Thermopolis, WY

Family-run breakfast-and-lunch counter that locals fill before noon, known for plate-sized pancakes and breakfast burritos in genuinely large portions. The kind of unfussy small-town diner where the coffee keeps coming.

A bookstore and coffee bar on Broadway that roasts its own single-origin beans on-site, with a wall of national coffee-review scores to back it up. Browse the shelves with a Super (dark coffee plus an espresso shot) and a baked good.

The town's brewpub, pouring ten-plus house beers alongside burgers and pub plates, so embedded in Thermopolis it runs a taphouse and saloon nearby too. The reliable evening spot when you want a local pint with dinner.

A genuine Thai kitchen in a town this size, cooking everything to order in a spotless room, with orange chicken that locals order on repeat. Welcome variety when you've had your fill of burgers and steak.

Sit-down Mexican spot serving tacos, burritos, and fajitas hot and fast, often with live music in the evenings. The go-to when the group wants margaritas and a full menu rather than diner food.

A Park Street pizza spot turning out thin stone-fired pies with homemade sauce and crust, plus garlic cheese sticks people drive in for. Easy casual dinner or takeout after a day in the park.

The dressier dinner option in town, a steak-and-seafood dining room set under a big-game trophy display of more than a hundred mounts. This is where locals book the special-occasion meal.

A long-running family sit-down restaurant doing American comfort plates and homemade pies, the kind of broad menu that suits a whole table with different appetites. Dependable middle-ground between the diner and the brewpub.

An easy, mostly flat path through Hot Springs State Park that links the terraces, the Swinging Bridge, and the riverbank. The walk locals use for an evening stroll, with the mineral terraces and steam on one side and the Bighorn River on the other.

A short steep climb off the Spirit Trail to a hilltop crowded with small rock cairns. The monuments were built over a century by people who came to heal in the springs and left a stone at the top to mark their recovery.

The switchbacking hike up Roundtop Mountain, the flat-topped butte that greets you as you arrive from the canyon. A rebuilt trail with a gentle graded climb to a summit looking over town, the river, and the canyon mouth.

The hill above town marked with a big white T for Thermopolis, reached by signed switchbacks open to hikers and mountain bikers. The summit gives a clean bird's-eye look down on the whole town and the canyon to the south.

A working dinosaur museum and active dig in one, with life-size mounts, a prep lab you can watch through glass, and summer dig sites just outside. The Dig for a Day program puts visitors of any age in the field with the paleontologists.

An old-school mineral-water water park inside the state park, with indoor and outdoor pools, hot tubs, a steam vapor cave, and one of the longest water slides around. Unpretentious and a little retro, and a hit with kids burning off energy.

The other mineral-water swimming spot in the park, a family pool-and-slide complex fed by the hot springs. Slides, soaking pools, and a relaxed scene make it the easy choice for an afternoon in the water with kids.

A surprisingly deep local-history museum whose centerpiece is the original cherrywood bar from the Hole-in-the-Wall Saloon, where Butch Cassidy's gang reportedly drank. Pioneer rooms, Native American artifacts, and old-West outlaw lore fill the rest.

The local outfitter running guided whitewater raft trips and fly-fishing floats through the Wind River Canyon, on water that crosses the Wind River Reservation. The way to experience the canyon from the river instead of the road.

A quirky downtown museum mixing a world teddy-bear collection, a textile studio, and a marble history display. Hands-on stations let you try spinning thread, weaving, or quilting, which makes it an easy stop with kids.

Wyoming's first state park, built around the world's largest mineral hot spring and free to enter. Rainbow-colored mineral terraces, a free state bath house with indoor and outdoor soaking pools kept around body temperature, and a small bison herd grazing the upper rangeland.

The source that feeds the whole park, pushing out millions of gallons of 128-degree mineral water a day into a steaming turquoise pool. Walkways trace the edge where the water spills over the travertine terraces toward the river.

A 1916 suspension footbridge strung across the Bighorn River inside the park, swaying gently as you cross above the rapids. It connects the terrace side of the park to the trail network and gives the best straight-on view of the mineral terraces.

The drive south on US-20 where the Bighorn River cuts a canyon with walls climbing 2,500 feet, each layer a different age of exposed rock marked by roadside geology signs. The road threads three tunnels and the Wedding of the Waters spot where the river changes its name.