Wyoming

Imagine craggy mountains in a spectacular panorama as you meander along a scenic road deep in the back country.  Mountain peaks jutting skyward more like the Swiss Alps than your vision of America.  Massive, rugged scenery doesn’t get much better than this than in Yellowstone National Park and the Grand Tetons.  The mountains loom high overhead, like a string of purple nuggets laid out carefully one by one.  Yellowstone hosts over half of the world’s active geysers and thermal phenomenon that have been working to attract visitors for over a century.   No less a nature lover than President Theodore Roosevelt, who created the first National Park at Yellowstone, proclaimed the 50 miles of road heading east from Yellowstone to Cody, to be America’s most scenic drive.  When John Colter explored Jackson Hole in 1807, he found the land teeming with wildlife, filled with natural marvels and geologic formations.  But wait, Yellowstone and Grand Teton are only a small corner of Wyoming.  The myths of the old West, the gunslingers, cattlemen and cowboys have come to define the rest of the region.   It was Buffalo Bill Cody and his Wild West Show that forever branded Wyoming as the quintessential western state.  At one point, he was the most recognized figure in the world and his colorful personality is still alive.  At some point, when the fur trade tapered off, cattle ranching took over as the primary economic activity, leaving the legends of cattlemen, farmers and ranchers to be explored in all corners of the state.  The railroad gave birth to Laramie, Rock Springs and Evanston and coal mining, which began in the 1860s, still continues today.  This diversity makes  Wyoming a very intriguing place to explore.