Cornerstone No. 188, page 12
previously. I was also able to use the ranch's corral alley as a location for the
photo I took when the sun was completely hidden by the moon. Another
novelty was the strict instruction not to venture over the fences surrounding our
viewing area, lest we disturb the local rattlesnakes!
Animal life was a theme of our Wild West road trip before the eclipse, especially
in the national parks of Yellowstone and Grand Teton, right next to each other
in the northwest corner of Wyoming. We saw bison, moose, deer, and
pronghorn antelope at close quarters and even a bald eagle perched in a
treetop by Jenny Lake. Of course, what we longed to see was a bear, but that
didn't happen until many miles after we'd left Yellowstone, driving out of Cody
towards Montana. The bear was about 200 m away, which was a good distance
– close enough for it to see me and look up, but far enough away for me to
jump quickly back into the car and for us to drive off if it became aggressive. It
didn't, of course, simply sniffing the air a bit, then looking bored, and finally
resuming a leisurely amble through the sagebrush.
Cody was an interesting place, named after Buffalo Bill Cody, the man who did
more than anyone to immortalise the image of the American frontier, and
through his Wild West Show became the first global celebrity over a 25-year
period around the turn of the 20th century. A fascinating group of museums in
Cody tell the story of the Wild West from different perspectives, including that
of native Americans.
The very next stop on our road trip was the monument to the Battle of the Little
Bighorn, where Indian braves defending their families defeated Custer's
cavalry, alas only hastening the destruction of their culture by so doing. These
days, there's a permanent memorial to the native American victims of the battle
where Custer's Last Stand took place, though it really shouldn't have taken
them more than 130 years to get round to building it.
As for the rest of a great trip, I'll let my pictures tell the story. You can see them
in the Wild West road trip album at
https://www.flickr.com/photos/r0smor/albums (note it's a zero, not an O, in
r0smor).
Ross Bennie
Cornerstone Publishing Programme 2017-2018
Edition
December 2017-January 2018
February-March
April-May
June-July
August-September
October-November
December 2018-January 2019
Number
189
190
191
192
193
194
195
Deadline for text
12 th November 2017
14 th January
11 th March
13 th May
15 th July
16 th September
11 th November