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By Priit Vesilind

Legends stalked the streets of frontier Wyoming. The nefarious Wild Bunch—“most notably Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid”—often scrambled over a rampart of red sandstone bluffs. They also traveled through a notch known as the Hole-In-The-Wall, part of a chain of hideaways called the Outlaw Trail.

Some folks say the Wild West begins on the border between Wyoming and Montana. Image courtesy of NG Maps

Access to the Hole, 25 miles (40 kilometers) west of the town of Kaycee, is across private land and must be prearranged. But the nearby Willow Creek Ranch at the Hole-in-the-Wall takes guests to the Hole on excursions. Its outfitters even simulate an “Outlaw Trail Ride,” a mad dash across the notch, one step ahead of the posse.

You’ve got to use your imagination to appreciate the Outlaw Trail. As a mechanic at the Texaco station in Kaycee told me when I stopped to get directions to Hole-In-The-Wall, “Actually, it’s a lot better off in your mind.” But if you crave history, you can reach the Outlaw Caves, where—after trundling up a rutted dirt-and-bolder road—the Wild Bunch often hid, sometimes crawling 150 feet (46 meters) down to the Powder River. Hey, if it was easy to get there, it wouldn’t make much of a hideout.

For more information on the trail ride, contact:
Willow Creek Ranch at the Hole-in-the-Wall
P.O. Box 10
Kaycee, WY 82639
Telephone: +1 307 738 2294; fax: +1 307 738 2264
http://www.willowcreekranch.com.
Weekly rates: (U.S.) $1,000 to $1,450
Closed November through April. Wheelchair accessible.

Read “Bighorn Country” in the September 1999 issue of TRAVELER.