During our 30 years on the road in the U.S., we crisscrossed the continent more times than we could count. Most of the time, we did it on I-40, because it was the quickest way to get from point A to point B, and we were always on a schedule. But on this final drive across the country, we could afford to take our time. So in order to see some relatively fresh territory, and try to beat the heat, we took a more northerly route, sticking to I-70 for much of the time. Which took us through Kansas, Colorado and Wyoming.

The first time we pulled off the Interstate to investigate a point of interest was in Oakley, Kansas: the Buffalo Bill Cultural Center. There isn’t a great deal of interest on the inside — just a few mementos on exhibit. But outside is a very arresting bronze sculpture of the legendary showman conquering a buffalo (well, technically a bison), and thereby earning his moniker.

Now a town named Oakley that has a monument to Buffalo Bill must also pay tribute to Annie Oakley, right? After all, she was part of his touring Wild West show, and a marvelous marksperson by all accounts. So surely she gets honored too, eh? Um… no, she doesn’t.

The town is not named after her, by the way. But still, you’d think that if the Powers That Were decided to memorialize Ol’ Bill in a town called Oakley, it would nudge them to think about showing respect for Annie too. But nope. Is it just because the males always get more glory no matter how much they don’t deserve more? Is it because more glory is awarded to those who, like William Cody, ceaselessly toot their own horn? For whatever reason, the score in these parts is Bill one and Annie zero. To be fair, he was an accomplished soldier and (for what it’s worth) bison killer. But he’s not famous because of those things. He’s famous because of his showmanship and PR campaign.

After Oakley, we headed on into Colorado, a state which of course is associated with the Rocky Mountains. But much of it is flat and pretty much undistinguishable from Kansas. It was in this part that we pulled off for the night in the town of Limon, a town which seems to have seen better days. We ended up at the Limon Heritage Museum, which was closed; but as it was rather isolated, we decided to park for the night and try to blend in with the old machinery exhibited on the outside.

The next morning, the museum was still not open until considerably later, so we didn’t have a chance to see what was on the inside. But we did walk around town a little, and stumbled upon an unexpected point of interest: a movie theater with a well-executed mural likeness of John Wayne in the alley on the side of the building. This painting is the work of two young women, Audrey Sayles and Staci Beauford, who call themselves “Some Girls and a Mural”. They are on a mission to “paint the plains” of Colorado, and have created a number of striking murals in such unlikely sites as on a grain silo.

It’s interesting that a day after we came across the tribute to the self-promoting Buffalo Bill Cody, we should come across this tribute to a celluloid version of his type of persona, a self-packaged image that was not just exaggerated but totally fabricated. His background made Wayne (born Michael Morrison) one of the most unlikely candidates to become a Western character, but now here he is, appearing on the side of a cinema house as the quintessential Western character.

We pushed on into Denver, which for the most part we just passed through. Except that, yes, we did stop at a Best Buy long enough for Dennis to obtain a new laptop. His old one was on its last silicon legs, and it would be much harder (and probably more expensive) to replace overseas. Not to mention it would be awkward to try to navigate through a keyboard with characters in Thai or whatever. So, one problem solved, one potential crisis averted, and one major expense minimized.

We also discovered the Rocky Mountains National Wildlife Sanctuary, which we decided to return to and do some hiking the following day.

From bronze statues to murals to museums to refuges teeming with flora and fauna, life on the road has always provided us with some serendipitous discoveries when we got out of our RV to stretch our legs.

7/6-11/2023