Day 33 - Devil's Tower National Monument to Sundance Wyoming - 60 Miles

This morning we made a special point of hurrying through our morning routine so that we could go visit the Devil's Tower while the early-morning traffic was light. We hadn't planned on staying up there, as we had been told that there was limited parking for RVs. We realized that we might have to just make the circuit and return.

But when we got there, we found that only two RV-sized rigs had made the trip, and we were easily able to park in a nice spot close to the visitor center. Grabbing the camera, and locking up the rig, we decided to pay the visitor center a quick visit, then maybe walk just a bit up the trail to the foot of the tower. That way we could get a few photographs, then head on down the mountain and give someone else a chance at our parking spot.

That's not how it turned out. Once in the visitor center, we immediately saw that it contained some displays and some items for sale to which we might want to pay further attention. Not wanting to tote our purchases up the trail when we took our walk, we decided to return to the center when our walk was over.

We started up the trail, which, unlike most trails, had been blacktopped so that nearly anyone could navigate it from the parking lot to the base of the tower. The first thing that we noticed was that we were on the shady side of the tower, and it was nearly impossible to get decent photographs. So, naturally we kept circling southward around the base of the monolith until sunlight began to bath the huge structure in a rosy glow.

The more we walked, the more we experienced conditions for taking good photographs. Soon we found ourselves routinely snapping the shutter, then continuing to walk south and eastward around the base. Before long it dawned on us that somehow, and without discussion, we had both decided to just keep walking until we had made a complete circle and arrived back at the parking lot. It appeared that at least a few of the folks walking near us on the trail had also been caught up in the enthusiasm for seeing all sides of Devil's Tower, and many of them kept pace with us for much of the morning.

At one point someone near us pointed out that there were as many as five climbers on the face of the rock. Though we had some trouble seeing them at first, we soon picked them out and continued to watch their progress for awhile. We were surprised to see climbers as we had read in the visitor center that it is an unwritten rule that climbers would stay away from Devil's Tower in the month of June to respect Native American ceremonies near the rock that take place that month. We were told by a ranger at the visitor center that most days up to 45 climbers can be seen climbing the narrow crags toward the top.

Concetta and I discussed just what was so fabulous about our hike this morning, and we decided it was the almost complete lack of man-made noise. Nothing but the songs of birds, and whisper of the wind disturbed the forest quiet. Yes, the soft murmurs of conversation from the walkers and their companions were at times audible, but everyone seemed to respect the almost church-like atmosphere that we were all enjoying on this bright, but cool Tuesday morning in the Wyoming woods.

When we had been walking for what seemed like a very long time, I began to believe that we were probably getting close to completing our journey. That's when we came upon a sign that said, "Halfway Point." Since we hadn't originally planned on making a LONG walk, we hadn't gone to the trouble of breaking out the hiking boots. My tennis-shoe shod feet had been protesting already, and now I found that we were only halfway to our goal. Oh, well, we both decided to trek on and not think about the impropriety of our footwear.

Fortunately, the second half of the hike did not take as long as the first half because we didn't encounter good camera angles, or the nice light we had enjoyed on the southern exposure. As we grew nearer to the north side of the Tower, the monolith was actually in the shade again. But the lack of distractions gave us a chance to discuss forest management, and the way the groves of trees surrounding the Devil's Tower look so very different than the forests we remember from our youth.

Nowadays, burned sections are allowed to remain, as are fallen trees, dead snags, and other sort of "messy-looking" forest scenes that are, in reality, the mark of allowing nature to determine the look of the forest. Nowadays the Forest Service even starts fires to clean out the under-story of forest refuse. Seeing burned patches is normal. At first it's somewhat unsettling, as the mind sort of expects a more tidy look to National Forests. But the days of preventing damage of any kind to the forest is over now, and we all will in time get used to the new techniques.

Once we had hiked just under a mile, we finally arrived back at the visitor center. There we loaded up on gifts for the grandkids, a bit of reading material for me, and a brochure or three for route planning. Then we headed for the RV. While we were hiking, the parking lot had completely filled to overflowing and the RV parking, limited in length as it was, looked completely filled as well. We knew that dozens of cars and RVs would be traveling up to the base of the Tower to park their vehicles and walk the path around one of nature's great wonders, too. It was time for us to give up our spot and bid adieu to what turned out to be a favorite stop in our journeys around the western United States.

Once off the mountain, we jumped back on Route 24 and headed north and east toward the tiny town of Aladin. There we intended to turn south on Route 111 until it intersected Route 14 which paralleled Interstate 90. From that intersection it was a quick jaunt to the next point of interest we intended to visit, the Vore Buffalo Jump.

Before we made it to Vore, we stopped by the Wyoming visitor center that is conveniently located just two miles west of our destination. There we tarried long enough to have our lunch, then see what the center had to offer. The center turned out to be a worthwhile place to obtain all the information we needed to proceed, not only to Vore, but for our intended route toward Thermopolis, Wyoming, in the morning. There were just dozens of brochures, booklets, and maps available for travelers, and the attendants were extraordinarily attentive and knowledgeable. So, we loaded up on brochures for everything we might encounter tomorrow, and for the next few days, and then set out for our afternoon stop.

