Yellowstone Gate (https://www.yellowstonegate.com/author/ruffin-prevost/page/3/)
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carrying the company’s Crew Dragon spacecraft and four astronauts launches in October 2022 from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. A Cody, Wyo. company makes custom parts for the Dragon spacecraft. (Courtesy photo from NASA)
By Ruffin Prevost
CODY, Wyo. — The famous Renaissance artist Michelangelo said that the “sculpture is already complete within the marble block, before I start my work. Continue Reading →
Yellowstone National Park Superintendent Cam Sholly spoke Monday in Cody about how the National Park Service responded to historic floods last spring that closed parts of the park for most of the summer. (photo by Ruffin Prevost)
CODY, Wyo. — Yellowstone National Park Superintendent Cam Sholly spent much of his time Monday during an annual tourism industry luncheon in Cody covering his agency’s response to last year’s historic floods that closed entrances from two gateway communities for most of the summer. The year before, Yellowstone saw its busiest summer ever, as visitors looking to avoid the COVID-19 pandemic flocked to the great outdoors. In 2020, the park was closed to visitors for two months in the spring, as officials worked to cope with the early stages of a fast-spreading virus before vaccines were widely available and best health practices were still being debated and developed. Continue Reading →
Kalyn Beasley and his mother Teresa Muhic operate Legends Bookstore, a Cody, Wyo. small business that finds success through personal connections with customers. (photo by Ruffin Prevost)
By Ruffin Prevost
CODY, Wyo. — When Legends Bookstore owner Teresa Muhic retired in 2013 from a career as a petroleum engineer and management executive in the oil industry, she was searching for a new project to help her stay busy. “I kind of poked around for about a year,” she said, while considering consulting and other options. Continue Reading →
“Marda’s Gift,” an award-winning short documentary, focuses on the relationship between baking instructor Marda Stoliar and the Fluckiger family, including Ezdan Fluckiger, back right, Lisa Fluckiger, center, and Eleanor Fluckiger, far left. It was directed by Kate McMahon, far right, and Daria Matza, back left. (Courtesy photo from Sheila Rittenberg)
By Ruffin Prevost
Eleanor Fluckiger’s favorite items at The Bread Doctor are the peanut butter cookies, English muffins, strawberry shortcakes and pizzas, a savory treat only offered every couple of months as a lunch special. She’s not alone in her passion for pastries. Five-star reviews abound on Yelp, TripAdvisor and Google for the family-run bakery in Torrington, a town of just over 6,000 people situated on the North Platte River in southeastern Wyoming, 10 minutes from the Nebraska border. But Eleanor, 25, has an advantage over the bakery’s many enthusiastic customers. Continue Reading →
Tim Kellogg, who formerly competed in rodeos as a saddle bronc rider and known professionally as the Meeteetse Chocolatier, started selling chocolates in 2004 to pay for a new saddle. (Courtesy photo from Tim Kellogg)
Meeteetse Chocolatier thrills in creating new flavor combinations
CODY, Wyo. — A cowboy astride a bucking horse has been an iconic representation of Wyoming for more than a century—at least since 1921, when that silhouette first graced uniforms for baseball players at the University of Wyoming. And chocolate has been connected to Valentine’s Day since 1861, when Richard Cadbury sold heart-shaped boxes of chocolate candies adorned with roses and Cupids. Tim Kellogg’s retail display case offers a range of chocolate truffles and other hand-crafted confections. Continue Reading →
WAPITI, Wyo. — A five-kilometer race, run or walk is a staple fundraiser for community nonprofit groups across the country. It’s relatively simple to organize, and draws a wide range of participants—some are zealous competitors, others show up mainly to support a beloved cause. But the most exotic and popular 5K fundraiser in Cody doesn’t have any running, and it isn’t a race. Instead, it features stops at several points along the course to sample treats like artichoke dip or tomato basil soup. Continue Reading →
CODY, Wyo. — Living in a remote mountain community can come with unique challenges. But that’s something Joelle Passerello knew in 2019 when she moved to Cooke City, Mont., a tourist town literally at the end of the road. Passerello, a single mother of two, manages a gas station in the isolated mountain town located just outside the Northeast Entrance to Yellowstone National Park. In the winter, the only way in or out of town is a 55-mile trek through the park’s northern range to Gardiner, Mont. Continue Reading →
CODY, Wyo. — Dozens of adventurers gathered here over the weekend to strap sharp metal blades to their feet and grip long, pointed axes in each hand before venturing into the Shoshone National Forest in pursuit of their dangerous and elusive prey: frozen waterfalls. Ice climbers from across the country attended the inaugural Wyoming Ice Festival, a four-day event offering clinics, gear demonstrations, a film screening and social gatherings for enthusiasts eager to climb some of the most challenging ice in the country. Less than an hour’s drive southwest of Cody, ice climbers converge each winter in the South Fork Valley to scale literal frozen waterfalls. Some are freestanding columns of ice—gargantuan icicles the size of grain silos—unconnected to anything but the ground below and a cliff edge above. Continue Reading →
CODY, WYO. — The north and northeast entrances to Yellowstone National Park could reopen to general visitor traffic as soon as mid-October if repair work runs according to schedule.
Yellowstone Superintendent Cam Sholly shared that ambitious construction timeline Monday afternoon on a community conference call with residents and business owners in the Cooke City, Mont. area. Sholly also reassured residents of the isolated alpine communities around Cooke City that they would be able to drive to either Gardiner, Mont. or Cody, Wyo. Continue Reading →
CODY, WYO. — Montana business owners and residents in Gardiner, Cooke City and Red Lodge joined with Wyoming colleagues in Cody on Monday to discuss how to ensure winter access to each other’s communities and to Yellowstone National Park after record rains last month washed out bridges and roads throughout the region. Floods left the park’s north and northeast entrances closed to tourist traffic. Citing June’s catastrophic floods and the the possibility of being cut off from automobile access to food, medical care and essential supplies this winter, members of the newly formed Park Access Recommendation Committee (PARC) said they plan to meet sometime in August with public officials in Montana and Wyoming to develop a plan to plow an 8-mile section of U.S. Highway 212 traditionally left unplowed for use by recreational snowmobilers. PARC members said during their online meeting that if repairs to heavily damaged sections of the Northeast Entrance Road between Cooke City and Gardiner are not completed by winter, U.S. Highway 212 would be the only option for residents to connect by auto to the outside world. Continue Reading →