The drive from Casper to Thermopolis takes two hours, the first eighty minutes of which are pretty boring. The final forty minutes through the Wind River Canyon are about as beautiful as any drive I’ve ever taken. Once you get to Shoshoni you turn north and drive along a lake which turns into the Bighorn River. Then you enter a canyon of multicolored rocks and flowers with the road right up against the river. The ride back south was even more beautiful. I could spend all day driving back and forth through that canyon in a convertible and never get tired of it.
Like Casper, Thermopolis is also a funny little place. The population is about 3,500 but it has a world-class dinosaur museum (the Wyoming Dinosaur Center or WDC), an amphitheater and the world's largest natural mineral hot springs. There's a tannery called Merlin's Hide Out. They sell all sorts of cool stuff like this:
Thermopolis also has one pretty cool restaurant with a brewery. But it also has this building with some uncool masonry (I hope it was built before the 1930s) and a Ron Paul sign.
Despite its libertarian streak, Thermopolis felt much younger, newer, and hopeful than Casper. I saw no cowboy hats or big belt buckles (although I did see a guy in boots with spurs and he was wearing them genuinely with no irony, unlike TR during his stint in the West Village). Most people were decked out in well-worn technical outdoor gear but with the swagger of a bow hunter, not a granola. The only time I smelled weed on the whole trip was by the men’s room at the One Eyed Buffalo (the site of my only real meal in Thermopolis—they make a hell of a prime rib). If Thermopolis was a singer it would be Sturgill Simpson.
At some point we had lunch. zson’s diet consists essentially of pizza, mac and cheese, and chicken tenders/nuggets so we had a fair number of meals at McDonald’s because (a) Wyoming pizza probably is not right and (b) there aren’t a ton of dining options in towns of 3,500 people. Thermopolis has a McDonald’s but more importantly it’s right next door to Ava’s Silver and Rock Shop. Much like Marls circa 1994, the shop’s outwardly dumpy appearance hides some amazing stuff inside. The owners (Eddie and Ava) are a husband and wife team of grumpy elderly geologists. Eddie discovered the Avaceratops (he named it after Ava) and he’s happy to tell the story. He’s also happy to tell you how the people running the Wyoming Dinosaur Center don’t know what they’re doing (apparently he and Ava helped get the dig sites started and were dismissed from their post sometime thereafter—Eddie is passionately pissed about this and Ava interrupted him at one point to merely say “It’s a sore point” and then got back to cleaning fossils). And man, do they have fossils. Cheap fossils! You can buy fossil fish for $10 to $20 and they’re beautifully perfect and decently big. They also have Spinosaurus teeth, shark teeth (for a dollar each), all sorts of plants (fifty cents a pop) and fish, bones from various sauropods, and an amazing lower jaw from a Mososaur. My biggest regret from the trip is not going back to their store on the way out of town to buy a fossil or two.
Then we checked into our hotel and learned that the air conditioning in our room was broken. I can say with great authority that there's nothing sadder than a Lasko box fan in your window on a 90 degree day. It was like freshman year in Monroe all over again. So we went over to Star Plunge where we swam in the hot springs, and this happened:
We played Bananagrams for a bit and had dinner, then we went back to Star Plunge to swim in the hot spring until it closed at 9 pm (once you pay you can leave and come back anytime that day). Then we slept a sweaty sleep.
Stay tuned for further installments later this week.
Posts
30 comments:
I can’t believe you packed black construction paper square masks for this trip.
And no condescension in the world is as thick and rich as Tri-State people’s regarding pizza. The inability to deign to even consider choking down a slice of non-NY pizza and the systematic dismantling of any outsiders’ feeble attempts at what any City dough-slinger has mastered is hilarious. I’m not saying there aren’t 18” slices of truth to the notion, but the ubiquity of this belief in anyone from the area — and the rampant sideways comments at the expense of any purveyor of pizza from beyond the region — is fascinating.
best pizza i’ve ever eaten - and there’s no close second - was at pizzeria lola in minneapolis.
It isn’t just pizza. I refuse to eat crab cakes if I’m north of Delaware. The only pizza we saw in Wyoming was Pizza Hut and I know from experience that it isn’t good. The beef out there was very good.
