Casper to Dubois

Well we ended up NOT camping in Casper. We stayed at teh campgrounds, but in a great lodge full of stuffed elk, bison, and deer. Our build day was pretty good, too. Our group worked on framing a shed, putting up the siding on the house, and building a rail for the front porch. Galvanized nails made the framing a bit trickier than normal, but we ended up getting a lot done anyways.

We left Casper and headed to Shoshoni on what Wyoming residents call the "lonliest drive in the state." Contrary to its reputation and expectations, the day ended up being great for most of our group. It was a 100 mile day through the desert, but that didn't stop us from having fun. Lunch was at Hell's Half-Acre, a 320 acre canyon/badlands/amazing rock formations that left us breathless. After a longer than normal lunch enjoying the scenery we pushed on the rest of the way to the Yellowstone Drug Store in Shoshoni where we treated ourselves to "world-famous" shakes. My chocolate peanut butter one was great. Then we all headed to the fire station where we spent the night.

We slept late the next morning (6 am), before heading out to Lander. It was only a 47 mile day, and it flew by. As we left Riverton, a little over half way, we caught our first glimpse of the snow capped Wind River Mountains. I realized my speed dropped to almost a stand still as I took in the beauty of the scenery. After a great lunch thanks to Shira's mad shopping skills (even though she won't by frosted flakes), we made good time into Lander, most of us getting there before noon. We spent some time in a local coffee shop and then the park before a group of us decided to go hiking in Sink's Canyon. After a nice little drive into the mountains we took a mile and a half hike up to the waterfalls that were several hundred feet high. We spent a little while there before it started to rain and we quickly descended back to the car. We had dinner at a pavillion in Sink's Canyon that our host church put on, and then we split up and stayed with host families for the night. Nine of us guys stayed at Jamie and Leslie's house, and we had a great time. It was so great to be in a real house again, use a real shower, and just enjoy a glimpse of normal life for a few hours. Its strange to think that in 3 weeks I'll be back home living a normal life again... All in all Lander was a great outdoorsy town with lots of hikers, backpackers, climbers, etc. (Its also home to NOLS, the National Outdoor Leadership School).

Today we travelled from Lander to Dubois (pronounced Do-Boys). Its a cool little western town with wooden sidewalks, a pharmacy/ice cream shop, and the river runs right through downtown. The 75 miles to get here were long, hard, windy, and up hill, but the spectacular view made it all worthwhile. On more than one ocassion today I caught myself running off the road because I was paying more attention to the mountains in front of me than the hills that I was climbing. We gained about 2000 feet of elevation today, so we're at about 7000 now. Tomorrow we climb Togwotee (sp?) Pass where we'll reach 9000 feet before descending into Jackson. Here we go!