Go East, finally.

 

9/25/25:  We slow rolled the morning and ran out of fresh water.  We left just before 10 with a sink full of dirty dishes.  It was already starting to get warm, another cloudless day.  The excitement for the morning was seeing someone leave the campground with a storage door open on their trailer.  I ran them down in crocs and sweats.  The crocs weren’t even in 4x4.  I was pretty happy with myself.  

We drove the longer route to avoid towing through the NP.  In retrospect, it may have been the better choice.  We took on fuel in Livingston and got rid of our trash.  We chatted with family as we headed east on the 90.  We took a detour towards Cody and it was getting hot.  The battery system in the rig was having a hard time keeping the fridge and our portable freezer running due to the heat.  We did stop in Belfry for a pizza and turned the fridge on propane.  This helped with the battery situation.  The pizza was pretty good and we ended up with leftovers.  

Based on the heat and the fact we didn’t want to pay much for camping, we only stopped to dump tanks and take on fresh water.  The Cody city dump is donation based for the dump and $1 in quarters gave us almost 7 minutes of fresh water.  The Boondocking spots just east of Cody look like nice spots, but they are in direct sun.  We’ll have to come back and explore Cody and the area some other time.  

We made it all the way over to Ten Sleep for the night as we wanted to get into the cool of the Bighorn Mountains.  Ten Sleep is a cute little town and the brewery used to be a harvest host.  Now it’s on Hip Camp and they charge way too much to sleep in their parking lot.  It was packed though.  

Driving ten minutes out of town we arrived at Leigh Creek National Forest Campground.  It appears it closed on the 15th, but it’s “still open”.  None of the signs are up and the amenities are locked.  We took the camp host spot and stayed for free…in the shadows of the trees and canyon walls.  We could also hear the creek behind us.  

Leftover pizza and a movie for the evening and I went to bed before eleven.  I was wore out from a long day.  

9/26/25:  We didn’t leave until 10 or so.  The drive out of the canyons and up into the Bighorn Mountains was beautiful.  We pulled off at a few viewpoints and enjoyed the ride.  Buffalo WY is a pretty cute town, not much to it, but it’s in a great setting.  It was hot so we took on fuel and continued east.  

A quick stop at Smiths Grocery Store in Gillette for provisions and we continued the 50 minutes to KeyHole State Park to find a lake spot to beat the heat.  There are 10 campgrounds in the SP so I took a picture at the gate.  Reservations stopped on 9/15 so it’s FCFS.  We found a decent spot on Pats Point and backed in.  I was setting up and Katy made us a sandwich as it was 3:00 and we hadn’t had lunch.  By looking at the outside of the rig, you could see we were in the middle of set up.  

I sat down to eat with Katy and someone walked up quickly to the screen door of the rig and got our attention.  He scared Katy and she said “holy $#!+” you scared me.  The guy was an officer from Wyoming State Parks Law Enforcement division.  

The officer told us they were doing a permit check and asked for our camping permit or day use permit.  I advised him we were in the middle of setting up and that we had basically just arrived.  He went back to his truck and said he’d be back in a minute.  I met him outside and he asked for my ID.  He said he’d was going to see if I had any wants or warrants and told me to unhook as quickly as possible.  He also told me he was going to keep my ID and would escort me up to the pay station to get squared away.  

Turns out my license is still good, I have no warrants and my credit card worked to pay for the site.  I told the officer I’m retired PD and showed him the picture I took of the map with the time stamp on it.  I said we weren’t trying to pull a fast one and most state parks we’ve visited have you find a site and then pay.  I asked if they were busy here and he said it’s slow this time of year.    Must have been why we got jammed up for not paying in the first 20 minutes of being in the park.  Overall, it was an odd experience and I walked away with a verbal warning.  

On a positive note, the site we landed l, PP-3, is great.  Right on the water with a rock beach and a distant view of Devils Tower.  It was pretty breezy and not too hot in the shade of the trees by the beach.  There are only two other campers in our whole loop.  We relaxed all afternoon and tried to watch a movie after having leftovers for dinner.