It was time to move on. I had been at Maiden Rock for four days. I arrived at Bannack early in the afternoon and found no one in either campground. I had my pick of all the campsites. I found the camp host site and made it mine.  There were a total of three of us in the two campgrounds that night.  I visited the town and wandered around looking at the building, the wood textures and the outhouses.  All the doors are kept unlocked which encouraged me to pause and feel the past.

The wind was blowing as I wandered through the cemetery.  I heard a slow and light tap tap tap.  It was a loose piece of wood on a grave fence swinging in the wind reminding me of a western movie.

I drove the Big Sheep Creek Scenic Byway and the Medicine Lodge Road. I invited Linda and her dog Gatsby to join me.  They were also staying at the Bannack Campground. Linda had sold her house in Maine and had hit the road with a TAB trailer. She had never towed a trailer before or camped in a trailer. But now retired she was up for a new adventure. She and her dog were having a wonderful time and were enjoyable companions for the day. One thing that puzzled us was that during our drive, our entire sighting of wild animals was limited to two chipmunks.

Notes:

• A video of how a  beaver slide works is at the link.
• One advantage of staying at the Bannack campground is that it is easy to visit the town late in the day when few people are there. When I wandered the town in the late afternoon there were only two of us in the town.
• I would rate the two campgrounds at Bannack low. The camping sites are squeezed together. The campground I was at had 18 spots, one vaulted toilet, no water, but it did have free wifi. $24/night. The camping fee also include entrance into Bannack City.
• At the south end of the Big Sheep Creek Scenic Byway is the Deadwood Gulch BLM campground. I had thought of staying there but with rain in the forecast I decided to stay at Bannack fearing that the road to the campground wasn’t graveled and may turn to gumbo. There was no need to worry. I drove by the campground and it had a good gravel road. I wish I had moved to it to spend a night or two.
• One item sticks in my mind. Linda told me that a friend had told her she would get bored out west. There is nothing to see. Ah, how wrong she was. Nothing is a wonderful thing.