OUR 2019 WIND RIVER RANGE TRIP Day 5

Monday, 10/7/19

As we prepared to leave on what would be the final day of our 2019 Fall Foliage Tour, Doug and I stopped at the Perkins Restaurant. They were good enough for our dinner the night before and we decided they would suffice for breakfast. Then it was on the road again. It was going to be another fine day, sunny with scattered cloud cover. A short hop on I-90 North to Ranchester at Exit 9, the last exit before the Montana border. This is US 14, the highway that traverses the northern Bighorn Mountains.  

It wasn’t long before we left the valley behind and started climbing. The climb was rather steep with several switchbacks as US 14 rose steadily into the sky. After climbing for several minutes, we came to a pullout. One sign identified this as the Bighorn National Forest while another proclaimed this to be the start of the Big Horn Scenic Byway.  In Laurence Parent’s Scenic Driving WYOMING, this is Scenic Drive #29 Big Horn Scenic Byway: Dayton to Shell. At this point we had traveled about eleven miles from the plains below at Ranchester. This route claims quickly and provides ever expansive views of the Northern Plains.

A sign at this point indicates that the Bighorn Mountains reached their highest elevation about 60 million years ago. Only a mile or two past that point, we encountered literally hundreds of cattle being driven down from the high pasture in the Bighorns by 6-8 cowboys. To quote Doug, “ ‘twas a modern-day scene out of ‘Yellowstone.’”

In pre-reservation times, promontories such as those afforded by this stretch of highway would have given vision-questing Plains Indians the impression that they could see, seemingly, to the ends of the earth.

After traveling about half the thirty-two miles to Burgess Junction, we noticed that stands of conifers are becoming more scattered and aspen are becoming a bit more prominent but, at no point thus far, particularly common. In fact, aspen, as a whole, for whatever reason, just did not grow in the Bighorns like they do on other mountains in Wyoming.

Burgess Junction is called that for a reason. From this point west there are two highways. US 14 branches off to the south by southwest before arriving at Greybull, fifty-two miles distant. This highway will take you all the way to Yellowstone National Park, arriving at the East Entrance to that park. US 14 ALT takes you directly west to the town of Lovell, before eventually moving on to Cody and intersecting with US 14. Lovell is forty-eight miles from Burgess Junction, and is  the largest town, but not county seat of Big Horn County.

Although there were serious doubts whether we would be able to visit the “Medicine Wheel,” due to the lateness of the season (i.e. snowfall), we still decided to try the alternate route first. By continuing due west we were now on US 14 ALT and just after passing the junction, we came upon the Bear Lodge Resort, which is open year-round, is accessible at this point and offers “call of nature” facilities, a restaurant and gift shop. This is the beginning of Scenic Drive #30 Medicine Wheel Passage Scenic Byway: Burgess Junction to Big Horn Lake in Laurence Parent’s Scenic Driving WYOMING. After using the restroom and getting a cup of coffee to go, we quickly returned to the highway.

There was a large yellow sign near the Lodge, which showed a map of both highways. It was very instructive and most helpful, especially the part that said there was a 10% grade on this highway, whereas there was a grad of only 5-7% on the other, US 14, highway. As Doug pointed out in his notes, if you’ve never driven down a steep incline you want to be very careful not to burn out your brakes.

“Note: on the western descent of the bighorns, US 14 ALT loses 3,600 feet in 10 miles, which contains a steep 10% downgrade, whereas US 14 drops 4,600 feet in 18 miles, a 5-7% downgrade. So, use your brakes judiciously.”

About eighteen miles from the junction we came upon a sign pertaining to Medicine Mountain and the great “Medicine Wheel,” a stone circle that lies atop a ridge below its summit. Designated a National Historic landmark, this symbol remains a mystery as the builders and purpose of the Medicine Wheel remain unknown. There is a theory that the wheel is a replica of the Sundance of Crow legend and was oriented to the summer solstice sunrise.

As Doug noted “Modern Indians use the Medicine Wheel for religious ceremonies. At times, flags, or offerings are left about the wheel . . . A gravel road leads up Medicine Mountain to the site of the Medicine Wheel.”

