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Date Climbed
May 21-22, 2004
Conditions
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Wyoming County
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My time in Wyoming has been short, and I have only been able to knock out just a handful of fairly easy county highpoints, mainly as add-ons to some larger trip. In 1999 I made an attempt on Gannett Peak, the state highpoint, but had to cancel the bid when I developed a debilitating blister on my heel walking in. That was frustrating, and I haven't been back for a second attempt since. Gannett remains my only coterminous western state highpoint that I lack.
I visited my first county highpoint in Wyoming a few days after summitting Granite Peak in Montana. I was driving through after a night in Thermopolis on my way to the Sturgius Bike Rally in South Dakota. The easy forested highpoint of Washakie County was just off the highway, so I went and nabbed it. In 2004, while knocking out a bunch of counties in Nebraska and South Dakota, I visited three more Wyoming counties, mainly those along the eastern border. I had plans to hike up Medicine Bow Peak as well but that early in the year it was still snowed in.
I would still like to visit more of Wyoming and hike its peaks, but so far it just hasn't ever been a priority. It is a beautiful state with expansive views everywhere. Maybe someday I will knock out Gannett. A fellow can dream, can't he?
I came upon these highpoints after a night in Thermopolis. My original intent was to climb the Washakie Needles, the highpoint of Hot Springs County, with a group that included 4 people that had been part of our successful Granite Peak (Montana Highpoint) expedition just two days before. In fact, we'd just come off of Granite Peak the day before, and after a long celebration dinner at the Grizzly Bar in Roscoe, I was to eventually join the Washakie Needles group in Thermopolis that night. First, I had to get to Billings and pick up my rental vehicle, which I did around 9 p.m. I didn't arrive in Thermopolis, Wyoming, until nearly 1 a.m. I was absolutely thrashed: tired, totally exhausted physically and mentally from the four days on Granite. I was having serious doubts about my ability to strap on the pack again and go for another big peak. What I really needed was a few days to recuperate. The next morning (August 7th, today), I decided to not attempt Washakie Needles. While the other guys were kind of bummed I wasn't going to go, my presence wasn't mandatory as they had enough skill to tackle it on their own (indeed, I would have been just one more body to ferry up). So after a nice breakfast in town, they headed out to do the Needles while I decided to just take a leisurely drive toward Sturgis, South Dakota, and go check out the motorcycles. On the way I hit the easy highpoints of Washakie County.
Before leaving Thermopolis I briefly visited the Hot Springs, some of the largest natural hot springs in the world, almost as big as a lake (kind of reminded me of the big springs in Balmorhea, Texas). From there I went northish to the town of Worland, then took US-16 east through the town of Ten Sleep and up the scenic Ten Sleep Canyon. This was some beautiful countryside: steep, high-walled limestone canyons with periodic volcanic rock (the roadside signs mention the type and age of the rocks, a nice touch). From Worland it was about 45 miles up this highway. Once it gained out of Ten Sleep Canyon, the highway meanders a bit in nice high-country pine forests, with some lakes and a ski area located up here. Finally I came to the Johnson County Line sign, my cue that I was near the Washakie County highpoints.
There are three areas that comprise the highpoint: two are located on the south side of the highway on a small hill with about 200 feet of gain, and the third is a ridge-point on the north side of the highway. For the southern points, I parked about a quarter-mile down a forest road (FR-25) south of the highway until I was about even (latitude) with the highpoints. From here I hiked up a moderate slope amid downed snags until I gained the top, marked by large heaps of boulders. There are two distinct boulder outcrops about 200 feet apart; I climbed them both. Both were topped with small cairns, but sighting between the two was impossible due to trees. I hiked by dead reckoning back to my car, coming out to the road about 300 feet south of where I parked. Not very dead, I said to myself.
For the northern point, I crossed the highway, aligned myself with the two county line signs, and with compass in hand, did my best to maintain a northern heading (with about a 10-degree allowance for magnetic vs. true north). In any case, the forest was open enough to allow for fairly direct travel; I hiked until I topped out on a very gentle ridgeline, agreeing with the map. Once on the grassy ridge I hiked its spine about 200 feet in both directions. Previous visitors have identified a good-sized boulder on which they built a small cairn as a possible location for this liner. Well, at best this just means I found their cairn. To be safe I hiked a bit in both directions as mentioned before. Where ever the county line crosses this ridge is anyone's guess, but I am confident I was there, although the exact moment when will remain a mystery. From here I trudged back to my car. Total hiking was about 1 mile (1/2 mile for each hike) and 400 feet of gain (200 feet for each hike) in about one hour.
