Day 37: Riverton to Rock Spring

Friday
My tactical error from yesterday became obvious today as we drove to Rock Spring. Instead of taking four days (two nights at Thermopolis, one night at Lander and one night at Rock Spring), We (that is mostly me) had decided to take it in two hops, each of about 140 miles, one night in Riverton and one in Rock Springs. Well we have arrived safely in Rock Springs, but:

1. Sally is shattered
2. In order not to get too tired I rushed us through the countryside, not stopping as often as would be nice, so;
3. We missed out seeing the Worlds Largest Hot Springs at Thermopolis
4. We also did not realise that we were crossing the path of the Oregon Trail, and so did not plan in stopping to see the remains along the roadside.
5. We shall probably stay an extra night at Rock Springs, which although it is quite pleasant is an industrial environment.

O.K., so my little sob story is told, and I am the poorer for having made poor decisions.
On a brighter note, we stopped at Lander, a small western town, for a cuppa. Interestingly the main street was quite wide and we found a note in a shop window which said that the street had been planned to be wide enough to be enable a sixteen horse/mule wagon to turn around, well on looking at it I reckoned I might just be able to turn our rig round in the the same length. The importance of the heavy wagon was that lander was an iron ore mining town.
We chose a coffee shop, called Old town Coffee. We walked in and ordered from the lady behind the counter, the place was almost empty, just some young guy lounging with his laptop, in fact I wondered if he was a college student (no he would be in college), or out of work (could be, but don't judge by appearances), anyway we ordered an Earl Grey for Sally and House Coffee for me, though I was slightly taken aback when I realised that the house coffee (which was actually drip coffee)was  more expensive than the clever cups like cappuccino and such like. Well I must say that I think that this was one of the best cups of coffee I have had in America, Sally also said the Earl grey was excellent, how about that! So I asked the make of coffee, which opened up for us a coffee workshop!!
The young guy lounging at the counter was actually the owner, (see what I mean about judging by appearances).
When I questioned the waitress about the type of coffee I was drinking he intervened and explained in great detail, with great enthusiasm that this coffee was not a Robusta Bean (pah! low quality, bitter) but Kenya Miiri coffee, grown in the shade, at an elevation of 1850ft, and that it was a brand called Heart. This and the way it was roasted and brewed gave it the flavour which I had so much enjoyed. He then went on to explain that coffee should be ground between two surfaces, like millstones used for flour, not cut as most of the cheaper electric grinders are. That this coffee is medium roasted, so as not to be too bitter. He told me that coffee should be made the way it was here in a filter, using a non metallic drip system. I was very impressed with this and bought some of the coffee  (though he tried to give it to me!!) and will try it and see if it tastes as good when I make it. I think what Sally and I both loved (apart from the drinks) was his enthusiasm for the product he was involved with (selling is too harsh a word).
On our way down from Lander we did see some more wonderful scenery, in particular a place called Red Canyon (for obvious reasons). Although there is an awful lot of flat grassland/desert as well, but we saw a lot more pronghorns, though we did not try too hard to photograph them as I felt that we would be creating something of a road hazard if we kept slamming on the anchors to take pics. We stopped in by the Beaver River as Sally spotted a lovely Beaver Lodge and dam, though we did not see the beaver.

Setting up at Sweetwater Event Center was quite interesting. I had called ahead to see if there was any availabilty, the lady said yes there was. We turned up. There is one other trailer on site. There are at least 800 full hook up sites on the campground! Yes there was enough space for us. But even more amazing, we could not find a site which was (a) level front to back, so we had to unhitch, (b) level side to side, (c) long enough to leave the chevy hitched on anyway. Not that we are picky......