Old Trail Town - Part 2

Continuing along the opposite side of the "street"........

This livery barn was built on the Clarks Fork Canyon in 1890...........

Three of the Old Trail Town buildings were used by the "Hole in the Wall Gang".  The Hole in the Wall Cabin (1883) was the famous hideout for the gang, including Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.

The Rivers Saloon (1888) was a favorite spot for Butch Cassidy where the gang plotted two different bank robberies.  The Mud Spring Cabin was used by Kid Curry and the Sundance Kid as a hideout before they attempted to hold up the Red Lodge Bank in 1897........

Half way along the old town street we veered down a dirt and grass alley that led to wagons that were located in back of the old cabins.

Old pieces of equipment seen during our wanderings..........

Dry Creek Homestead Cabin built in 1900...........

Behind the cabins LC and I spent a long time taking pictures of wagons in various states of repair and disrepair.

I was surprised how interesting they were to me.

And surprised just how much my Mountain Boy knew about old western.......stuff.  

Tools and wagons and farming equipment........

Beautiful and once-functional and still-artistic wagon wheels...........

We have rabbits that live on our property and that house underneath the storage buildings.

They are sweet and cute and I really like having them around.

Our neighbor has told us that we should expect to see baby bunnies any time now, and I have been waiting with great anticipation to see these little things running around.

As we were wandering around old wagons and wagon parts yesterday I took this picture of a lone baby bunny hopping in the grass.

Too cute...........

LC started pointing out the difference in springs underneath the wagons indicating just how hard or soft of a ride each wagon provided.

I had never thought of such things before, assuming that everyone in those days had the same uncomfortable traveling experience.

I was surprised at how interesting these things were.

And when you looked at them closely just how lovely their lines were.

Until my oldest son gave me a digital camera for Christmas a couple of weeks before leaving Tennessee, and until I actually developed a new-found interest in taking pictures, I had no idea that I would look at old machinery from an artistic perspective.

Beautiful and functional.

I had fun photographing them from different angles.........

I was very glad that we had decided to visit the Old Trail Town before hordes of tourists descended on Cody.

There are four or five campgrounds located within the city limits that are already beginning to fill up.

Campgrounds in the city limits seems like an oxymoron to me but not to everyone I guess.

Regardless, I was happy that we visited while we could still enjoy this place in the quiet..........

Eventually we walked into a large structure that contained all types of wagons - chuck wagons, water wagons, supply wagons, fancy buggies both covered and uncovered, winter buggies on skis.

I walked into the building and was delighted by what I saw.

I was "in the zone" - over the past couple of hours I had moved from "I'm not sure how interesting this is really going to be" to "I saw a lot of the same stuff for free at museums in Meeteetse" to "this is way-cool and I'm having a great time"..........

Throughout our wanderings in Trail Town I had been constantly surprised by LC.

I knew that he had grown up on a farm in Tennessee but was surprised that he knew what so many pieces of equipment (both indoor and outdoor) were.

He remembers having oil lamps before electricity came to the Tennessee Valley.

Before they had electricity????

It would be an understatement to say that I was surprised.

And much of the farming equipment that I looked at and knew nothing about, he described seeing and using growing up.

He was in familiar territory.

When my Mountain Boy saw this wagon he smiled in recognition.  

It was exactly like one he had ridden on his farm as a child.

This man is only 12 years older than me, but when he told me about the wagon I laughingly asked him what century he grew up in.

The wagon was in one corner of the large barn so I could not take a picture of the side of it, but to this inexperienced western woman it looked like so many wagons I had seen while half-watching and half-listening to boring old western movies way-back-when........