July 15, 2001. Rawlins to Jeffrey
City, Wyoming. (69 mi.) Mile 2761
Riders in the storm
The Western Hills
Campground in Rawlins, where I used the RV data port to connect the computer
because the data port in the office wasn't working. This is an attractive
campground if you like treeless, shadeless, gravel parking lots.
Last night we delayed setting up
our tent because of intermittent rain, then made a late evening decision to
walk to a restaurant for more food (we keep getting hungry). When we got back,
it was 10:00 pm and dark. We decided to set up our tent near the only shelter
in the whole campground, a picnic pavilion on the other side of a wall from
the designated tent area. This area offered softer grass and more protection
from the wind and rain. We were sound asleep before 10:30, when suddenly we
were awakened by someone outside the tent, "Hello? Is anyone in there? You
have to move your tent! You can't have your tent here!"
It was Doreen, the campground host,
whom we had watched earlier telling some Boy Scout leaders they couldn't cook
in the picnic pavilion in case a rogue briquette escaped their BBQ grill under
their watchful eyes and ignited the pavilion during the current rain storm.
The Scout leaders gave a sigh and moved their BBQ out of the shelter and into
the rain. Now Doreen was on our case. Apparently she suspected earlier that we
would try to camp outside the tent area and came checking. I protested that it
was 10:30 at night and we would be gone by 6:00 am, but she said no exceptions
could be made. "No camping in the pavilion area!"
She sat in her truck with her
headlights on (not in a helpful way) until we got out, pulled up stakes, and
dragged our tent 10 yards to the other side of the wall. I told her this
experience would go into my journal, which prompted her to get out of her
truck and get in my face with a prolonged lecture on why she couldn't allow
tents in the pavilion area. "That's where people eat! I can't make
exceptions!"
When we got up the next morning
(Sunday) at 5:30 am, it was raining hard, and no one was was trying to eat in
the picnic area. It looked grim for bicycling, with thunder and lightening in
all directions. We packed up, though, and left Western Hills Campground as
promised, riding across the street to the shelter of a Super 8 Motel, where
they let us use the lobby to watch the Weather Channel and listen to our NOAA
weather radio.
6:00 AM and stormy at the Western Hills Campground's designated tent area
By 10:00 am, the storm had passed,
the sun came out, and we thought we could make it to our next destination in a
window of good weather. We rode like crazy, fighting a blustery side wind
across big open spaces to outrun another storm system. We only stopped a few
times, once for food, a few times to check out the historical points
indicating we were paralleling parts of the Oregon Trail, Mormon Pioneer
Trail, and Pony Express Route. I imagined the Pioneer women facing the same
weather under tougher conditions.
1)
2)
3) 
1) Wyoming landscape
2) Roadside crosses
3) Split Rock - a landmark on the Oregon Trail and Pony Express routes. Thousands of overland westward emigrants passed through this valley in the
mid-1800s.
Miles and miles
between services, Mike gets lucky.
Twenty miles from
Jeffrey City, we pulled over and stared into a dark, ugly thunderstorm that
had formed over the route ahead of us, sending down rain and lightening. Two
motorcyclists stopped behind us and did the same, also reluctant to continue
until the thunderhead slowly moved to the north. Once it did, we again pedaled
like crazy into what we hoped would be a clearing in the growing number of
thunderheads. Ten miles from Jeffrey City, we found ourselves under another
storm. I was becoming increasingly unnerved as lightening flashed in all
directions. Suddenly there was a blinding flash overhead, with an deafening
boom and crack that caused me to instinctively duck and swerve. An antelope,
spooked by the thunder, ran toward us. The rain started to pour as we pulled
our bikes into the ditch and covered up with our tent fly until the storm
passed.
Our shelter from
the storm. Thanks to bicycle kickstands, we aren't quite the highest thing
around.
It had been a long day
and I was very glad to see Jeffrey City, or what is left of it. Jeffrey City
is a present day ghost town. The only services still open are a bar/cafe and a
motel. The town was founded in 1955 for uranium mining, boomed to a population
of 4,000, then collapsed to its present population of 200. Houses, gas
stations, a school, tennis courts, all are abandoned and boarded up. We got a
burger, a beer, and a motel room, and collapsed in exhaustion.
