Hello from Chugwater, WY.

Hello from Chugwater, WY.

Wednesday morning August 31, 2011 (third travelogue of this trip).

Well, we are a day behind our schedule. More about that later.

Sunday, we toured Yellowstone and The Tetons. We drove the truck. In total, we drove a bit over 320 miles!!! It had been years since we viewed the gorgeous and amazing Tetons. We had lunch at a great little restaurant in Teton National Park. We then drove north towards Old Faithful. We saw it erupt just as we entered the area, so we knew that we would not be able to wait for the next eruption. We did walk around the area and had a quick snack in the lodge.

We then drove around the north loop (Madison, Norris Canyon Village,and Fishing Bridge). From there we headed back to Cody (about 50 miles from the east entrance). We saw some elk and lots of buffalo. We had hoped, like everybody else, to see moose and bear, but it was not to be.

We had planned to leave the campground early Monday and be home Tuesday. We had the engine started, but noticed one our the chapter members was having a problem with his bus. He was not able to release his parking brakes (cause by a failed brake diaphragm). He had the parts to convert to a more modern system (from DD3 to Spring brakes for the bus crowd). It took 4 of us the whole day to do the conversion. Mounting the parts was the easy part. Getting the air brake control system was the challenge.

We all left yesterday morning and we met up with them a few times – the last time a bit north of Chugwater. The system was functioning well.

If you follow our blog, you know that we have stopped here a couple of times (once on the way up to Cody). It is a quite little town that makes a good logistic stop. Last night I unloaded the bicycle and rode around the town. Once you get off the main street, the town does not look like it is “dead”.

Responding to Judy's comment on PETA and the pig race. PETA would have no problems with the race. The pigs love it, as they all get a nice treat at the end of the race. The track is very small and they don't have to run a lot. You can tell that they have done the race a bunch of times. As soon as the gates are raised, they run very fast. The owners of the saloon had to work with the Montana legislature to get approval so that the patrons could wager bets. I think they said that the proceeds go to worthy charities and a state fund for recreation. The whole event was a lot of fun.

We got an off-line comment from some friends asking us to post some pictures. We have gotten very lazy about taking pictures (took a few) but even more so about taking the time to process them so that they can be posted.

That's all for this trip.