I spent the rest of the day heading towards Sturgis with a side trip to Devil's Tower (and the hundreds of bikers). Sturgis was pretty awesome but the weather started to get real bad. I bailed just as the rains fell and the lightning knocked out power, and ended up spending the night in my car along a highway in South Dakota. The next day I hiked White Butte, the North Dakota highpoint, then went on home.
On my 2004 trip through the High Plains, I had opportunities to visit a few easy Wyoming county highpoints, the first couple congregated up near the Black Hills of South Dakota. Weston County is one such place.
The Weston County highpoint is just an insignificant point along the county's eastern border, which is also the Wyoming-South Dakota state line. There's not much to it, but the highpoint is close to a major highway and has good road access. By the time I arrived in the area it was getting late in the day, about 6 p.m. or so. It had been a full day: two mountain hikes in Sylvan Peak in Custer County and Virkula Peak in Meade County, including time spent lost while on Sylvan Peak, some time at the Mount Rushmore Monument, time spent dodging a major thunderstorm cell while attempting the Crook County highpoint in Wyoming, and a successful, if muddy, visit to the nearby Lawrence County (South Dakota) highpoints at Crooks Tower. Fortunately the Weston liner looked like quick work since I was pretty beat by this time. The access road that led to the Lawrence County highpoints was just a few miles away from the access road to the Weston highpoint. They both feed onto US-85. I crossed into Wyoming, went about 2 miles, and turned east onto Cold Creek Road, which turned to dirt. It was a well-graded road that went southeast about 2 more miles, putting me back into South Dakota and a few hundred yards east of the highpoint. I parked in a clearing roughly due east of the objective. With the sun low, it got pretty cold pretty fast!
From my vehicle I walked into the forest and beelined it west until I reached the state-line fence (this is also marked as such on the access road). I then turned south and followed it as it rose up and down with the terrain. The Weston County highpoint was just where this fence topped out. Previous visitors have made a tradition of jamming coins into the old fencepost at the highpoint. I counted about a half-dozen coins, some clearly weathered with age. Maybe sixty cents worth. I stuffed a Missouri Quarter into the fencepost. About 150 feet south was another rise that also seemed to be as high. I went there and found more coins stuffed into the fence, so I put what left I had, a dime. At each place I stuck my foot through the barbed wire to "step" on the Wyoming side to make it official. With that, I walked back to my vehicle and drove back north about 25 miles to Lead, where I stayed the night at a neat little ma-and-pa (actually, ma-and-son) hotel/cabin outfit on the north edge of town. For the price of a usual hotel room ($45), I had a two-room cabin with TV, two beds, a fridge, stove, a small patio and great views. It wasn't 5-star, or even 2-star, but everything worked and that was fine with me. Actually, I was most intrigued by the coffee table. It had a drawer built into it. When I pulled it open it revealed itself to be a stereo/turntable unit from the 1960s! Very relic stuff. Probably didn't work, but I'm sure some retro-buff would pay top dollar for such an item.
This highpoint lies very near the South Dakota state line, and not far from a couple of county highpoints in South Dakota's Black Hills. I had just completed a pleasantly strenuous hike up the Meade County highpoint, and had driven about 45 miles, zig-zagging westward through the northern Black Hills. There was one more South Dakota county I was after, plus two in Wyoming including this one. Mapwise, it made sense to get this one first. As I drove west through the towns of Deadwood, Lead and Savoy, the weather started to get really nasty. It had become a little threatening while descending form the Meade County highpoint, but in the hour or so afterwards, it had turned into a really big deal. Even an automated weather service warning came out over the radio. Visually, the sky was dark gray and very ominous to the west. But ... so far, no rain or anything of the sort. Knowing I was probably pushing my luck, I went for it anyway. From Savoy on Alt-US-14, I drove up a series of forest roads west for about 11 miles. The junctions were well marked and even included signs to the Cement Ridge Lookout, which I presume is a minor tourist attraction for those willing to seek it out. A few miles short of the goal the first rain drops began to fall. As I drove up to the saddle just west of the highpoint areas, it was raining pretty good. Still, I figured I could run the short hike and be in and out in just a few minutes. Literally as soon as I stepped out the car door, a big bolt of lightning struck nearby followed by thunder and hail... No way. I just got right back in and drove down back to Savoy. This highpoint would have to wait another day.
