Ranch Trips

Just west of the Continental Divide, in the foothills of Wyoming's Sierra Madre Mountains, there is a valley that combines sagebrush meadows and aspen groves with stands of cottonwood trees and open fields of alfalfa. In 1905, John and Mary Boyer settled at the north end of the valley. With their eight children, the Boyers built the YL Ranch, a horse and sheep ranch that at one time had more than 30,000 sheep on thousands of acres of land. In 1926, the Boyer family built three long cabins under the cottonwoods by the main ranch house and opened one of Wyoming's first guest ranches. Over the next fifty years, the YL Ranch became a destination for families from New York, Boston and Chicago who wanted more than a vacation. These families wanted to live - for a week, for a month, sometimes even for a summer - in the heart of the American west.

Today, the Boyer family still owns and operates the YL Ranch. The ranch is one of those places where the west is more than a memory. Herds of antelope still graze in the meadows, flocks of magpies still talk to each other in the cottonwoods along Savery Creek, and the three log cabins by the main ranch house are still open to the kind of guests who want more than just another western vacation. The ranch is part of the real West. Essential things like breathing the fresh air, eating a home-cooked meal or riding a horse up the Savery are the main attractions here. Guests say they sleep better at the ranch than they do at home, and that's understandable. The ranch is a fine place to accomplish things. You could spend years fishing, swimming, riding and exploring the Savery Valley. But at the end of the day, when the birks stop singing and about two million stars come out, walking into your cabin and falling asleep by the fire can also seem like a big accomplishment.