Bike Tour West: Day 12. Close Encounters.......

Up and off early under cloudy skies and a few sprinkles. We bid farewell to Keystone and would definitely like to return. The roads around here are amazing and we would have loved to have had time to do them all again. Today we ticked off another bucket list ride and headed up Spearfish Canyon which truly was amazing - the photos cannot do it justice:

We arrived in Spearfish in time for breakfast and then continued Northwest under clearing skies to Wyoming.

Eventually our destination came into to view - it can just be seen on the horizon in the photo below:

The final approach

And at last we are there - The Devils Tower. This was the first National Monument and was established in 1906 by President Theodore Roosevelt. It is 1267ft high and is a sacred place for the Native American peoples of this area.

Of course it was also featured prominently in Speilberg's Movie "Close Encounters of the Third Kind". A movie I really enjoyed when it was first released.

After walking around part of the base of the Tower we headed away from the park but had a close encounter of the wildlife kind on the way out:

Note that we only get close to creatures without horns. We have seen Bighorn sheep and Pronghorn Antelope but neither of us was willing to hang out for the photo-op.

Another 130 miles down the road and we arrived in Buffalo, WY which is nestled below the Bighorn Mountains which were shrouded with cloud as we pulled into town.