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by Larry Heck of
(There are many millions of stories about the naked west. As with all Pass Patrol Campfire Tales, the facts of this one have been distorted.)
It began on a late July evening in the year of 1996. I was enjoying a quiet evening alone camped near the Ute Indian reservation in southern Colorado. The night was filled with the sounds of the forest. A nearby bubbling stream, the bawl of a cow calling her calf in the distance, and the howl of a Coyote trying to find the calf before the cow did. I was sitting near a campfire dreaming up another story for our next newsletter when I heard the familiar sound of drums in the distance ... or was that thunder? Or could it be Caveman's Jeep. He's the only one who can find me when I'm trying to be alone. "Oh well," I thought. "He won't tell anyone where I am."
Caveman's Jeep topped the ridge followed by Magnolia in her Cherokee, Sunshine in her Bronco, Ramblin' Rose in her Rodeo, and Loco Weed riding shotgun for Ramblin Rose. "Oh well," I thought. "Let's party."
"No time to party," Caveman said as he stepped up to the fire. "Word just came in. The Wild Bunch knocked over the train in Tipton and hightailed it for Hole in the Wall!"
I've been tracking the outlaws for a long time. So long, my nickname has become, Outlaw. But the trail went cold. I had been waiting for the Wild Bunch to surface one more time so I could get a fresh start. "How long ago?" I asked.
"August 29th., 1900."
The outlaws only had a 96 year head start on us. With Vortec V-6 power and Magellan GPS technology, we should be able to catch up to them in no time. I poured my Pepsi on the flickering flames. "We better get started."
"I can't go," Caveman said. "I gotta put a muffler on my Jeep. Folks keep mistakin' it for Indian war drums. If I didn't have V-8 power I never could have gotten away from that calvary that was shootin' at me."
"That weren't no calvary," Loco Weed yelled. "That was your own motor backfiring!"
"Like I said," Caveman grinned. "I can't go. I gotta tune my motor."
Caveman had done well. He assembled a posse of Pass Patrol's elite. Loco Weed ... the best tracker this side of the Pecos ... or was that the Rio Grande. His sidekick, Ramblin Rose ... capable of determining exactly how old the trail was by examining scat left behind. Magnolia ... able to ride night and day without sleep or rest as long as those danged outlaws don't steel her car again. Sunshine ... sharpshooter and the best dutch oven cobbler cook this side of the Mississippi. It was another adventure of Outlaw, Loco Weed, and The Girls.
 |
| Butch Cassidy slept here. Wyoming Territorial Prison |
Our posse rolled across the Wyoming line just past noon. We made a short stop in Laramie to visit the prison where Butch Cassidy spent some time in 1894. The prison is a historic monument with guided tours and lots of information about bad guys of the wild, wild west. They knew all about the Tipton train robbery. While The Girls went for a stagecoach ride, I began digging into the history books.
As one story goes, Butch Cassidy had made a deal with railroad officials. If they would hire the Wild Bunch as on-board guards for the trains, there would be no more train robberies. All the officials had to do was meet Cassidy at Lost Soldier Pass to sign an agreement.
Unfortunately, the officials were caught in a bad storm and missed the meeting with Butch. Butch didn't know about the storm and figured he had been double-crossed. He rounded up the gang and headed for Tipton. If you saw the movie titled, "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid", you saw the railroad car explode as Sundance asked, "Think you used enough dynamite there Butch?" The express car at Tipton was destroyed in that same fashion.
According to another book written from stories told by Kid Curry, Butch and Sundance were not involved in the Tipton Train Robbery. According to that book, Kid Curry and some of his pals pulled the heist copying the style Butch Cassidy used to rob the Wilcox train one year earlier. The express car at Wilcox was also blown apart while getting the safe open.