The portion of US 14A between Burgess Junction and Medicine Mountain traverses more open terrain that, at this latitude and altitude, that approaches timberline, with open expenses of grassland interspersed with stands of conifers. Very few aspen are visible from this route. Additionally, very little of the alder-willow thickets that moose prefer is visible along this route.

Another two miles and we came to the turn off for the Medicine Wheel. As the sign indicates parking for the Medicine Wheel site is one and a half miles, while the Medicine Wheel itself is three miles from this point.

Note: there are no turnouts. Bus and large RV traffic is not recommended. As a site that is still sacred to the Northern Plains tribes, commercial tours are not permitted. Incidentally, there are probably a couple of inches of snow on the ground, so it remains to be seen whether the Medicine Wheel can, at this time, be reached safely.

As Doug said, “(he) had to back down that road to a safe turnaround point many years ago due to a snow drift that crossed the road at a steep, oblique angle.”

It was right at twenty miles from Burgess Junction to the Medicine Wheel, and we decided to go no further on US 14 ALT. We returned to the Junction, where we would take US 14 to, ultimately, Greybull, Wyoming. This stretch of US 14 does not involve the steep descents (10% downgrade) described previously for alternate route.

As we returned, we stopped at Observation Point, which is seven miles east of the turnoff to Medicine Mountain. At 9,430 feet, this is the high mark of the route. Burgess Junction, comparatively speaking, was at an elevation of 8,300 feet.

After making another pitstop at the Bear Lodge Resort (Burgess Junction) we headed south, on US 14, before turning west toward Greybull, Wyoming via the Bighorn Scenic Byway. Elk View Inn, which is located two miles west of Burgess Junction, also still appeared to be open on this date, thus giving travelers a chance to use the facilities, stretch the legs and, if desired, grab a bite to eat.

Peaks visible on the first eleven miles are more photogenic than those visible from the Medicine Wheel Passage Scenic Byway. If you need a break from the road, a large parking area is available eleven miles west of Burgess Junction. We saw a small bull moose on the north side of this road; he was slowly walking and occasionally browsing at the edge of a clearing next to timber. This sighting was directly across from the aforementioned parking area. If Doug hadn’t pointed him out to me, I would have missed out on a golden photo op. It was definitely the best moose sighting I have ever had.

After another dozen miles the long, steep descent to Shell begins. Pockets of aspen began cropping up almost immediately just west of the point at which we began our descent. Color is decent but not an eye-popping shade of yellow.

On the way to Shell Falls we viewed an interpretive sign at a pullout that stated a tornado struck there in June 1959. Although rare, tornadoes have occurred at altitudes up to 10,000 feet in the Bighorns.

Unfortunately, Shell Falls Visitor Center was gated, boarded up and closed for the season. It appears visiting season is only through the middle of September. Like the Upper Mesa Falls in Idaho, these falls are not nearly as grandiose as the Lower Falls of the Yellowstone, but at 120 feet they do fall a mite longer 120 feet to 114 for those in Idaho. Although they do not have nearly the water volume as the Upper Mesa Falls, in a lot of ways they are more spectacular. Shell Creek, which starts at an altitude of over 11,000 feet in the Bighorn Mountains drops over 7,000 feet as it descends down the western side of the Bighorns and is funneled through Shell Canyon before entering the Big Horn Basin. The narrow canyon constricts the flow of water so much that when it goes over the granite rocks at the visitor center it creates a gushing torrent of water that is spectacular to see.

It took a little over half an hour to travel the twenty-six miles from the falls to Greybull. And that, though not the end of our journey, was the end of our 2019 Fall Foliage Tour. From Greybull we took US 16/20/310/Wyoming 789 to Lovell, Wyoming. The thirty-three mile journey took about thirty-five minutes.

We stayed on US 310 all the way to Rockvale, Montana going through Bridger and Fromberg, before merging with US 212 at the aforementioned Rockvale. It took us about one and a quarter hours to cover the sixty-seven miles. Another fifteen minutes put us in Laurel where we picked up I-90. From there it was just a hop, skip and a jump until we were pulling into our parking garage. Although our 2019 Fall-Foliage Tour was a bust in some ways (the four feet of snow wiped out all chance of showing Becky Glacier National Park and all of its glory) we still got in some good shots of the Rocky Mountain Front and especially the Wind River Range. Oh well, there’s always next year.