Wyoming to South Dakota

September 3

We awoke before dawn and we both felt it was a good enough time to start driving. We got our act in gear, stopped in Walmart to use the restrooms, and then drove through Cody in the dark. We never did see Cody during daylight. I decided that the route the GPS selected ought to be amended and chose to take US 14A (alternate 14) instead of US 14. Razelle asked why the alternate route and I couldn't give a really convincing answer. It just looked like a better alternative to me.

The towns we came to were very small. We had to slow down as we passed through each one. By the time we reached Lovell, Wyoming the sun had come up. We then crossed a wide body of water on a straight road lined with flotsam on both sides, indicating that it wasn't always above water. At the end of this road sat the tractor that must have been called into service whenever the flotsam needed to be cleared. Before us was a formidable wall of a mountain ridge. The road across it promised to be steep and exciting. It kept its promise. Razelle was not too thrilled by the hairpin turns and switchbacks. At a pullout we stopped to eat breakfast from our food supplies. An explanatory sign explained the history of the construction of this road and gave significance to the vista below us.

We continued upward and crested the ridge; then we drove on the plateau above. After a distance on this plateau we saw the dome of an installation of some kind on a mountain peak that still had patches of snow on it, way up here. Just beyond it there was a sign pointing to "the Medicine Wheel." All I knew was that this wheel was some sort of Stonehenge-like thing. At that moment, almost after passing it, but not quite, I had a compelling impulse to try and see this wheel.

I turned into the gravel road that led to the Medicine Wheel. Within a mile I came to a parking lot and parked the van. Only one other vehicle was here. Beyond a gate at the end of this parking lot the gravel road continued into the distance to a hill that seemed to have some kind of structures on it. Razelle was having trouble with the thinness of the oxygen in the air at this elevation, so she stayed with the van while I walked onward past the gate to investigate the structures ahead. The road there was longer than it appeared at first. It passed a patch of snow. I saw a couple of hunters in orange vests with hunting dogs and hunting rifles (I assumed the other vehicle in the parking lot was theirs).

As I walked on the gravel, a single stone caught my eye. It was jade green. I picked it up. I reached the medicine wheel after passing jutting rocks on the shoulder of this promontory – they had anthropomorphic features. I took in the surrounding vista and I felt a reverence for this sacred spot envelop me. I took a few pictures, and included "no evil," our stuffed toy monkey in some of them.


A sign said to walk around the wheel to the left (clock-wise). I felt compelled to set my green stone on a post of the fence that encircled the Medicine Wheel, alongside other such stones previous visitors had set there. It was Shabbat, Saturday morning. Ordinarily, we would have been in a synagogue this morning, but I had searched the Internet for a synagogue near Cody and found that either none were close enough to reach; or they were close enough, but they didn't hold Saturday morning services. This was the closest "sanctuary" around so I closed my eyes and prayed a personal prayer. Then, feeling uplifted, I returned to Razelle along the same gravel road I had come.

I walked as quickly as I could. When I reached the patch of snow I collected a double handful, balled it up and carried it in my hat back to the freezer in the van. I also collected an older couple – a heavy-set man who favored a leg, his wife and their two tiny dogs. The man had served with the Merchant Marines distributing humanitarian aid around the world. He had complimentary things to say about his experience in Israel; less complimentary things to say about the countries in that region that he also had visited.

I noticed more vehicles were in the lot when I reached the van and a young woman in uniform was near the small cabin by the gate. A sign on the gate said only those unable to walk could drive beyond that point. Razelle was very eager to see the Medicine Wheel after I described my experience. The woman in uniform opened the gate for us and Razelle and I drove to the Medicine Wheel.

We were alone there. Razelle found a stone, too. She circled the site in the proper direction, counted the posts that encircled the Medicine Wheel and placed her stone on the one whose number had the most significance to her. Then we stood together and prayed parts of the morning service aloud. We said Shehechiyanu, the Shema, Adon Olam, the Cohanim's blessings, and we both said the Mourners' Kaddish for our fathers, whose death anniversaries were coming up in a few days. We didn't have a minyan (a quarum of ten) when we said Kaddish, but it seemed appropriate enough to us to say Kaddish here together in the rarified air on this mountain top among the spirits of this sanctified place. And it felt very important that we each remember our fathers here while we could. We returned to the van with tear-streaked cheeks and an emotional sense that our impulsive choices to take alternate routes and gravel roads to this spot were not done by chance.

We returned to the parking lot to thank the young woman for enabling Razelle to pray at the Medicine Wheel, but an older man in uniform was there instead. He opened the gate with a smile. We told him that the woman's act was far more significant for us than she could have known, then we drove on.

The descent from this plateau was even more dramatic, it seemed, than the ascent had been. On our way down we encountered a lot of traffic going up in the opposite direction. We surmised that they were all streaming toward Yellowstone National Park this Labor Day Weekend. We were keenly aware that our destinations were going to be popular destinations the next two days, with crowds at venues and competition for lodging. Nothing we can do about that.

We reached Interstate 90 at Ranchester, Wyoming and then zipped along the interstate at highway speeds. We reached our turnoff to the Devil's Tower by late afternoon. As we drove in its direction we strained our eyes in the Tower's direction looking for it to come into view. We imagined Steven Spielberg as a kid on some family road trip having the same moment of awe when the Tower first appeared in the distance. Of course we don't know if he ever took such a trip, but we imagined it, anyway.

Then we saw it. 

At the appropriate place we pulled off the road and took its picture in all its splendor with the lighting emphasizing its texture and prominence. We reached the entrance booth and showed our pass. Beyond the gate we came across an impressive number of prairie dogs active along the roadside and poking out of the turf in the receding distances. These creatures are protected here and it was a pleasure to see so many of them this visit. When I was here in 1997 with Maayan there didn't seem to be as many.

At the visitors center we got into a discussion with one of the rangers who intends to visit Ayer's Rock in Australia, which she mentioned was similar to Devil's Tower in the respect that both are monoliths. I described the Uluru region to her and sketched a diagram of the roads and related rock formations. Isn't it amazing that we are so knowledgeable? Did all this really happen on one trip? And in such a short time? We ourselves marvel at the scope of what we've done and we can't grasp the enormity of it, at times, until asked the kind of questions this ranger asked.

We continued driving while we still had light. At Sundance, Wyoming we turned onto the Interstate and drove into South Dakota, our thirteenth state on this trip. Our GPS was programmed to takes us to the Walmart Superstore in Spearfish, SD. We easily found it, pulled in among campers and trucks, turned off the engine and lights and went to sleep, this time with more confidence than the last that it was safe to sleep at Walmart.

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RAZELLE'S PHOTO OF THIS DAY

Aaron walking along the path to see the Medicine Wheel