We left Laramie and headed north to swing past Wilcox. All that is left today is a sign beside the tracks with Wilcox written on it. That robbery occurred June 2, 1899. Our next stop was at the museum in Medicine Bow. A book written about the area inspired a weekly TV series called the, "Virginian". The museum contains photos and information about that series.
Our next stop was in Tipton. There are two theories as to the getaway route. Some tales claim Butch Cassidy headed for Hole in the Wall. Kid Curry, who claims Cassidy wasn't even there, says he headed south.
Loco Weed and Ramblin' Rose began checking the signs. After 96 years of weather, the trail was a little hard to find, but then Ramblin' Rose found some dried scat. No doubt about it. The mountain lion that left that scat behind was trailing the outlaws. We mounted up and headed north across barren rangeland toward Hole in the Wall.
Even at breakneck speeds sometimes reaching twenty miles per hour, it was an entire day before we saw lights from a town over a distant ridge. The town was South Pass City, first established in 1867. Gold was discovered and it became the largest settlement in Wyoming. Much of the town has been restored and South Pass City is a designated historical site. One of the buildings was a quarantine hospital for miners with the plague. It was called a Calamity House. A young woman named Jane worked at that house and for the rest of her life was known as Calamity Jane. The plague she worked began in the town of Miner's Delight.
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| Calamity Jane got her name helping miners in Miner's Delight |
Since the ranger had some rules against our posse staying in the restored hotel, we left South Pass City and headed for Miner's Delight. According to the ranger, Miner's Delight is in a state of "Arrested decay". Apparently, that means they are trying to keep the buildings from falling down but funds are not available to make any repairs.
We camped about a mile from Miner's Delight. As soon as the tents were up, the entire posse headed for Lander to get showers and supplies. Since the posse threatened to throw me and Loco Weed in the creek if we didn't get showers, we went along.
The next day, we were up at dawn ... well almost dawn. Okay, so maybe it was nine o'clock before we left camp. In any case, we were hot on the trail of the outlaws headed for Hole in the Wall. Loco Weed found some tracks that took us to the Oregon Trail. We followed that historic wagon road until it connected to another historic trail used by the Pony Express. By late afternoon we had reached the town of Jeffrey.
From Jeffrey, we headed north but came to a screeching halt where a crew was working on a bridge out. Loco Weed asked the supervisor if the outlaws blew it out to slow us down and he said, "Uh ... What?"
We used Poison Spider Road to get around Rattlesnake Hills and found civilization in the town of Powder River. According to the store clerk, her great grandmother told her the outlaws passed through there about 96 years ago.
"Darn! We haven't gained even one year on them!" We charged out of town going north and connected to the Big Horn Mountain Trail. We barely got started before the sun went down and Loco Weed, "don't do no trackin' after dark." Especially on his birthday. In fact, he refused to do any more tracking until we threw a birthday party for him.
We pitched camp at the Middlefork Campground south of Grave Springs and began heating up the coals. Sunshine whipped up one of her delicious Dutch Oven Cobblers while Magnolia took her truck apart looking for a candle that she was sure the thieves didn't take last time they stole her car. By the time she found the candle, the cobbler was golden brown filling the valley with the aroma of tasty apples. Ramblin' Rose and I were getting the fire to about eye level so Loco Weed's camcorder would have enough light to record the entire event just in case the Western History Library wanted a copy. Unfortunately, Loco Weed's camcorder needed more than a campfire so I drove my Blazer up to the fire and turned on 600 watts of Warn off-road lights. That was all it took to get the party rolling. As we sang "Happy Birthday" and munched on apple cobbler, a deer appeared from out of the trees to see what all the fuss was about.
The next day,
we were at it bright and early. It wasn't even noon when we crossed Poker Creek and headed
down Hole in the Wall Slope. We could see the infamous Hole in the Wall long before we
reached the private property line west of the historic site. Since the land between us and
Hole in the Wall was private property, crossing it would be trespassing. Word is, the
local sheriff gets down right mean if he catches someone trespassing. That meant we
couldn't go all the way to Hole in the Wall without hiking around the private property
between us and the only access up the Red Wall. From where we stopped, the entire area was
in full view and the outlaws were definitely not there.
