Wagon's Roll

A chilly grey start this morning, (yesterday, by the time you read this). Temperatures well below that of recent days. It was almost London-like!

We opted to head east to Cody, the town named for renowned Wild West showman, Buffalo Bill Cody.

Old Trail Town was our destination, a street of 26 historic buildings and wagons dating from between 1879-1901. It included the Rivers Saloon, an old haunt of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. It even still had bullet holes in the saloon door.

One of the characters who kept popping up was a mean-looking, bearded chap called John Johnson, or more intriguingly, "Liver-Eating" Johnson.

Johnson's body was actually reinterred at Old Trail Town with Robert Redford as one of the pall-bearers. Redford had played the formidable character in a 1972 movie called Jeremiah Johnson.

The exit, as exits so often are these days, was through the gift shop. I perused the shelves of books looking for nothing in particular when I spotted a red-spined volume entitled: Crow Killer.

It was a book all about the exploits of "Liver-Eating" Johnson, also know as the Crow Killer. Crow referring to the Indian tribe rather than the carrion-eating bird.

He was given his somewhat unpleasant moniker following his oath of vengeance against the Crow Nation after discovering his pregnant Indian wife murdered by a group of young Crow warriors.

The obligatory scalping complete, Johnson would insert his Bowie knife up to the hilt just under the Crow victim's ribcage, reach in, tear out the liver and devour it raw, blood staining his beard.

It's a real page-turner; I can't put it down! (Incidentally, Johnson thought Buffalo Bill a "tenderfoot" and "the worst shot in the West".)

Oh, and the girl at the gas station in Cody took a picture of the tattoo on my wrist. Mrs SP thinks it was a move; I think she liked tattoos.

Long drive tomorrow as we head east for South Dakota. We've got a stop midway and, of course, a little historic photo opportunity along the way, too. :)