The next day we decided to drive a loop around the entire gorge in order to drive the 23 mile “Wild Horse Scenic Loop Drive” on the north side in search of wild horses. The dirt road runs along the White Mountain rim above the cities of Green River and Rock Springs in southern Wyoming. There are numerous information kiosks along the rim edge (on Kiki’s side) that explain the many facets of the surrounding area.
At the kiosk for Pilot Butte we stopped to help an elderly gentleman in a dodge truck that had experienced a flat tire. Being a rental it was not easy to change a tire when one is uninitiated. It appeared that the tire had popped a bead on one of the many prairie dog holes in the road.
We traveled onward searching for “wild mustangs”. We saw antelopes and a Horned Lark. We saw brilliant red Indian Paintbrush. We saw three foot tall piles of horse …. poop on the road that the stallions use as calling cards to other stallions as territory markers. We saw colorful rocks, We saw other travelers in cars, trucks, motorcycles, four-wheelers, on foot, and vans all looking for just one of the 2,500 “wild horses” referenced in the Flaming Gorge Adventure Guide. But scanning and glassing thousands of acres of sagebrush we saw zero wild horses. Finally, at one of the kiosks it informed us that in the early 1980’s the BLM began efforts to control the wild horse population on the 469,000 acre area due to their environmentally destructive presence to a total of: 250. OOPS! The overzealous tourist industry added a single itsy, bitsy, tennywenie, mini, tini zero to the real total (sounds like mail-in ballots don’t it?). So, now there is 1 horse per 1,500+ acres. Mr. Needle I am pleased to introduce you to Mr. Haystack. Stopping the K2R2 by a truck to talk across rolled down driver side windows with a fellow Texan we learned that we could see the horses at the BLM headquarters in Rock Springs in their holding corrals.
After leaving the bone jarring dirt road we glided into the rear of the BLM offices and saw “Wild Horses”. Tons of them! Awaiting, all waiting for a new owner. The colts were frolicking in the enclosures under the watchful eyes of their mother.
We rolled up to the Dam after what had been a spectacular drive and bought our BBQ dinner at a red trailer parked in the visitor center parking lot. Then we gave the K2R2 its head as we headed for the OK campground corral.
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Ah yes….the flip flops. That I understood David to say one time that he would never wear flip flops. I guess he flip-flopped on that. Pretty neat place. Too bad you never got to see the mustangs in their free environment