Tour 5 – Day Two
I only managed six and a half hours sleep but they were solid. I had a full two hours to get my time lapses compiled and had a waffle while I waited. We met up with Bill at 9:30 and he had two choices between Nebraska and Wyoming. All the indications eventually pointed to Wyoming, so we headed west to where to buffalo roam and the deer and antelope play.
Which as it turns out, is actually Kansas, not Wyoming.
Not far across the border we had a deer cross the street in front of us and there were antelope in the fields watching. The only buffalo we had seen were corralled in South Dakota.
A half hour into Wyoming, we came across Devil’s Tower.
We stopped for about ten minutes to take a few pics. The pattern in the farmer’s field kind of looked like UFO landing pad.
Lunch was at Donna’s Diner in Moorcroft where I had an amazing Dutch Apple Pie as an appetizer.
Life is short. Always eat dessert first.
And then I had a patty melt.
We were done by one and headed west on the interstate, and before long, a range of white capped mountains came into view.
We passed through Buffalo and continued west, climbing into the mountains until snow appeared in patches around us.
We stopped to take a look at one developing storm to the east that appeared to be at the same altitude.
Meanwhile, the Kiwi on the tour had his first encounter with snow.
Bill decided to head back down into Buffalo and then we headed south where there were storms just hanging out on the mountains.
They didn’t want to come out to play.
We made several stops to watch the storms and one in particular was sending out good signals. We saw a nice base develop.
But nothing beyond that except some spectacular cloud formations and a little bit of lightning.
We left the area just before eight and had a pit stop in Buffalo before driving a little north of the city to watch the lightning. I got a couple of of shots before Bill said it was time to go and then the sky went BOOM!
Lightning lit up the entire sky.
You didn’t have to tell us twice to get inside.
My lens was quite wide and only caught a fragment of the lightning that spread across the sky.
We headed back to Buffalo and then turned east to Gillette for the night. On the way, Bill noted that we were in good position for tomorrow.
And showed us a picture of a tornado caught in Laramie, Wyoming earlier in the day. It was in an area where, interestingly enough, the conditions were not favourable. In fact, they were floored that a tornado had developed there.
The hotel for the night was the Super 8.
Some went over to Subway for dinner and walked in fifteen minutes before closing. The sole employee’s face must have dropped.
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