Much of this writer's summer vacation was spent behind the steering wheel on drives through the mountains of Colorado, Wyoming, and Montana. Yellowstone National Park was the final stop before the return to Oklahoma.
Needless to say, we had to buy a lot of gasoline.
The price we paid for gasoline, usually 87 octane—or 85 octane in the mountains—varied from about $1.68/gal at the starting point to $2.19/gal at a Conoco station at the Old Faithful Inn in Yellowstone Park. (I think if I had to bring a tank truck up those mountains and through the park I would have charged more.)
Generally, gasoline prices for unleaded regular were about $1.89/ gal.
Here are some thoughts about vacation, travel, and travel expenses in this new day of higher fuel prices.
A car is best
There is no option to seeing the mountains except by automobile. Sure, Lewis and Clark did it 200 years ago using boats, horses, and feet, but they had 2 years for the trip, and we had only 2 weeks.
We had to pass on the fun of pulling and paddling boats upriver and walking over the Rocky Mountains. And what would be the cost of motels for about 750 nights?
Our trip included a week in Estes Park, Colo., and then moving north and west past the Grand Tetons and into Yellowstone National Park for about another week.
In central Wyoming there are few trees. There are rolling hills and a lot of sagebrush but not much else. It is nice to have an air-conditioned automobile to enjoy the hours of passing through an interesting and very different (to us) countryside.
Ranch houses were several miles apart and usually set a long way back from the highway. And seldom were there cars in sight either ahead of or behind us.
Alternative energy
While driving across Wyoming on State Highway 287 near Sand Draw we came to realize there were other ways to travel west to see the mountains.
Passing over the top of a hill and heading down into a valley, we spotted something moving low along the shoulder of the road some half a mile ahead.
It was a bicycle. A recumbent bicycle, to be exact, and it was pulling a small trailer with camping gear. On a recumbent bike, the rider reclines to pedal. This rider properly wore flags, brightly colored clothing, and a helmet.
We had been talking about how fortunate we were to have filled up the gas tank in Rawlins, Wyo., at $1.79/ gal, before heading out on this long strip of lonely road through wide-open country. We had not seen a service station for quite a while.
That, I'm sure, had no effect on our bicycle rider. I don't know what the cyclist was using for energy but it had to include a lot of water and food bars stashed in the trailer.
You couldn't help but admire someone so dedicated to saving fossil fuels by taking his vacation on a bicycle. I don't know how far someone can travel on one of those things in a day, probably a hundred miles. But those mountains! Even with all the gears on a bicycle, climbing the Tetons and Rockies has to be unpleasant.
We passed the rider and went on to our destination for the day. I assume the rider also stopped for the night, but who knows? He might have passed our motel at 4 a.m. the next day.
Yellowstone riders
That, of course was not the last cyclist spotting. If you have traveled in that part of the country you know there are more than a few hardy souls traveling by bicycle. Some even travel the roads of Yellowstone Park itself.
I can't recommend that. It is open range there, and some of the animals are less than friendly. And they get in the road, stop traffic, and dare you to make them move. Bicycles are no match for a buffalo. And a bear looking for a snack in your little trailer would be even worse.
I'm not ready to move from automobiles to bicycles, but I'll bet that after seeing those mountains Lewis and Clark would have gladly made the trade.
I think I'll stay with the car for now and pay the little extra for gasoline.
