Day 79 (August 3) – Buffalo Bill

Brad has been looking forward to this day for a long time.  I’m not sure if it’s his absolute favorite so far, but it’s high on his list.  We spent most of the day at the Buffalo Bill Historical Center.  We toured 3 of its 5 museums.  The admission is good for two days and it takes that long to see the whole complex.  We started out in the very recently overhauled Buffalo Bill exhibit.  It is all about William F. Cody and his life and legacy.  Next, Brad and Audra toured the Cody Firearms Museum.  Carmen did not really want to look at guns, so I took her on to the Plains Indians Museum.  This was a very thorough and impressive exhibit.  We got about halfway through the Indians Museum and got very hungry.  We decided to eat out in town.

It may seem as though I am obsessed with food (well…), but eating out on this trip is such a rarity that if it’s good, or even if it is not, it is memorable.  We ate at Irma’s Restaurant and Grill in Irma’s hotel.  This claims to be the “First Hotel in the Rockies” and was named after William Cody’s youngest daughter.  Brad and the girls had the buffet (lots of meat – buffalo brisket, buffalo sloppy joe’s, fried cod, ham, fried shrimp, cole slaw, green beans, mashed potatoes and bread pudding with whiskey sauce).  I ordered a buffalo burger and coffee.  It was oh, so, good.  I even helped Brad and Carmen finish their bread pudding.  (Carmen’s was without the whiskey, but still good.)  The restaurant looks like an old saloon, minus the hard liquor.  We really enjoyed the food and the atmosphere.

Then we walked around the main street and took in some shops.  I found some used Justin lace ups for $25!  Didn’t get them.  May regret it.  The girls each bought a rabbit pelt, and they each got a prehistoric shark’s tooth straight from WY where an ocean used to be a long, long time ago.  I bought the 7^th Diana Gabaldon book at a used book store.  I’m reading the 5^th and bought the 6^th at a used book store somewhere on the west coast.  Brad bought a buffalo hide.  OK, not really, but we looked at several and seriously considered it.  It may be our Christmas present!

We got back to the historical center around 5 and finished up the Indian exhibit.  Then Carmen and I wanted to run through the Firearms museum.  There were some pretty incredible (record holding) stuffed bears in there.

After all that: WalMart.  Need I say more?
Buffalo Bill Historical Center