Djokovic has a lost a total of one set in his first five matches. He seems to be quite good at tennis.
The pizza in costa rica is fabulous. Better than a lot of places in jersey. Thin crust and wood ovens. We just landed in florida. It's far hotter than down by the equator. Zman and zson fly fishing and fish kissing is awesome stuff.
Can't wait 'til next installment.
I will sell you as many shark teeth as you wish....$.90 per....shipping not included.
Who took the pictures of you?
Dave, I live in Florida. So does Mark. Or did you guys make plans?
I’m guessing he is in Miami? And is only relying on hearsay as to the local temp. One doesn’t get much out into the sunshine during a layover.
zman and his son look *exactly* alike. uncanny.
Layover in ft lauderdale. Flying to newark in an hour. 90 in jersey as well. Truly makes no sense that costa rica has such pleasant weather. It's many hours south of florida!
The picture in the bison coat and hat was taken by the lady at Merlin's Hide Out. The Zoltar photo was taken by a guy who works at Star Plunge. I did not include the photo of the maintenance guy from our hotel, zson, and a robin. The guy looked like Brady's son which took me aback, and he had a live robin perched on his index finger which took me further aback. Turns out the bird flew into a window and got stunned and for some reason hopped up on the kid's finger for a little while. It even let zson pet it. Then it realized it was a wild robin on a Brady-look-alike's finger and flew off. I told the kid that he's Batman now. I'm not sure he got the reference. I think he was really high. That's Thermopolis for you.
zson actually looks exactly like zwoman.
Great trip, even if you didn’t toke a robin with tb12’s stunt double.
And I’m impressed you had the drive to make at least 3 posts out of the trip.
I’m eagerly awaiting marls’ kfc review.
Also, that fur coat is pretty dope.
Espys is pretty good family viewing. Lots of inspirational stuff. Ciara, well she is easy on the eyes.
And my wife wants to hook up with Megan Rapinoe. She needs to get in a long line.
This just in. Good people, he is now at KFC.
I'm giddy.
Should we really be asking the Gheorghe with the youngest child among us to do that to his body though? Godspeed Marls!
Dave and I just missed each other. I’m in west palm for the day. The wife scored us free box seats (from her company) for Nas tonight. Gonna drink by the pool all day and then go listen to an old guy rap.
Given my recent meal, you could also come here and listen an old man crap.
And carp.
Crapé Diem
Marls, inquiring minds want to know...
This silence feels ominous. Hang in there Marls!
marls is mainlining colon blow
Daryl Morey does not give one single fuck.
sitcom story here in suburbia this evening. my daughter calls upset because her car's been towed from the movie theater she was at. drama, because i'm packing for my canoe trip, and have to wake up at 4:30 tomorrow, and don't need this shit. wife goes to pick her up, calls the sheriff's department, who don't have the car in their database yet.
meanwhile, i'm at home with our friend jimmie (who you've seen in a couple of posts here - he's the dancer/dance teacher who stays with us on thursdays). he's cracking every white people/black people comparison joke he's got. and he's got a lot. he's interspersing that with being incredulous that i'm choosing to go into the woods for a week. 'that's some real white people shit', he tells me. i suppose he's got a point.
fast forward an hour or so, and still no sign of the car in the sheriff's tow database, so we file a stolen car report. a deputy sheriff comes to the house - couldn't be more pleasant. he takes a call and starts smiling, and tells my daughter that they'd found the car in a different part of the parking lot. she starts crying out of embarrassment - she's mortified. and jimmie's giving her the entire business. then he tells the deputy (a young white dude), 'treat her like you'd treat me'. which was funny, except for the awkward. jimmie has a damn charisma about him, 'cause the deputy laughed.
and now i type this while i finish my beer and get ready for bed. i'll be online for part of tomorrow, but after that, you won't hear from me until a week from saturday. keep it rolling, boys and girls.
also, how the hell can harden and westbrook play on the same team at the same time? two of the most ball-dominant players in history in the same lineup? that can't work, can it?
I seem to recall them being on the same team once before. “Ball-dominant players” made me giggle though.
That’s TR-level brainfart from the dictator’s daughter! In high school, I once took my moped to a repair shop b/c it wouldn’t start. Mechanic told me it was b/c the gas tank was empty.
Post a Comment