The main reason for our trip was a business trip to the Cheyenne, WY office for Steve. That's right, I haven't mentioned it here yet but Steve got a job a few months back but I didn't want to jinx anything. Since he was scheduled to spend time at the Cheyenne office we thought that it'd be the perfect time to make it a vacation too. He'd go off to work in the morning and Fearghus and I had fun during the day. Of course the main thing that Fearghus wanted to do was to chase all the cute little rabbits at the KOA campground. They had rabbit holes under all the mini cabins. Occasionally I'd see a prairie dog but they were very shy and scampered underground the moment they were spotted.
After walks with Fearghus I'd explore the city. Cheyenne has this amazing greenway that circles the city .. 32 miles of it and growing! Bikes and pedestrians share the concrete path along greenery, a creek and many city parks. We found a short section and had a great time walking it and looking at the sculptures by Tim Cherry that we found there.
We'd come back and Fearghus would stretch out on the couch. Here he is after being woken up. He likes to curl up against a blanket.
Over the weekend we drove to Boulder, CO and walked along their open air promenade. It reminded me of the Third Street Promenade in Santa Monica but with the people of Berkeley. Nice Victorian houses nearby. Nice but not my cup of tea. We're not really Berkeley types. Plus they don't allow dogs on the promenade so we had to leave Fearghus at the campground. I did like their City Hall, very pretty.
We also spent a day at the Curt Gowdy State Park walking around. I was surprised to see cactus along the path which was extremely narrow, just wide enough for a foot. Turns out that they were meant for off road bicycles. LOL Fortunately we tried a short section and then turned onto the road to return to the car. As you can see, Fearghus loves being out and about.
Downtown Cheyenne had some really interesting buildings and a few shops. I didn't get a chance to take the trolley tour but a very nice lady at an antique shop was telling me all about the local history. Apparently the area used to be the red light district with saloons and brothels and the politicians (this is the state capitol) didn't want anyone to take note of their visits. So they had underground tunnels that would connect to these houses of ill-repute.
There's a pretty plaza downtown in front of the old train depot. Every Friday night during the summer there's a band playing .. apparently it's quite a party. I got a kick out of the big painted cowboy boots flanking the main entrance.
A couple times we ate at a downtown restaurant called Sanford's. I believe that it was named that after the old Sanford & Son TV show because every inch of the place is covered with junk .. nice junk and definitely interesting to see. The first time we were seated at a table with a White sewing machine.
What I found most interesting about Cheyenne is that it's a small town in the middle of a desolate landscape. There's scrub and the land is fairly flat. While we were there a thunderstorm complete with high winds and lightning came and didn't go away for four hours. The next day we found out that 2" of rain fell. The shopkeepers were very friendly and nice. I didn't believe Steve's boss when he said that it's such a small town that you run into coworkers every time you go out. Of course the very next day we ran into one of Steve's coworkers at a gas station. Of course when you realize that they have a population of less than 60,000 that makes more sense. It's very surreal to me, a person who's always lived in metropolitan areas. Heck, our town of Sunnyvale has a population of 140,000 and there are more people living in the city of San Jose than all of the state of Wyoming. I enjoyed it but after a couple weeks it was time to head back home. I did manage to visit a couple quilt shops and a yarn/needlework shop that I'll tell you about tomorrow.
