The Edelweiss restaurant is at a river crossing 30 miles north of Cody. No town or even village nearby.

When I was a kid our family stayed a week at the DOD run Eibsee Hotel which was next to Eibsee Lake at the foot of Zugspitze. Built in about 1910, torn down soon after we stayed there in 1972. DOD ran many resorts around Garmisch at that time. Surely fewer now.

"I had lunch at a place called Edelweiss Cafe in the middle of nowhere"

That got my attention. In 2019, on assignment in Germany as a DOD civilian, my wife flew over for a month and we did tourist stuff on the weekends. We stayed at Edelweiss Lodge in southern Germany over the Labor Day weekend. The lodge is owned by the DOD and used for recreational getaways by soldiers and DOD civilians in Europe. Strange to find a cafe with that name in the middle of nowhere - perhaps there is some German/Swiss or Alpine connection with the original owners - or maybe he/she spent time in the DOD in Europe and visited Edelweiss Lodge?

Curiosity took hold and I did a teeny bit of internet digging. The bar was built in 1973. Approx. 2018 the property (bar/lounge, nearby home, 9 acres incl. some RV hookups and a bandstand and riverside picnic area) was for sale for 500k. Some listings note it as being in Clark, WY and other times they say Powell.

In Cody I try to go along with the relentless gun obsession and think of it as a historical re-creation, a theme to attract tourists. But I know that many of the residents and visitors are genuinely obsessed about guns.

Glenwood Springs is far more liberal than Cody. The gunfight melodrama included several pro-Trump statements and one anti-Biden statement that were warmly received by the audience.

I visited Orvis and Valley View twice. Camped at each place once. Orvis was awesome. Valley View had terrible mosquitoes on my first visit and the pools weren't quite hot enough on my second visit.

Nude hot springs aren't my thing, but I can easily think of two more commercial ones in Colorado. Valley View, in the San Luis Valley. And Orvis Hot Springs, over by Ouray. Didn't you stay there?

I wouldn't be surprised if Spencer Penrose is related to Charles W. Penrose who was a polygamist and had MANY children.

I know of two commercial hot springs near Penrose. Dakota Hot Springs and Desert Reef hot springs. Both are nudist hot springs which is rare for commercial places.

Glenwood Springs used to have a shoot out nightly (?) for the tourists, but it was permanently canceled after too many complaints about gun violence.

There's a Penrose town in Colorado, close to Canon City. I never thought about where the name came from . . . Spencer Penrose, google says. There's also a hot springs resort in Penrose - which I did not know. I bet you did!

I didn't see sheep anywhere else in the region, and I don't ever see cows in the same field. But I agree that they must be sheep.

Definitely recently shorn sheep!

Movies only on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. Closed on Sunday, of course.

You looked it up earlier, built in 1950 by a Mormon named Hy Bischoff.

Escaping out of the front windows in case of a fire wouldn't be an option. I bet that was built before there was a fire code.

There's a movie theatre! It's not total dreary.