Monday, October 1, 2018

We left our Lyman, WY camp at 9:00; 38-40 degrees. We wondered why our heat went on last night a half dozen times.

Our plans were to drive to Cheyenne, WY to camp, all on I80.  We drove over the Green River and by Flaming Gorge, WY and crossed the Continental Divide twice in the Rockies:  once at 11:00am at 6,930 feet on and a second time at 12:30 at 7,000 feet elevation.

We drove through Laramie, WY passing signs for the Sand Creek Massacre Trail (1864 US Army killing of Cheyenne and Arapaho Indian old men, women and children in southeast Colorado). 

We also road by the Ames monument, the highest point on the transcontinental railway at 8,247. Dedicated to Oakes Ames (construction manager) and Oliver Ames (Congressman from Massachusetts), financiers of the 1863-1869 Transcontinental Railroad.

Finally, we drove by Abraham Lincoln Memorial Monument, between Cheyenne and Laramie, WY a 15ft bust of Lincoln on a 30ft granite pedestal. It was originally placed on Rt30, called the Lincoln Highway, which ran from New York to San Francisco, but moved to I80 in 1969. It stands at the summit 8,640ft near Sherman Hill.  Interstate 80 follows the path of the first transcontinental railway.

We plan tomorrow to drive 350 miles into Nebraska where the time will change from Mountain to Central time zone.