Sherlocking In Wyoming
Part 2
By Don Hobbs

Well, I survived another week in the wilds of Wyoming.  I dropped into The Library a few times to watch my beloved basketball team blow a two games to nothing lead. They lost four straight to the other team and lost the N.B.A. Championship game on home court. It took several Red Ambers in those nice glasses with the logos of an oblique Sherlockian silhouette to ease the pain. I am not sure if the pain was from losing or from being away from home for such an extended period.

The wizened old hippie was at his usual spot at the end of the bar, sipping his coffee and offering tid-bits of information to any unsuspecting patron that happened to get too close to him. Most of the regulars avoided him at all costs. It was graduation week at Wy-Tech, so he had a continual stream of newbies to chat with, and try to convince them of one of his outlandish theories. I had learned early to keep my distance.

I did get to drive back down to Denver to pick up one of my co-workers from Florida. I left Wyoming and drove to Cheyenne, which is the capital of Wyoming. This is the largest city in the state, but with only 53,000 residents, my home town of Flower Mound, Texas is larger. A radiologist I was training told me that the state of Wyoming is the only state in the continental United States without a metropolitan area. Instead, it was just one large rural town with very long streets in between communities. I believe this. 

I did take a photograph of the state capitol building in the state capital of Cheyenne and once I got to Denver, I took a photograph of the Colorado state capitol building. This got me thinking about the line in “A Scandal in Bohemia” when Holmes tells Watson that it is a capital mistake to theorize before having all of the facts. I decided to look up ‘CAPITAL’ in the Canon and was surprised at finding it mentioned in nineteen of the stories. This got me thinking about another photo-journal of capitol buildings. That will be for another time, though.

I had the opportunity to visit Rocky Mountain National Park over the weekend. It is an easy drive down from Wyoming. We took I-25 south to U.S. 34. This road goes into Estes Park, Colorado. There was a restaurant call “A Taste of Bohemia” on the right-hand side of the road before arriving into Estes Park. We pulled in and ate there. I had a lovely Mill Stream trout that luckily not been in the milk. We were able to eat without causing a scandal. When we left there, the temperature was in the low 70’s.  We drove into the park and the temperature dropped to 41 degrees as we reached the 12,000-foot level.

As we made our descent across the Continental Divide, we stopped at every photo-op that arose. My co-worker photographed elk, moose, chipmunks, prairie dogs, beavers, and an entire host of other critters that presented themselves to us. My photo-op came in the form of Lake Irene.  Is it possible that its namesake could Irene Adler? The lake’s elevation is about 10,000-feet, the same elevation as Leadville, Colorado. This is where Oscar Wilde was a lectured in 1882. According to Carole Nelson Douglas’ Good Night, Mr. Holmes, Adler and Wilde knew other. This needs further investigation. That too will be for another time and until then . . . .

Happy Collecting!!