On a very sunny and very windy day a couple of weeks ago LC and I drove west, and only a few miles away from Cody.
If we had driven further we would have made it to the small community of Wapiti.
If we had driven further still we would have made it to the mountainous and pine tree filled Shoshone National Forest.
And beyond the national forest is the East Gate of Yellowstone National Park that we have not yet passed through since returning to Wyoming.
We did not make any of those places on this particular trip, but we did make it to the Buffalo Bill Reservoir...........
Buffalo Bill Reservoir is one of those places that is both wonderfully beautiful and incredibly strange at the same time.
It is a very large body of water that is stunningly blue against a usually stunningly blue sky.
It is entirely surrounded by rock and the lack of trees is always slightly disorienting.
My brain tells me that where there is water there should be many trees, so whenever we come to this place a "does not compute" message always obligingly and predictably lights up inside my brain.
There are no trees but what there is there is so beautiful.
Rugged and hazy and barren mountains in every direction.
Big water in a high desert plains environment where water is often hard to find.
Rock - endless rock - in interesting and jagged formations that tell me that eons ago these surfaces were very hot and then cooled very fast into tortured and jagged shapes.
And immediately beside the reservoir (at least at this time of year) interesting reservoir-related artifacts and mounds of curious tourists...............
A portion of the two lane highway that begins as Sheridan Avenue in downtown Cody, and that travels past the reservoir, through Wapiti and the forest, and then leads directly through the East Gate of the park.
The transformation during that 50 mile drive from the town to the park gate is stunning.
It moves from desert to pasture land to mountainous and pine tree filled, to eventually the magic that is Yellowstone.
Much of the highway parallels the north fork of the Shoshone River.
During that drive there are stunning views around every bend in the road, and multiple campgrounds and picnic areas where travelers can pull off the highway to rest.
And (primarily in the winter when typically mountain dwelling animals move down to lower elevations to graze) it is a drive where animals such as deer, elk, big horn sheep and buffalo are amazingly abundant.
A link to the very first trip that LC and I took on this highway, only a few days after we arrived in Cody in March of 2011:
One of three tunnels that were dug into Rattlesnake Mountain and that make up part of the highway..............
I will never be able to look at these types of boats without thinking of Alaska.............
I have traveled through the shorts tunnels that are cut into the mountain many times and for some reason never thought to take pictures while we were passing through.
On this day I finally thought to snap a couple of pictures, suddenly curious to see how they would turn out..............
A couple of links that provide more information about the reservoir and the dam:
There are still far too many tourists floating in and around Cody and so LC and I did not wander up to the Visitors Center on the day I took these pictures.
Rather, we stopped only briefly beside the water and then returned to Cody.
A link to a stop we made at the Visitors Center not long after it opened for the season last year:
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