indians, saloon girls, mounted cavalry, and gamblers . . . high entertainment for us cyclists and the locals who lined the street.

HEARD ON THE ROAD TODAY: 

"I feel like I've been turning on the rotisserie all day."

"I'm cooked."

"I think this day is harder than Teton Pass because of the heat and headwind."

"If you poked me with a fork right now I'd bleed gravy."

SEEN ON THE ROAD TODAY:

PHOTOS OF THE DAY:

Mike says that Jack E, Lope is related to Aunt E. Lope.
He never married because he can't elope

Thomas posing in his short shorts for my Chippendale calendar.
Unfortunately the glare off his legs overexposed the photo.

Okay. Works for me.

Got milk?

In Shawnee, WY, pop. 3, the one existing building serves
as a P.O., a supply store, and a beer joint; don't know
whether Amy, the owner, lives there too.

Postmistress, salesperson, bartender, and local historian,
Amy poses with Carol, Val and a customer.

Not to be outdone by Shawnee, Lost Springs posts a population of 1.
How can you call something a town with a population of 1?
Mike says that there are only a handful of towns in Wyoming
with populations larger than their elevations.

The Gals (Sonia, Val, Carol, Jill) in their new tee shirts ala Sonia: "Not Listening," "I didn't do it," "Do I look like I care?" and "Who asked you?" Each is perfectly suited to the personality of its wearer, of course.