3 hours is the new 1

The Ray clan trekked it to the Flaming Gorge over the weekend. The state of Wyoming website said to head south on HWY 191 and take any of the dirt roads which would all lead to the reservoir. Easy enough, we thought.

Famous last words. 

Heeding the directions of this trusty website, we turned on the first dirt road we saw and trusted that we would end up at some water eventually. Welp, eventually never came. Instead, we meandered on every dirt road in southwestern Wyoming EXEPT for the one road that actually lead to the reservoir. (Turns out the website was wrong- there is only one correct road to take and all others lead to nowhere.) A simple road sign or two would have been helpful but I guess Wyo doesn't believe in those. And another thing? Each dirt road branched off into two more dirt roads every couple miles, so there were infinite possibilities to choose from. Oh, and did I mention there were no road signs? It was some sort of sick joke I tell you. 

Exhibit A: dirt road number one.

All was not lost on our 3 hour drive to the Flaming Gorge (one which should have taken 1 hour). We saw some amazing land and this abandoned house in the middle.of.nowhere. It was probably a few hundred years old and not even remotely close to any sort of civilization. Can you imagine walking next door to the outhouse in the freezing, windy, Wyoming winters? No spank you. 

After traveling about 100 miles out of our way and realizing that someone (coughkeanecough) forgot our cooler of food and beer that I diligently packed for our journey, we finally found our way with the help of the first road sign we had seen all day. Oh happy day!!

We finally made it to our destination by lunch time. Before leaving the truck, we feasted on beef jerky and Goldfish crackers, since that was all we had. 

At long last...all the hoopla was well worth it.

The gourds had a great time swimming and we had the whole place to ourselves which was Keane's favorite part. He hates people is not a fan of crowds. 

We spent the next few hours hiking around, playing with the dogs and skipping rocks. The only things better would have been a sandwich in my tummy and a beer in my hand. 

Oh well, better luck next time.