You are not in Wyoming if you do not visit the Terry Bison Ranch! Train rides, Pony Rides, Trails Rides and a ranch full of farm animals. We also learned this location is an also a campground! Cabins and buildings completely decorated in rustic, old country decor, a small, replicated country town nestled off the freeway into the rolling plains. This place was nothing that I had imagined it would be. Again, we have seen this from a distance, but had no idea what it was, what it entailed other than it was a campsite for campers and had some cabins and cool looking kid parks in the back! Boy oh boy, did we not know what we were in for upon arriving! The crazy thing is, my dad has lived here for 20 years, if not more- and never once stepped foot onto the property. Again, we’ve been here a dozen times, and never explored outside of the little circle of where my dad lives. Goes to show, there is so much happening around us, that being cozied up into our life and living our norm, and not going out and looking to experience things- you could be missing out on so much! This was just another hidden gem found in this town that blew us away!
We were captivated intially by the thousands of bisons just freely roaming the land. The corrals and stables for the horses, set closely to the bunk houses and farm kitchen! As well as the turkeys and peacocks roaming the property freely. I definitely felt I was in the good ole country, with the viewing of the expansive landscape, array of ranch activities, and all the farm animals. This was built with hard work, grit and sweat over the many years it’s been here! There were ranchers that were working away, intertwining us into their labor, showing us things that we wouldn’t have seen on just a self-guided tour of the property. We took the guided vintage train ride across the lands to view and feed the bison up close! We’ve been to plenty of farmsteads and farms, but this was the real deal. It felt like we were in scenes of the tv show, ‘Yellowstone.’ Just a little more gritty! This was an active ranch doing their thing, that was intertwined with showcasing their hardwork and efforts to all of us who were paying to “spend the day at a ranch.” What a brilliant idea.
We learned a lot of the history of the bison and that ranch specifically. As that property is home to over 2,500 bison and use to cover over 200,000 acres at one point! Can you imagine working all of that?! The ranch now is only 27,500 acres that spreads into Colorado. As we were wrapping up the self guided tour of viewing their beautiful array of Clydesdales, the three kids were asked if they would like to feed the calf’s. Something so simple, so the boys thought! Blake enjoyed laughing at them as he kept saying how he had to do this as a kid and these boys have no idea how easy they have it! LOL. Total side note, if you have read our other event entries c we definitely feel it is important to teach common lessons to our children when they’re doing certain things or say specific stuff. We are adamant that our children understand what they have, what they are able to do is something to be very grateful for because life is not this easy for some! That the opportunity that they are given isn’t something that is spread across the board for other children their age, let alone for families to do on a normal base. Our boys are definitely coming to an age of understanding this by the questions and statements they converse with us in moments like this. We want them to love life, love others, have a consistent tone of respect. Understand working hard, working hard for themselves and for others, understand gratefulness and grace. Understand what’s a privilege and what’s a need. To be able to forgive and have grace. To know what perseverance is, what determination entails and to live lively but responsible. So we take any opportunity to explain that to them, as for us, it’s easier to explain with a analogies of things they are doing or have done for them to better understand.
The kids enjoyed their skywalk above all their corrals and animals, the feeding of the calves, the loose peacocks, turkeys and chickens that roamed freely and of course the best part- hand feeding the bison! A trip it was and something they can mark in their memory bank, as they spent a few hours at the real grit and grace, Terry Bison Ranch!
It was pretty warm and we decided to go cool off with some lunch and a trip to an escape room! To really challenge their brains a bit!