Dateline: Rock Springs, Wyoming. We spent the last three nights in Meeker, Colorado, visiting relatives who ranch there. I have three cousins living in the area, and we visited two of these and their spouses. We learned a lot about cow-calf operations, which is what Cousin Bill operates. Meeker is a very pretty part of north-western Colorado. Around Meeker there are pine forests, aspen forests, scrub-covered hillsides, farmed meadows, you name it.
A bunch of wealthy folks have 'discovered' the region and bought ranches to use as hunting lodges and summer places. Everybody in the area seems to love hunting and shooting. Yesterday as we were out for a scenic drive a herd of maybe 35 elk ran across the gravel road in front of us - beautiful animals that are also very tasty.
Meeker is a part of the so-called "overthrust belt," an oil and gas producing region that runs all the way north into Alberta. A number of otherwise pristine canyons have large oil or gas facilities "decorating" them. Before the petroleum firms arrived there wasn't much going on except agriculture and the various activities which support it, plus hunting-based tourism.
Today we drove north out of Meeker through Craig and on north to link up with I-80, where we turned west. A lot of the day we drove through rain. We noted again a thing we've noticed many times before: the nature of the terrain often changes at the state line. Can this be coincidence? As we drove north out of Colorado into south-central Wyoming the terrain became dramatically less interesting and less picturesque when we crossed the state border. Northern Colorado is just better looking than south-central Wyoming.
As we drove today, we must have seen several hundred pronghorns also called antelope, in groups of 5 or 10, within a hundred yards of the highways. These animals have very pretty and dramatic coloring: tan and white and black. I guess they may be attracted to the area along the roads because in winter the roads are salted and the salt contains minerals they need but otherwise don't get from their browse.
Pronghorn don't pay any attention to cars passing, but I understand they are very leery of a hunter on foot. This is the reason hunters want extra-long range rifles with very high power scope sights, so they can shoot them at extreme distances. Wyoming hunters refer to them as "goats," I think because a skinned antelope looks like a skinned goat, being about the same size and body shape. Once again you'll find pictures from our last few days on the other DrC's blog at cruztalking.blogspot.com.
