Another travel day! Back-to-backs are not a lot of fun, but we have a method now – don’t set up completely. Makes take-down so much faster.

First thing, it’s sprinkling outside, after raining all night. Looks bad out there, but it really isn’t, so take-down is a piece of cake. Get out of the park at 9:04, just in time to hit the bike shop. We get there and they take The Bear’s wheel in right away. Fitzgerald’s Bicycles – great folks, great place! They also have an in-house coffee bar, so we get some java and look around while they get her fixed up.

By 9:43, we’re back on the road! Raining off and on now, but again, the roads are not slick, so we can make good time, but here’s what it looked like outside – this is where the “Amber waves of grain” line comes from:

Yes, it’s crooked – hard to take great photos when you mainly have to drive the rig. Anyway, a bit later the rain really came down, and it was like this:

Fun times!

We kinda have to go through West Yellowstone, so, what to do? Well, we’ll be stopping by the Slippery Otter to have a pizza for lunch, of course! We need to see if it’s still the best pizza we’ve ever had. It is:

That’s two thirds of the Supreme. Won’t last much longer. To drink, The Bear had a Pigs Ass Porter, which was pretty good, though a wee bit light for what I wanted, so I had the Black Ghost Oatmeal Stout. Not Guinness, but pretty good:

Here’s their logo inside the pub:

After lunch, less than 100 miles to Bozeman, and actually, we’re just outside Bozeman, on the way in, so we really only have like 85 miles to go. Cloudy mountains:

And other beautiful scenery:

Yeah, still wet, but it looks to be drying out. We’re going back to a KoA we stayed in last year – a bit of trepidation, because last year they were adding on, and rebuilding all kinds of stuff. The Bear looked online, and a lot of folks are still complaining. We shall see!

Travel day! So, of course … it rains. I heard it pitter just before I went to bed last night. Grrrrr. Luckily, it did not rain hard (yet), so we get out without getting soaked, or muddy. Yay. I’ll take small victories.

After we leave, it starts to rain, but thankfully not hard, and I’m glad the roads are not slick. Mostly it’s just pittering. Everything goes swimmingly until we get to Jackson, WY. A lot of folks are stopped, parked off to the side of the road, looking at something in the river. I don’t care what it is, I just want to get going, but there’s a dark blue Ford something-or-other SUV parked half on the road. REALLY? It’s a two lane road, and this is at the entrance to a bridge. I CAN’T get around him, and NOBODY is going to get past me, there’s just no room. Ok, he’s walking back to his car. So’s his passenger. Ok, that explains being parked half on the road (did I mention that that is illegal as all hell here?). And he sits. I think he’s checking out the photos in his camera. I honk. I’m completely ignored. I sit, trying to be patient. He’s still looking down at something on his lap, I guess (HOPE!) his camera. After a minute or two, with traffic stacking up behind me, I honk again, just a short toot. He looks around, wondering what the commotion is, I guess sees traffic stacked up behind him, so he starts to move ahead. Flashers are still on, and it ;looks like he’s looking for another place to park … passes several, so that’s not it. Still got the flashers on. He’s a Canuk. From Alberta. I thought Canadians were half-way intelligent. I guess every country has their idiots. I hope they take him back soon. After a minute or so of wandering left and right on the roadway, he turns off his flashers and heads on down the road – FINALLY! Now he looks like he’s racing out of here. He’s not going all that fast, because I can barely keep up with him, and we’re starting up the pass over the mountains, from Jackson to Victor. He decides to pass a small pickup in front of him, and does it in a no-passing zone. Yup, right-hand blind curve, yellow stripe firmly on our side. he doesn’t care – NOW he’s in a hurry. Go figure. Good riddance. Oh yeah, there was fog close to the pass at the top:

Luckily it didn’t last long, because it was THICK! Just past the fog, I catch the guy from Canukistan. Great. Just prior to a construction zone. It vaguely crosses my mind that one short mis-application (or rather, non-application) of brakes, and he’s off down the mountainside, a lot of the worlds little problems quickly solved … but no, that would not be right. Hopefully he’s going elsewhere from us. Most of the way down the hill … BRAKE light. Great! Just had the front brakes done last week or so! I have brakes, so I’m not worried, but it just … ARGH. Oh, well.

The rest of the trip (all 15 miles of it, or so) is uneventful, and we get checked into our campground. Yay! Immediately, we head for the bike shop, to get The Bear’s front wheel re-taped. I actually remember where the bike shop is from last year! Yay! We whip in, and … they’re closed on Mondays. Great. Gotta love it! Off to lunch, at The Big Hole BBQ. Ate there last year, good stuff. Only sandwiches for lunch, but that’s ok, I can deal with it. Then, off to a brewery! And IT is closed! REALLY? Until 16:00. ARGH. Guess the beer will have to wait. Well, that’s ok, we can get our growler to take with us, in case they have good beer.

Brake light – had it checked out. Low fluid. Ok, the fluid was so high it looked like it was out, but obviously it’s not, so we’ll ignore that one until we get to Bozeman, MT and get it looked at.

Beer – hit two places. First one was Wildlife Brewery. They had no stouts or porters, but they did have a Bear Claw Black Ale that was pretty good. Ok, so I’ve found ONE ale I like!

Next place was the Grand Teton Brewing Company, and they DID have a Stout – their Black Cauldron Nitro Stout. Quite good! Not quite up to the Stout at Moonlight Pizza in Salida, CO, but pretty close. Not growler worthy, though, I’m afraid.

Off to home and maybe Longmire if we can get the Tailgater to work.

Got a fairly early start. We’d done all the outside prep we could do, so it was pretty easy to get going this morning. Pulled out right at 9:00, headed for Riverton, WY.

After a couple of hours, it was time to switch highways, and kinda time for lunch, so we start looking … nothing too far out of the way. There re billboards for a Chinese Restaurant at our exit, and that sounds really good. Ok, I see Burger King – BZZZZT! … McDonald’s – BZZZZT! … Taco Bell – BZZZZT! … no Chinese place … this sucks! Last place I see is Pizza Hut, and we have to eat, so … ugh.

Actually, the pizza was pretty good, considering. Not great, but not bad. Actually better than some of the others we’ve had recently, which is REALLY bad for the independents! Do we need fuel? Nah … we’re over half a tank. Off we go. Oh, yeah … we’re not actually going to Riverton, we’re going to Dubois (pronounced DEW-boyz). A bit further. Maybe we should have filled up …

The scenery is nice:

And this one, which looks like it has a glacier on the right side:

Yeah, I know – hard to tell. Phone photos are hard to tell from. Lots of reflections, too.

We get to Lander, somewhere on the way, and the needle is close to “E”, so we stop and fill up. A bit over 32 gallons, which means we only had a bit less than three to completely dry. I don’t like getting that close, it’s only about thirty five miles when we’re towing.

A few minutes after three, and we’re at the local KoA. Woohoo! Steaks in town tonight, and some REAL photos of the sunset – hope it’s a nice one!

Well, I went, and it was pretty drab. I actually made this where it looks better than the real deal! Not a lot of work, Clarity, Saturation, and some Shadow adjustments:

Tomorrow – Victor!

Oh yeah, on the way back, I saw this laundromat, and thought the doorway was interesting:

Only in Wyoming. Or Montana. Or Texas, Oklahoma, Idaho …