Lander to Dubois Wyoming today,a long 72 miles with 2800 ft of ascent, climbing from 5,300 ft to 6,900 ft. A good day, starting off cool, light wind and getting into the low 70s. We rode through the Wind River Indian Reservation, almost 2 million acres reserved mostly for the Shoshone and Arapaho tribes. We passed Crowheart Butte- legend has it that this was the site of a fight to the death between the Shoshone leader Chief Washakie and the Crow Chief Big Robber. They chose to do this instead of having their warriors fight. Chief Washakie won and supposedly cut out Chief Big Robber’s heart and ate it. Maybe that is what Putin and Zelenskyy should do. Although Putin would have a good chance of winning- after all he is a judo black belt.
We all got to Dubois fairly late, there were some good uphill climbs. Timmie, Than and I stopped at the Dubois Museum of Military Vehicles, 5 miles before our campsite. Timmie and I spent several hours there. A HUGE collection of military vehicles from World War I to the Vietnam war. It was all built by a millionaire lawyer. It showcased the musket that fired the first shot in the Revolutionary war. Purportedly fired by John Simpson at the Battle of Bunker hill. The museum founder purchased it at auction for supposedly $940,000! Simpson was courtmartialed as a result, because he was supposed to wait until he could see the white of the British soldiers eyes. Anyway, Timmie and I got lost in this museum. It was organized as a maze within a huge building the size of a Walmart, with no exit signs anywhere. Timmie started to get a bit antsy looking for a way out. Finally we found someone who directed us to an exit. There is only so much time one can spend looking at old military vehicles!
We stayed at an RV park campsite which was nice, by a river. Dan and Than cooked a great oriental noodle dish with a Greek salad.
That evening Mel, Simona and I went to the rodeo at Dubois Fairground, the first rodeo of the year!! There were a lot of people there, don’t know where they all came from, certainly not from the tiny town of Dubois! It was pretty cool, hadn’t been to a rodeo in a long time. Of course they start out with the flag ceremonies. A lady rode around the stadium with the American flag while they played the country song “God bless the USA” by Lee Greenwood. I actually got tears in my eyes as she rode past us at breakneck speed with a huge American flag waving in the breeze. They then had a prayer to start off the rodeo- ahhhhh, experiencing the real USA here in Dubois Wyoming! It was funny, the announcer was asking who was there from various states. He asked who was there from California and there were some cheers, he responded “welcome to America!” It was fun looking at all the people there, a lot of families with young kids wearing cowboy hats, a lot of teenagers hanging out. There was a dance after the rodeo and it was Friday night, undoubtedly many would be going dancing afterwards! I kind of feel bad for the cattle in the show. Although the bulls seemed to have fun throwing off their riders in a nanosecond. I swear they were all off that bull in less than a second, except for one guy who managed to hang on for somewhere around 7 seconds. He had won some championship last year and he was really good! The barrel racing was cool. They had women riders ride around 3 big barrels that were set up in the field, it was impressive how they could make their horse turn around a barrel and speed on to the next one. They would really fly! Then they had the calf roping which was kind of sad. Got to wonder what these animals think about all of this. Seeing the herds of cattle along our ride peacefully munching on prairie grass, I would have to assume that is a better life than being transported to rodeo shows and being the object of all of these rodeo games.
Got to sleep about 9:30- late for me but it was a good day!
Here are the RidewithGPS stats:
Biking across the USA with Mike 
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