Cheyenne Wyoming - Frontier Days

Cheyenne, Wyoming

Cheyenne Frontier Days

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Next on our agenda was Cheyenne Frontier Days. This was our ultimate destination that everything else was scheduled around. This is an annual festival that started in 1896, to celebrate rodeo and the western culture. In 1968, I attended this festival with my high school band from Alton, Illinois.  Our school sent us to enter the marching band competition in the main parade. Believe it or not, the ”Marching 100” from Alton, Illinois won first place! It was a great experience for a teenager and I vowed to return one day. And here we are!

Cheyenne is the largest city in Wyoming and has the land to spread out into the countryside. This area is pretty much a high desert landscape, with small hills surrounding the area. It seems that the city is still growing, with many new neighborhoods outside the city limits. Warren Air Force Base is located in the area. Along with that, the Air National Guard resides at the air base. We also found everyone there to be so friendly and welcoming.

When we arrived at the RV park east of town, we found a spacious site with full hookups. This location was nice since it was not on a highway (noise) and was very quiet. The park was about 6 miles from the event. We were setup and felt at home, but ready to party at Frontier Days.  We then drove into town to Frontier Park to get information and get oriented on the location and the best route. The information personnel were very friendly and helpful. The CFD schedule brochure allowed us to plan the next four days and the events we wanted to attend. We purchased tickets to the rodeo and the Championship Bull Riding events. We had already purchased tickets online a few months ago to attend the Luke Bryan country music concert. So, we now had our four day schedule lined up. We returned to camp and prepared some dinner, and get rested up for the next four days.

The next morning, we awoke by 6 am to go into town for the free pancake breakfast. This event is held for 3 separate mornings and is free to everyone. It was held at the depot square downtown, which is adjacent to the large railroad yards. It’s amazing how fast they can move thousands of people through the lines; we were only in line for about 5 minutes before we got our food. That day there were over 5000 people served! It’s just one of the CFD experiences. We didn’t expect the breakfast to be so delicious; each person got 4 pancakes, butter, syrup, 2 slices of ham and coffee! Everything was yummy and we hung around and listened to some of the live country music. What a hoot! After walking around downtown for awhile, we headed back to camp to relax and get ready to go to the rodeo. The rodeo began at noon, so we changed and got to Frontier Park by 10 am. We had some lunch there (fair food), walked around looking at the vendors booths. Kurt was in search of his ultimate cowboy hat. He’s so picky (Kurt picky?), so he looked around and tried on many hats. Nothing was just right. Close to noon, we entered the rodeo arena. It was so exciting to finally be there! We had been looking forward to this for a few months. This rodeo is the “Daddy of ‘em All”. One of the longest running rodeos, since 1879. There was a grand entrance with all the CFD dignitaries, rodeo managers, beauty queens, local politicians, etc. Then the rodeo proceeded with the bull riding, bronc riding (saddled and bare back), steer wrestling, team steer roping, barrel racing and the finale, wild horse racing. The wild horse racing is s such a hoot; they bring in actual wild horses and there are a few teams each with 3 cowboys. They have to catch the horse, get a bridle and saddle on it and then race it around the track. These horses didn’t want to cooperate, but the cowboys did their best. There were about 4 of the 10 horses that actually made the complete ride. It was so much fun to watch. This rodeo lasted for over three hours. We will never be able to see another rodeo like this one. Guess we will have to come back someday!

After the rodeo, we went back downtown to check out some bars. We walked around awhile and found that most of the businesses were closed, except for a few bars and restaurants. We did stop in one bar for a drink, and then headed back to camp for the evening.

The next morning, we were back downtown for the 9 am parade. CFD has three separate parades during the festival. The parades are pretty much the same, with the majority of the participants being horses. There were several marching bands, many horse groups, antique stage coaches and wagons of all sorts, antique tractors, antique cars and trucks, military groups, Indian dancers and various local clubs. The parade was about 1 ½ miles long. It was very enjoyable and also very patriotic. This parade is so well organized, which makes it a great event for all the visitors. After the parade ended, we headed back to camp to take the dogs out for a walk and have some lunch. We relaxed for awhile and got ready to go to the bull riding championships that evening. The CBR started at 8pm, so we went early to go see the Indian village, where we watched a group of Indian dancers and then ate Indian Tacos. We also walked through the vendor’s exhibits and Kurt was able to find the perfect cowboy hat.

The CBR bull riding event was very exciting. We got to our seats early and settled in for the big event. The arena was setup in a smaller area, since it was only bull riding. The chutes were setup closer to the seating area, which made it much easier to see. This was a big event, the national finals! The cowboys that qualified for competition were the best 20 in the nation. The arena also has two large screens to see the action up close. The competition was fierce and amazing. These cowboys and the bulls were top notch. The event lasted about 1 ½ hours, until the final cowboy was named the best bull rider in the country. A young cowboy named Wesley Silcox from Utah won the competition and a nice check for $275,000. Not bad for a few 8 second rides! Wow, what an exciting night and a full moon to boot! After the event, we went over to the Buckin A Saloon for a couple of drinks. The band was awesome and the drinks were ice cold.

Our last day at CFD began with the pancake breakfast again! We just couldn’t resist as it was so much fun the first time. It was tough getting Kurt out of bed that morning, as the night before was a real party event. We went back to camp after breakfast to relax and get ready for the night’s concert. We had tickets to see Luke Bryan and Thompson Square. We headed to downtown before 5pm to hang out and then go out for Mexican food. I really wanted to get to Frontier Park early, since the concert started at 8, and Luke is a very popular country music star. We had dinner around 6pm, but at that point we knew we were running late. We drove to the park and was not able to find any parking space, all lots were full and even the surrounding neighborhood’s street parking was full. By this time it was close to 7pm, so Kurt dropped me off at the front gates and decided to go to a “park and ride” lot. He drove to the parking area and waited for the bus to arrive. In the meantime, I was waiting outside the gates for him to get there. It began raining and I was able to find a dry spot under the eve of a building. Kurt called me and said that the ½ hour bus had not arrived. The bus finally arrived at 8pm, so we missed the opening band, Thompson Square, who we really wanted to see. Kurt finally arrived just before 9pm, and Luke’s band was just setting up. We finally got to our seats, as the rain was coming down. The only good thing was our seats were under the roof, so we could stay fairly dry. Luke finally took the stage around 9:20, which was late due to the rain. We were totally underwhelmed! We had seen him in West Palm Beach when he opened up for Jason Aldean, and he was much better then. I guess success doesn’t always mean you get better. Anyway, the night was pretty disappointing. That’s too bad because we paid a lot for the tickets. Oh well, I guess we couldn’t have every night being perfect.

We had decided to stay an extra day just to get rested and ready to continue on our journey. We slept in late, then had a nice breakfast. This was a down day, where I was able to laundry and get some housekeeping done. Kurt went on a bicycle ride around the Cheyenne greenway. He also took the dogs for a truck ride to get them out of the RV for awhile. He then made the Walmart provisioning trip and we were ready to move on down the road. Next stop, Devil’s Tower in northeast Wyoming!

Cheyenne Frontier Days was such a wonderful experience and we truly enjoyed our time there and in the city. The western life style is awesome. We have found Wyoming to be such a friendly state; everywhere we went the locals were so helpful and welcoming. We hope to come back again one day and spend more time in the state; there is so much to see.