(If you would like to hike to Hole in the Wall, the BLM office listed later can show you how to do that. There is also a horseback tour available from Kaycee, Wyoming.)
Our posse backtracked to Outlaw Cave, then went to Kaycee. We barely missed the outlaws by about 96 years. Fact is, the Wild Bunch robbed a train in Wagner, Montana on July 3, 1901. Loco Weed, Ramblin' Rose, and I figured we could catch that bunch of varmints a whole lot easier since the trail was only 95 years old. The rest of the posse was tired, dusty, and ready to go home.
"We can pick up another posse along the way," I said. "Let's ride!"
We lit out of Kaycee headed straight for Wagner ... but that's another story.
Author's note: The BLM office in Buffalo, Wyoming is open to the idea of identifying a potential public access route around private property to Hole in the Wall. The historic site is on public lands but is nearly surrounded by private property. To get the BLM moving, they need to hear from you. Write to them and tell them you support identifying a public access 4x4 trail across BLM land to Hole in the Wall, preferably from Hole in the Wall Slope. Be sure you specify "4x4 trail" or they will think in terms of a foot trail. You can also obtain maps and other information about Outlaw Cave and Hole in the Wall by writing to:
Neil Schiche Recreation Planner Forester
Bureau of Land Management
189 N. Cedar St.
Buffalo, Wy. 82834
(307)684-5586
In case you haven’t heard, our genius president just declared two million acres of our Utah playground to be a national monument. No one seems able to tell us what that means to public access. Typically, a national monument is under the National Park Service which is notorious for closing every road that is not paved. On the other hand, Canyonlands has always been an exception with selected 4x4 roads open, but every time the park service does another plan for Canyonlands, more of those roads get closed too.
This new monument is being placed under the control of the BLM which has always been the most open for public use. Under a typical BLM plan, most of the 4x4 trails would be left open but the BLM has never controlled a National Monument before. Now what?
In other words, the future of Utah for 4Wheeling is a big question mark. Clinton made this declaration without a majority vote in congress or any other vote in congress, all by himself and it is legal. Two million acres! Maybe he did inhale.
A fellow who runs a bed & breakfast business and has horse ride tours near St. Elmo wants a big section of the National Forest closed down for his own personal use. Of course that’s not the way he presents it, but that’s the way it spells once you get all the letters in a row.
He calls it a quiet zone. In other words, no motors running. He wants Hancock Pass closed for public use unless you have a horse or are on foot. In his proposal, he ignores the fact that all other routes out of that valley are already closed to motorized travel and he could take his horse tours over any of them and never see a vehicle.
By calling it a Quiet Zone proposal and leaving out all the profit he intends to make from his personal use of public lands, he has gotten a lot of signatures. Enough signatures to get the Buena Vista newspaper behind him and enough to bring pressure down on the forest service to listen to him.
The Forest Service needs to hear from us. Don’t go into any lengthy details. Simply send them a note telling them you are against the Quiet Use proposal and in favor of keeping Hancock Pass open to motorized travel. No other explanations are necessary.
Write to:
Charlie Medina, District Ranger
San Isabel National Forest
325 W. Rainbow Blvd.
Salida, Co. 81201
by Gene Killan
Way back in the bad ol' days, maybe in 1975, the main lady and I set Yosemite National Park as our destination. We packed the Datsun with our tent, bags, stuff, and a cooler. Sorry about the Datsun, but we didn't know about 4x4s yet. Besides, all we did then was drive on pavement.
