A few miles west of Fort Laramie lies more rich history, namely some important sites on the famous Oregon Trail. It was 2,170 miles long and served as the road between Independence, Missouri, and Portland, Oregon, on which so many emigrants traveled in the mid-1800s. There are many historic sites along the Oregon Trail, and we visited two of those in Wyoming: Register Cliff and the Oregon Trail Ruts located near the town of Guernsey. Register Cliff was mile 658 of the Oregon Trail and, of the thousands of names carved by travelers into the soft sandstone of the cliff, several hundred are still legible. Some trail ruts, made by the countless wagons of the emigrants, as deep as five feet, are three miles west of the cliff.
Approximately 50 miles north of these Oregon Trail sites is Fort Fetterman, which, like Fort Laramie, served as a U.S. outpost. Fort Fetterman, however, is not as well-preserved as Fort Laramie, but is still worth a trip to see this historic spot of the Old West. A walking tour of the old fort points out how it once looked and tells the rich history.
Back in Lusk, we visited the one place in town that is not to be missed: the Stagecoach Museum. The Stagecoach Museum was opened on May 15, 1970, and the amount of relics and displays has been growing ever since. The museum houses a wide collection of fascinating stagecoaches and artifacts, including a stagecoach used on the famed Cheyenne-Black Hills Stage and Express Line. Also on display is the Hat Creek Stage Station Store, which was visited by historical travelers, including Calamity Jane, Buffalo Bill Cody, and others.
 Located near the town of Guernsey,...  Located near the town of Guernsey, Wyoming, Oregon Trail ruts can be plainly viewed. Some of these ruts are nearly five-feet deep. |  Fort Fetterman, although not...  Fort Fetterman, although not as elaborate as Fort Laramie, is still an interesting stop. |  Scotts Bluff was a welcome...  Scotts Bluff was a welcome sight to the Oregon Trail travelers. It was an interesting break from the miles of endless plains. |
The Nebraska state line is not too far from Lusk, and we decided to visit two interesting sites there: Scotts Bluff National Monument and Agate Fossil Beds National Monument. Scotts Bluff was another stopping point on the famed Oregon Trail, and this unusual landform was an important milepost to the travelers; after miles of plains and no change in scenery, Scotts Bluff was a welcome sign. A few miles away, Agate Fossil Beds is the area where paleontologists dug up countless ancient mammal bones, including the ferocious bear dog. The Fossil Hills Trail leads to the historic location where a number of quarries were excavated into the Agate bone bed.