Last year, after laying into the Mountain Man Rendezvous, one of the feature events of Jackson Hole’s Old West Days, I wondered if maybe I hadn’t been a little harsh. This year, after going again with my boy, I’m wondering if I didn’t go too easy on it. Once again I was disappointed with the “pre-1840s” reenactment. Only one man in buckskins even said hello to us – everyone else either sat dourly in his tent or yucked it up with their fellow rendezvousers – and one woman’s only words to us were “Don’t touch those beads.” I’m the kind of guy who lives to learn something new, a trait I hope to pass along to my 21-month-old, but not a single Mountain Man or woman offered even a shred of information about the curiosities that lay around their tent. I guess one needs to pull out one’s wallet to receive that kind of treatment.

— Richard Anderson