We pulled into Tuolomne Meadows, put up the tent, set up the Coleman, and started gettin' up the grub. Thinking that a campfire might be nice, I drove back to the government woodpile (really), to get a few sticks to burn. Went back to camp, but no Sue there. I looked around a bit in the dim light of dusk, but all I could find was a bear combing through our food sack. Still no Sue. I repositioned the car so the headlights would point to other parts of the site, and there she was, peeking under the doorflap of the tent, hoping for a way to avoid ol' Bruin. I pulled forward and Sue jumped out, scampered to the passenger side, and flew in. Bruin didn't care, as he was still eating.
About that time a guy who was a little less wet behind the ears came by, clacking two good size rocks over his head. The bear heard the racket, looked up and saw what appeared to be an approaching eight foot critter making a scary noise, and hightailed it outa there.
Well this was just terrific, we thought, so back to what was left of dinner. Pretty tasty, despite the fact that we still had a couple more interruptions from the evening's guest. But now we knew how to scare him away, no problem.
After dinner, we cleaned the site, packed up all the food into the cooler, and PUT IT IN THE CAR, just like it says to do in the current issue of Campfire Tales. That was our big mistake. You see, long ago these bears learned that every cooler has a treasure inside. And then they learned that if they ever wanted to get that treasure, they'd better memorize what a cooler looks like. So they did. They learned it real well, too, long before we ever showed up that night.
Round about midnight, I could hear outside the tent the typical bear sniffing and rustling, the stuff that makes for nervous nights in the woods. I listened and listened through the dark, finally thinking, "oh who cares?" A few more minutes, and then the fun began. I heard the squeaks and groans of a car's suspension. Well, it seemed that ol' Bruin thought he'd test the Datsun as a cradle, rocking it back and forth. Clever as I thought I was, I said to myself, "This guy's gonna get real bored, then he'll stop, go away, and leave me to get a good night's rest in the great outdoors. Yeah, sure. He was just beginning.
Next thing I heard was the breaking of glass as it hit the ground. Now, enough, I thought. This meant war. I turned on the lantern, stuck it out the tent door and looked to see exactly what this guy was doing! But, well, WHOA! This guy was really BIG! Up on his back legs, he stood about seven feet and looked down to me and the lantern as if to say, "Hey bud, this is MY Datsun; Get your own."
Being only half awake, I wasn't smart enough to leave Bruin alone, so I began to heave rocks about the size of softballs around him, hoping this might shoo him away. Didn't want to hit him, ‘cuz I didn't want him to get defensive. That could hurt, you know. Sue didn't look at it the same way when she peeked out, though. She thought it might be good to make a connection or two. She started chuckin' those rocks everywhere, well, everywhere except at the bear, since that's what she was aiming at. The poor Datsun took a few in the haunches though.
Meanwhile, the bear thought this was getting a little crazy, so he got out of there. Probably figured that if we were willing to beat up the Datsun, he'd have no part of it.
After all of this, we weren't going to stick around, so we packed up the tent and gear, picked up the Datsun pieces, and left.
Now to us, this all was perceived as quite serious, so we thought we should track down Ranger Rick and let him know. We found him, safely tucked into a nice log cabin near the east entrance to the park. Well, we knew this was an emergency, so we began pounding on his front door like there'd be no tomorrow. We started hearing thumps and clumps and bumps of all sorts inside, and finally an angry "Whaddayawant!#%&!!?!" We shouted the details of our trauma through the door, never seeing the guy, after which he said we were lowlives for bringing food into the park, and, "What were we anyways, stupid? Nobody should ever put a visible cooler in his vehicle." The bears think it's an invitation." Well, thanks a heap, Ranger Rick, for the advance notice. Why not set up another park where folks can camp for days and days without food? Great idea.
At that, we left the park and slept in a trashed Datsun at a rest stop.
Well, "So what?" you might ask. Easy. Blankets. It's all about blankets. You gotta bring 'em. That way, you can hide your cooler so Bruin won't start an inappropriate treasure hunt, and if you forget, at least you can keep warm through the night in your windowless car at the next rest stop. Cool, huh?
Talk atcha soon
Badhat
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