Treasure hunting at Pole Mountain

A rendezvous of sorts. My son and I planned to meet up in Wyoming one last time before we moved on out of the area. It was a two-hour drive for him, coming from the Boulder area, and his first time driving to another state on his own. He arrived well and with no issues a few minutes after us. Problem was, we had not yet found a place to camp as it was a Saturday afternoon and many of the places we looked at were either already occupied or no cell service reached. So, we settled on a not-so-great spot instead of beating our heads for the rest of the day. The Medicine Bow National Forest just to the east of Laramie, WY would be our home for the week.

It was out in the open, along a fairly well traveled gravel road, but it made for an easy escape to a better spot when the weekend campers packed up the next day. We settled in, made a run for groceries and snacks, and with the sun just starting to drop, we took off to explore the nearest of numerous points I had marked on my map; one of the old WW2 era bunkers that the military had built out here for training.

Now, I had been here before, in 2013, and even explored this particular bunker with Conor, but I had to make sure Kerri and Tim got to see the sights as well. We explored inside, on top, and around the bunker, which has nothing much exciting to speak of, but the fact that this old guy still stands out here is pretty cool.

The next morning we woke early, gobbled down some cereal, and continued our treasure hunt. Next on the list was the Ames Monument which was built, by the Ames brothers, for the Ames brothers at the highest point of the Transcontinental Railroad. The Ames brothers played a pivotal role (and helped finance) the construction of the railway, unfortunately they did it in such a way that that did not make a lot of people feel so great about them. So, they built a monument in their name and had the trains stop here to change locomotives, forcing the passengers to stare at the monument for the time it took too do so. It didn’t help their image, and eventually the railroad was rerouted around the monument. The Ames brothers were viewed as assholes for the rest of their lives…. but the monument still stands.

Not far from the monument is the the ghost-graveyard – Old Sherman Cemetery – of the town that once stood near the railway station. If a ghost-town is a town in which the inhabitants have all gone, then the ghost-graveyard label fits this place perfectly as most of the inhabitants (all but two) have left as well… relocated over time, with only a single gravestone left in the graveyard, that of a 1 year old child.

After leaving the grave and following a long and  harrowing dirt road adventure, climbing back up into the National Forest land, we made it to an old natural spring – Laycock Spring – with an aspen grove growing out of the surround area. On one of those trees is the inscription from Spanish explorers (and some additions of my idiot countrymen of more recent years).  I could not find any information on how old this tree carving is, but I can imagine the Spanish explorers stopping at the spring for a night’s rest and leaving their mark behind. A nice piece of history found way in the far reaches of one of our forests.

More miles down even more dirt road and we came across two old graves under a large tree in the middle of a meadow. Unmarked, they leave no hint  as to who may be resting here, but once again I let my imagination run wild and see the long battle that some cowboys may have had here. Two of the fighters (on one side or another) losing their lives and buried in the shade here.

We continued on, to the far opposite side of the National Forest in search of jewels, and we were not deprived. After a bit of wandering, we came across the place we were looking for; some old Uranium mines (or at least that is the unconfirmed story about them). Two large pits dug into the hillsides, just dripping with quartz crystals in every direction. If it is true that these were Uranium mines, then some minor research says that the uranium that grows in and around quartz is more than 2 billion years old (nearly 1/2 the age of the planet). That is some old dirt we were questing about.

Onward we adventured, to another bunker filled with even more graffiti and a grand view of the rolling hills and not far down the road from this one were some old relics of a steam kitchen on the edge of a meadow.

All told, we spent a good portion of a day wandering about the National Forest roads to find all these nick-knacks of our history still left behind on our public lands. The rest of the day was spent moving from our exposed location from the night before to a new spot further down the mountain, among some trees and rocks to provide a bit of shelter from the Wyoming winds… but not before we had ourselves a little fun with my old Datsun 280Z which now belongs to my newly graduated son.