Moving around the mountain

Our departure from Dubois afforded us last admiring looks at the Grand Tetons as we turned our noses toward Pinedale.  

 

Because weather was more settled this time, we took the opportunity to visit a historic site we had not noticed before.

In the process, we got a good walk because trailers were not allowed down the lane to the Cunningham cabin, a homestead that predated the establishment of the national park.  John & Margaret Cunningham used the dog-trot structure from 1888 until 1895, when he constructed their main residence, and turned the cabin into a smithy & barn.  Dog-trot cabins - basically two cabins connected by a center breezeway are a style used mostly in the South and Appalachia.

In 1892, Cunningham allowed two Montana men to winter on his Bar Flying U Ranch.  In the spring, a self-proclaimed posse from Idaho recruited men from Jackson when they pronounced the duo to be horse thieves.  They shot & killed the two men, whose crimes and/or guilt were never made clear, nor was the exact identification of the alleged marshal and his men.

When we walked the homestead area, a fine herd of horses grazed near the cabin.

And along came a gosling . . .

. . . quite young and inexplicably walking alone down a path, and then began to follow us.  There was no other waterfowl within sight or sound, so where that little waif originated from was quite a mystery.  With later research, we came to the unlikely conclusion that it was a greylag goose.  If anyone has a better idea, I'd love to hear it.

 

He wore himself out trying to keep up with us.

I herded the little fellow over toward water and hoped for the best.  He was an adorable little creature, reminded me of a sight Gail & I enjoyed - Mr. & Mrs. Mallard that used to stroll side by side down the trail in Watson Woods when we were walking there.

The Wind Rivers, Wyoming storms . . .

It was a long way around through Jackson to arrive in Pinedale, where we were treated to a beautiful view of the magnificent Wind River range from the other side.

Each of our first two days in Pinedale was punctuated by violent storms - winds that blew belongings all over creation and rain so strong that the mountains were completely obscured.  Very shortly after I took the next photo, that mountain was no longer in sight.

In addition to that cute little gosling, our trip list grew a bit more when we identified feruginous hawk, northern harrier, red-tailed hawk, yellow warbler, broad-tailed hummingbird (at our feeder which blew down and into pieces) & California gull.