10 hours 45 minutes
618.99 miles
We woke up bright and early and left Kathy & Brian's place, headed for Yellowstone. This was our longest day driving on our entire road trip, with most of it in the state of Wyoming. We went through Cheyenne, took a break in Laramie and then tried to make our way to the Mormon Handcart Historic Site. I say try because when I went on the LDS website it listed an address in Alcova and in Lander, but they were well over an hour apart, so I really was not 100% certain which way we were to go. I tried both addresses in our GPS and it did not like it, so I tried the 'Places to Visit' option and found a 'Mormon Handcart' option. I plugged it into the GPS and off we went. By the way, that showed it was about 1/2 way between the two cities (Alcova / Lander) so now we were looking at a 3rd totally different choice. Well...the GPS happily told us that we had arrived at our destination, however, we were literally in the middle of no-wheres-ville. Sagebrush and wheat just blowing in the wind. Nothing. We determined we had given it a good try and since we had well over 10 hours driving on the agenda, we continued on. (Not much in the way of pioneer spirit?) Maybe 15 miles down the road I saw (but almost missed) a sign and a couple small buildings and that is when we found the "Willie Center 6th Crossing". Below is what I found on the internet "after the fact" which probably would have helped a lot!
"2006 - The LDS Church has established a small welcome center at Sixth Crossing, which is about an hour's drive from Martin's Cove. The center includes a staging ground for handcarts used by groups of visitors -- most of them Latter-day Saints -- who come to pull the carts on trails that lead to Rocky Ridge and Rock Creek as a remembrance of the faith and courage of emigrants."
I guess I did not realize that the Willie Handcart Company and the Martin Handcart Company were stranded 60 or so miles apart from each other. That's a long way when you are walking!! Hearing their names 'together' all these years, I just presumed. While there we spoke with the sister missionary who told me the reason that there are addresses listed in Alcova and Lander is they have to drive into town to get their mail as they don't deliver "out here". She was very helpful though and told us that we did need to stop in Lander for their "World Famous Choke Cherry Shake". So we did. And it was delicious.
After driving and driving through prairie land, it was a welcome site when we drove through the Grand Tetons on our way to the south entrance of Yellowstone. So breath taking!
We were amazed at how much snow was still on the ground as we made our way through Yellowstone towards our hotel at Lake Yellowstone. We actually did not stay in the main hotel (shown below) but in one of the cute cabins behind the hotel (Lake Hotel Cabins). Without realizing it, I liked that a whole lot better as we did not have to hear noisy neighbors in the hallways of the hotel. Instead we heard the coyotes howling and the crickets chirping. Plus it was our kind of camping - - soft bed, hot shower and easy walking to dinner!
The main hotel was completed in 1891 and restored in 1990. John did find a couple things he thought still needed fixing - always looking for a fixer-upper!We had dinner at the Lake Lodge hotel in a cafeteria style setting. It was surprisingly affordable and the food was great. We then checked out the gift shops and then settled in our cabin for the night.
