Kevin – Tuesday. With the forecast suggesting 91 degrees for a high today, we thought it best to get an EXTRA EARLY start. Reveille was a 0500, with move out at 0550.
Yesterday we pushed and accomplished two days of the schedule in one day. Today we’re contemplating doing so again. If we can, we would like to get from the 1847 pioneers Green River camp south of the ferry over to Granger Wyoming, where Black’s Fork and Ham’s Fork combine. However, the first half of this 14-mile section is hiking through sandy hills though the last 7 miles are on an oiled gravel road.
We’re in another section of the western trails where there are multiple variations – some marked Oregon and Pony Express Trail but some of those markers have the Pony Express face grouted over. It’s like the trail was marked for both, then revised after they found out the Pony Express went a different way. Hummmm. Also, there are markers with all four of the historic trails (Pony, Oregon, California, Mormon), and some with just Oregon. I’m going to have to do a dive into the order in which these markers were approved, created and placed along the trail. Some are on private lands. Many are on public lands. If anyone knows anything about this subject, please contact me.
On July 1 1847, the Battalion detachment’s ‘Express’ riders sent from the area of Casper to try to catch Brother Brigham were still 2-1/2 days from doing so. My analysis suggest the Express was camped in the neighborhood of the 8th or 9th crossing of the Sweetwater River. The remainder of the detachments and presumably most of the Mississippi Saints were encamped at Willow Spring for the night.
Today after about 2-1/2 miles of hiking, I decided to try the bike because the 2-track is pretty solid – for the most part. There are some sandy patches but the majority is firmly packed with a modest amount of rock fragments. Works pretty good, with a few walking spots. Denny tries the bike in her section and happily we get about half of our biking distance.
At 5-1/2 miles, our extraordinary run of good luck ran out. Denny’s back tire went flat. We tried to reinflate it but it sounded like a rim gash into the tube. Alas and alack! We retire her bike and try mine – with the seat lowered so my center of gravity made me less susceptible to tipping over when I hit a sandy spot. The final 2-1/2 miles through the section was hiked afoot.
In this area there were power lines, pipelines, and some kind of fiber optic communication lines being installed. For ease of access, a variety of roads have been created and except for the concrete trail markers, we’d have no idea which way to go. Some sections were so convoluted it was clear the trail didn’t go that way or people would have commented on the strange bluffs.
At one point we were completely surrounded by small hills but we were in a bowl and couldn’t see anything else. A ridge became something we looked forward to arriving at. The more expansive ridge views gave us better bearings on where we were headed and where we have been. We could see all the way back east to the Wind Rivers. Off to the south was Pilot Butte and the Uinta Range. To the west the Wasatch Range is just coming into view.
The final section for today is another one of those roads marked as ‘Private’ but isn’t. A lot of heavy mining trucks come and go, kicking up quite a bit of dust and small rocks. There’s a chemical plant east of Granger that mines soda ash. Look it up in WIKI. Soda ash happens to be Wyoming’s ‘top global export.’ That’s saying something about its importance. It’s not a particularly pretty chemical plant – stuck out in the middle of the desert, smack dab on top of the trail. But, what do you think the pioneers would say about ‘progress’ and ‘technology’ making life better for people? Would they be in favor of the factory and its jobs or would they rather we preserve a few miles of trail swales out in the boonies? After all, Denny and I are probably the only people who’ve been on this trail section in quite a few weeks – other than power line, gas line and communications workers.
It was getting pretty warm and eventually I had to give it up a two miles short of Granger. After a couple bouts of heat exhaustion in the past decade, it’s important to not tempt the fates. Denny dotes on me to my complete embarrassment, but secret delight. She’s a great woman.
Our route back to Farson takes us a few miles south to I-80. We check out the RV park we’re going to be using for a couple days starting tomorrow. It looks FINE! Then off to Rock Springs for some groceries. We also called a bike shop to see if they could fix Denny’s bike but they’re backed up in anticipation of the 4th. Dang! I’ll have to do the bike repair myself tomorrow. I’m kind of book schmardt, but PRACTICALLY, an idiot.
And did you hear it’s National Diarrhea Week?
Yep. It runs through Friday.