The Vore Buffalo Jump is a destination about which we've been talking for days. At this ancient site, Plains Indians would sometimes drive buffalo herds over cliffs in large numbers to make the process of hunting easier and more productive. After all, buffalo hunting with bows could be an iffy and extremely dangerous way to obtain this particular food. Still, as our guide pointed out today, a single buffalo might keep a single person in food for an entire winter season.

But I was a bit skeptical as we approached the Vore site. Nowhere could I see evidence of a cliff face in the grassy, gently-rolling terrain. Amazingly, we had only to park the RV and wander into the Vore ticket office and the secret was immediately revealed. Vore, named for family upon whose ranch the site was located, held a secret. The secret was that underneath the grassy fields the geologic strata was largely composed of gypsum, a sort of "weak sister" of calcium carbonate, or limestone. Nowadays we make sheetrock out of it for home building.

Many years ago the gypsum had come into contact with sufficient enough water to cause a section a couple of hundred feet in diameter to collapse and form what we describe today as a sinkhole. Presto! The Indians had a ready-made cliff face over which they could drive the buffalo. Over the centuries thousands of buffalo were killed in this fashion, and the animals were butchered right on the site.

Well, the story sounded terrific, and we only lacked a guide to get started on our tour of discovery to the bottom of the sinkhole and a world that we had never explored before. Stepping into this roll was a young high school graduate who was but a couple of weeks on the job. Bright, intelligent, and extremely friendly, Shelby took us under her wing and escorted us first to the information "tipi," then to the actual dig at the bottom of the sinkhole. We were prepared to be thrilled, and we definitely were NOT disappointed.

Shelby explained in depth each and every salient fact about the archeological dig, while I tried to capture as much of the surrounding visual aids as I could photograph in the rather poor light of the tipi. Still, I think we got the gist of what she was trying to tells us. Once she had given us the background, we headed down the corkscrew path toward the floor of the sinkhole.

The hole had been discovered by the Wyoming Highway Department when they were planning the route for Interstate 90 back in 1971. The Vore family had been using the "big hole" for their personal dump site for many years at that point, and had added about four feet of rubbish in the bottom of the hole. The Highway Department decided that they needed to know how stable the sinkhole would be should it end up in the highway right-of-way. But when they took a core sample they came up with not only the Vore Family garbage, but pieces of ancient buffalo bones as well.

Of course at this point the archaeologists were called in, the highway right-of-way was permanently moved 150 feet to the south, and a bulldozer went to work removing the top layer of refuse. After that, archeologists went to work on what has been described as "One of the most important archaeological sites of the Late-Prehistoric Plains Indians."

It turned out that the site had been in use from about 1550 to about 1800. Hernan Cortez brought a little over a dozen horses to America in 1519, and later explorers brought more. By the seventeenth century there were large horse herds in the Americans. Still, these particular Indians seem to have been still afoot when they tricked their quarry into running over the cliff. The evidence for this is the existence of rock formations called cairns that were put in place by the natives in an inverted V-formation to help guide the beasts to the cliff edge.

Shelby told us that these animals were not the smartest and had poor eyesight. So, the animals at the "front" of the herd had to be gently persuaded to head in the correct direction by Indians in animal skins in order not to alarm the herd. Once the lead animals were nearing the edge, other Indians would suddenly create a disturbance at the rear of the herd, which caused the panicked trailing animals to push forward in the direction the herd had already been moving. Once this happened, the animals in front were literally pushed over the edge and into the trap by the animals in the rear. According to Shelby, without the help of the trailing animals, the whole scheme would fall apart.

And there you have it. When the archeologists finished their exploratory trenches in 1972, they had reached a depth of fifteen feet below the surface of the sinkhole. The estimate of how many animals lay in the sinkhole runs around 20,000. According to Wikipedia: "In 1982 the site was transferred to the University by the Vore family with the stipulation that it be developed as a public-education center within twelve years. Funding limitations prevented development, so the site was again transferred to the Vore Buffalo Jump Foundation, which has built a small interpretive center and provides interpretive services. The Vore site is located in a narrow strip of land between I-90 and old US 14. The site was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1973."

Concetta and I were especially impressed with our history-loving guide, Shelby. Her enthusiasm definitely enhanced our experience, perhaps because she reminded us so much of our own enthusiasm for history. Considering that she had only been on the job for two and a half weeks, she knew her material cold and she could answer all of our questions without hesitation. After the tour was over, she told us that even though she loves history and geology more than anything, she has decided to be conservative. When she attends college in the fall, she will be pursing a degree in the field of Business Administration. She hopes to make enough money in that field to pursue her first loves of history and geology in her free time.

And that's it for today's adventures. Tomorrow we'll be headed west again with eye toward later dropping south toward Thermopolis, Wyoming in a few days. Until then, we wish you exciting destinations and memorable travels from the Davises, the Happy Wanderers.