Santa Ynez Valley

Santa Ynez Valley
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Monday, September 12, 2016

Chief Joseph Scenic Highway and Beartooth Highway

We took a long drive from our base camp and drove over the Chief Joseph Scenic Highway to the junction with the Beartooth Highway.  We then took the Beartooth Highway over Beartooth Pass to Red Lodge and then returned to Cody via MT-72 and WY-120.  The Chief Joseph Scenic Highway mostly follows part of the route that Chief Joseph used leading the Nez Pierce Indians attempting to reach sanctuary in Canada while trying to avoid capture by the US Army.


Starting up the Chief Joseph Scenic Highway



View from the summit at Dead Indian Pass



A memorial sculpture for the Nez Pierce



A panorama from along the Beartooth Highway



Long Lake



Looking down below Beartooth Pass



Video panorama from Beartooth Pass



This juvenile Red-tailed Hawk was using the strong updraft on the mountainside to hover while scanning the terrain below.  It would then swoop down low over the land below and then return high up to hover again.




A couple more views from the Beartooth Highway



Buffalo Bill State Park

We are spending several days at Buffalo Bill State Park on the edge of Buffalo Bill Reservoir on the Shoshone River, a few miles west of Cody, Wyoming.


Our campsite along the shore of Buffalo Bill Reservoir



A couple of views across Buffalo Bill Reservoir




Mountains to the north



We've seen a lot of wild Prairie Sunflowers lately.




Died sunflower seed head



A couple of the local inhabitants




Just outside of Cody, we found this large field of commercial sunflowers.





Little Bighorn Battlefield

A few years ago, Barbara learned that one of her great-grandfathers was buried in the Custer National Cemetery within the Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument.  He was a civil war veteran and Custer National Cemetery was the closest national cemetery to where he died.  We decided to visit the National Monument to visit his grave and to see where Custer's last stand happened.


The older part of Custer National Cemetery



Grave of James Upton (Barbara's great-grandfather)



Area along the Little Bighorn River where many more Indians were encamped than Custer was expecting



Last Stand Hill where Custer and his group met their end



A sunset in the plains


Bighorn Mountains

We spent a few days in Buffalo, Wyoming, so that we could explore Wyoming's Bighorn Mountains.  Here are just a few images from one of our drives into the Bighorns.


The Bighorns viewed from the east.



A mountain stream



Water Lily covered lake