Business 888-380-9872 | Vacation 800-756-6342 | Meetings 855-847-4698 | Group Air 877-252-3415
The Cowboy Country tour is an 8 day luxury Tauck Bridges adventure that will allow you to hit the trail and collect some adventures. This Stories by Ken Burns tour travels through the great states of South Dakota and Wyoming. This week under the magnificent prairie sky is the ultimate travel experience in the area. You’ll relive the Wild Wild West stories of lore and visit places like Yellowstone.
8 Days • fr. $5,390
Your Tauck Bridges Wyoming family vacation begins at 5:45 PM at the Jackson Lake Lodge. A transfer is included from Jackson Hole Airport to Jackson Lake Lodge in the heart of Grand Teton National Park. Meet the new friends who will share this Cowboy Country adventure with your family at our welcome reception and dinner.
JACKSON LAKE LODGE
Marvel at the mountain majesty of Grand Teton National Park before setting off on a rafting adventure* down the Snake River. Along the way, your guide will help you spot the beavers, eagles, elks and other animals that live in the park.
After lunch at your choice of restaurants at the lodge, head to the park's Mormon Row Historic District, whose preservation is being supported by a grant from Tauck. A homesteaders’ settlement dating back to 1890 located in an undeveloped area of the park, Mormon Row is home to a number of weathered historic structures – including the iconic T.A. Moulton barn, an unofficial symbol of the park – with the dramatic Teton Range as a backdrop. You'll feel like you’ve traveled back in time at the site, which attracts photographers from around the world... so have your camera ready!
This afternoon, travel to the historic (and trendy) Western town of Jackson to explore as you wish, or check out some of the fun things to do back at Jackson Lake Lodge. Spend the evening as you please.
Breakfast, Lunch
JACKSON LAKE LODGE
You may want to check out the American Indian artwork and artifacts on display at Grand Teton National Park's Colter Bay Visitor Center before traveling on this morning to Yellowstone National Park, established in 1872 as America's (and the world's) first national park – where your historic "home away from home" for the next two nights, the Old Faithful Inn, is just steps away from the famous Old Faithful Geyser, shooting up to 184 feet in the air approximately every 90 minutes! Keep an eye out for Yellowstone's diverse wildlife as you explore some of the features of the park – whose geologic wonders include two-thirds of all the geysers in the world – with your family as you please. Have dinner at your classic inside-the-park lodge at your leisure tonight.
Breakfast, Dinner
OLD FAITHFUL INN
Wake up to a world of amazing natural wonders in Yellowstone National Park and spend the day sightseeing in the park with local experts from The Institute of the Yellowstone Association, who share information about the park and its abundant wildlife as you explore; Yellowstone protects threatened or endangered species including the gray wolf, whooping crane, lynx, grizzly bear and bald eagle.
Have a picnic lunch, and see some of the 10,000 hot springs within the park, as well as bubbling pools of mud and volcanic calderas; and, a short distance from your lodge, make sure you reserve some family time to watch mighty Old Faithful shoot its plume of steam high into the air just about every hour and a half – a highlight of any Wyoming family vacation! After a day that is truly a celebration of the West’s natural beauty, enjoy dinner at leisure back at the lodge.
Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner
OLD FAITHFUL INN
Say goodbye to Yellowstone and continue your Wyoming vacation to the historic town of Cody, Wyoming, founded in part by the famous "Buffalo Bill" Cody, from whom the town got its name. Glimpse the history and culture of the heyday of the American West at the Buffalo Bill Center of the West, whose five acclaimed, connected museums each tell a different side of the story – focusing on the Plains Indians, Western art, historic firearms, the region's natural history, and the life and career of "Buffalo Bill" Cody himself. Have a western-style dinner and then thrill to bucking broncos, steer wrestlers, calf ropers and barrel riders and more at the nationally famous Cody Nite Rodeo – a fixture since 1938 here in Cody, often called the "rodeo capital of the world."
Breakfast, Dinner
HOLIDAY INN® CODY AT BUFFALO BILL VILLAGE
Journey through Wyoming's Bighorn Mountains today, past deep canyons, vast grasslands, and blankets of wildflowers en route to one of the highlights of your Wyoming vacation – a double dose of Western ranch life that your family will love! First, feel the spirit of Cowboy Country during an authentic ranch experience – including a cookhouse lunch and an opportunity for a horseback ride*, or a horse whisperer or a roping demonstration – at the T-A Guest Ranch in Buffalo, Wyoming. A real working cattle ranch, the T-A Ranch was the site of a famous siege and shootout during the infamous "Johnson County War" in 1892; you can still see the old gunshot holes in the ranch's original horse barn! Later, continue on to an overnight and dinner at your leisure at yet another real Wyoming ranch – the Ranch at Ucross – topping the night off with an old-fashioned campfire complete with stories and s'mores!
Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner
THE RANCH AT UCROSS
Depart the Ranch at Ucross and Wyoming and head for the Black Hills of South Dakota. Look up in wonder at the Crazy Horse Memorial, where you'll view the work in progress as artisans carve the likeness of the famous Lakota warrior out of the mountain. Begun in 1948 after an Oglala Lakota elder commissioned sculptor Korczak Ziolkowski to create the memorial on the face of Thunderhead Mountain to show “that we have heroes too,” the independently funded project is now carried on by members of the late sculptor's family; when completed, it will be the largest rock sculpture in the world. At the project's visitor's center – which includes the former Ziolkowski family home – you'll explore exhibits that speak to the diverse histories and cultures of America’s native peoples, and learn more about this unique family project.
Then it's on Mount Rushmore National Monument, where you’ll be welcomed by the colossal granite heads of four US presidents: Washington, Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt and Lincoln. The sculptures were the work of Danish-American Gutzon Borglum and his son, a 14-year project begun in 1927. From here, you’ll head to the K Bar S Lodge for an overnight stay and this evening’s farewell reception and dinner to celebrate a week of authentic western magic in Cowboy Country.
Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner
K BAR S LODGE
Tour ends: Rapid City. Fly home anytime; a transfer is included from K Bar S Lodge to Rapid City Regional Airport. Allow a minimum of two hours for flight check-in.
Breakfast
All rates listed are per person based on double occupancy and are subject to change without notice. Your land package pricing will be confirmed and guaranteed once your deposit is received and applied to the booking, except where price increases may result from increases in government taxes or fees. Room configurations are subject to availability. Guests added to your party after the booking are priced at the prevailing rate at the time they are added.