After a short while by which time I had driven back down to pavement, the storm cell passed and it got sunny again. In fact, within an hour (it was about 4 p.m. by this time), the skies were mostly clear again! I was able to use this opportunity to get the other two nearby highpoints I needed, Lawrence County in South Dakota and Weston County in Wyoming. The rain had muddied up some of the forest roads but I was still able to get these with no problems. I considered driving right back up Cement Ridge but figured that I'd give it another few hours to dry out and instead, I took a hotel in Lead (pronounced "leed"), a nice little cabin just north of town.
Early the next morning (today), I got moving and drove back up to Cement Ridge, in absolutely perfect conditions. The road actually leads all the way to the lookout tower on the west end of the ridge line, but the highpoint is a hill on the east of the ridge. I parked at a bend in the road and walked up the open forest and grassy slopes to the bigger southern area, marked on the map as 6,674 feet and the likeliest highpoint. I also went north a few hundred feet and checked out another area that had an outside chance of being as high. The two areas were mostly scrubby grass and brush mixed in with rock jumbles. Forest cover was moderate - enough so that views from the top were mostly blocked but in a few instances allowing some nice views across the countryside. After a short tour of the second area I walked back down to my vehicle, the whole hike of one mile taking about 40 minutes with about 150 feet of gain. From here I drove to the lookout and took the opportunity to snap some photos. The lookout has a picnic area and appears to allow public access. The views out over the hills and valleys were stunning. After a few minutes I returned back down to the main highway and started the long drive south toward Colorado. It was well over 100 miles to Lusk in Wyoming, where I got a lunch, and from where I set out on my Sioux County (Nebraska) adventure. By this time the weather started to get slightly nasty again, but fortunately nothing really bad happened.
After a successful visit to the Sioux County highpoint hills in Nebraska, and a hip-hop lunch at the Subway Shop in Lusk, I headed southwesterly to gain yet another county highpoint, the Goshen (Wyoming) apex. The weather was becoming steadily worse; a band of clouds north of me looked very suspicious, as in tornado-spawning suspicious. I kept an eye on them, drove west on US-18 through Manville, then south on WY-270 toward nowhere, it seemed. This is Wyoming folks: wide open spaces, wide open ... wide wide wide open. In other words, really wide open spaces. I was in a sage and grass covered semi-desert area ringed by hilly mountains, one of which, to my south, was the Goshen highpoint. I crossed into Platte County then immediately turned east onto a dirt road, which leads 4.5 miles later to a FAA radar golf-ball site sitting atop the highpoint, not too far inside Goshen County. Signs at the start mentioned the penalties one may get for interfering with the goings-on of the radar people, but nothing said to keep out. The road was ungated and in great shape, so I merrily drove in, all the way to the top. A very pretty drive: toward the top the trees get thicker but mostly it was open terrain, with views only limited by the horizons and today, the low clouds.
I drove to the FAA facility and entered through their open front gate. Two cars were parked there and it was obvious the place was in use. The low hum of generators could be heard. I knocked on the door but no one answered. I drove back out and parked off the road near the entrance, where a bigger sign explained that visitors will be subject to search and that firearms and explosives are strictly forbidden. Again, nothing said I wasn't welcome. I got my boots on and left a note in my windshield saying I'd be back in about 30 minutes and that I was clean (seriously!).
Even though I was at the "top", I still had some decent hiking to do. There are three areas that reach 6,120 feet: two right by the facility itself and another about a half-mile to the north. I chose to get the northern area first. This is a separate little peaklet from the other two. I walked an older road to a fence line, descended the rocky and grassy slopes a short bit and then ascended the other side, gaining the top where there sat a good-sized cairn of rocks, but no register. Quick and easy, but steep enough to speed up my breathing. I walked back to the FAA ball, went around back to the second big area, where I found another cairn, then walked to the third area, closest to my vehicle, but of the three, the least likely to hold the highpoint. Views were open here- no trees to block views and very pretty in all directions. I got back to my vehicle and it seemed no one had come by. I changed and got moving and made my way south to Laramie, where I stayed the night in a hotel in town. The next day: Colorado, and then on home.
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(c) 2002, 2004, 2007 Scott Surgent. For entertainment purposes only. This report is not meant to replace maps, compass, gps and other common sense hiking/navigation items. Neither I nor the webhost can be held responsible for unfortunate situations that may arise based on these trip reports. Conditions (physical and legal) change over time! Some of these hikes are major mountaineering or backpacking endeavors that require skill, proper gear, proper fitness and general experience. |