Buffalo Bill, Gunfights and a Rodeo

We took a day-trip to Cody, Wyoming yesterday to soak in some "real" western culture.  Cody is named after Buffalo Bill Cody, and the city is all about him and his legacy.  

First stop was the Buffalo Bill Museum, which is actually five museums in one.  It's very well done, with comprehensive exhibits of firearms (I've never seen so many guns in my life), Plains Indians, Yellowstone-area natural history, western-themed art and, of course, Buffalo Bill himself.  The boys spent most of the time marveling at the guns (and various trophy heads of caribou, elk, deer, bison, etc.) and the animals in the natural history section.  We learned a lot about horns vs. antlers, the near-extinction of the bison, the various ecosystems within Yellowstone and lots of other great stuff.  It's well worth a visit -- definitely not a cheesy tourist attraction.

The "Cody Gunfight," however, is probably one of the cheesiest, corniest things I've seen.  It was like watching a bad local theater production.  The boys, of course, loved it.  Lots of guns and gunshots.  Adam retrieved a spent shell, and Matthew reenacted the entire battle at dinner. We had dinner at the Irma Hotel, which was designed by Buffalo and Bill and named for one of his daughters. 

After dinner, we headed out to the Cody Night Rodeo, where amateur and/or aspiring rodeo stars took turns wrangling steers, riding bucking bronos, roping calves and racing around barrels.  It was pretty cool -- you don't realize how much skill it takes to do some of these events.  They had events for young kids: calf riding for the boys and barrel racing for the girls.  They were all really good.  At one point, all the kids in the audience were invited onto the arena to try and take a ribbon off a calf.  There must have been 50-75 kids and two calves.  Our boys participated, but only Matthew Gilchrist got close to the calf (and he got pretty darn close).  They all thought it was great fun.  

By the time we left the rodeo, it was 10 pm.  It was a spectacular night sky, with an almost full moon and tons of stars.  I see why people love this place.