Virginian Hotel — Hotel in Medicine Bow

We recently watched a documentary about the Lincoln Highway, the precursor to I-80, and it prominently featured a little town called Medicine Bow, WY, and the Virginian Hotel. We had to travel to Boulder, CO, recently due to a death in the family and discovered that our trip would conveniently take us by this area, so we decided to make a pit stop at the Virginian for a drink and some conversation with the locals.

Tara, the bartender on duty, invited us to explore the hotel, which was considered one of the nicer properties in the region when it was built in 1911. Apparently, it was the first to feature electric lights and indoor plumbing. They have an "open door" policy in the old hotel section, where the rooms are decorated true to the period, and tourists are welcome to look around. Lower-priced rooms have a shared bath down the hall, another attribute that was standard of early 20th century tourist accommodations.

We liked the hotel and the town so much, that we decided to stay overnight here on our way back home. After spending the evening hanging out with some of the guests and regulars at the bar, we felt as though we were crashing at a friend's house, only the house was big, old, and possibly haunted. We chose to sleep in room #4 of the hotel, which was close to the restrooms and sitting room. Although these rooms do not have TV's or phones, you can still access wi-fi, which was strong enough to stream Netflix on my laptop the night we were there. If you prefer rooms with more modern amenities, they have a newer motel section you can stay in. The old hotel has 2 floors of rooms, and the night we stayed (Sunday), we were the only guests on our floor. Fortunately, they left the hall lights on, so midnight runs to the bathroom weren't as white-knuckle as they could have been, but it was still an experience. I definitely got the sense that there are ghosts here, but nothing hostile. We slept well, but we live near a railyard, so we are used to train noise. Those who are not should probably bring earplugs.

We ate breakfast in the dining room, which was delicious, and prepared by Tara, our bartender from the other day. Their menu is reasonably priced and, judging from the number of locals that frequent the restaurant, they do a good job of cooking the food. Drinks are reasonably priced in the bar, where smoking is allowed, FYI. The dining room remains non-smoking.

We hope our travels will bring us back this way so that we may have another opportunity to visit the Virginian and...

The good, the bad, and the ugly

First, the good: This high rating is due purely to the fact that they had rooms available the night the eclipse happened, and where other rooms were going for $2,000 a night if available at all in this eclipse totality zone, these people did not gouge. The rooms were $73 per night. Now, for the bad: the rooms offered were not the beautiful historical ones that make up the original hotel, but were in a sort of 1970s annex. And I actually didn't mind the trains going by at what seemed like hourly intervals throughout the night, loudly whistling to warn us all to get off the tracks, but my traveling companion wasn't so thrilled with the romance of the authentic Western sound. The hotel's Wi-Fi was free but very spotty, as was phone service, but given the size of the town of Medicine Bow, I doubt the Virginian proprietors could do much about that. The TV worked, but was a tube-style with terrible image quality, and the remote was long gone. So, no using that clever travel hack we see everywhere about how easy it is to charge your phone by plugging into the USB port on the back of your digital TV screen. The decor was straight out of a 70s retro magazine: polyester bed spreads with orange and green flowers, with striped rug in matching colors. Good or bad? You decide. Don't ask me what was smudged into the rug under one of the chairs because I don't even want to know. The ugly: there was a strong smell of garbage in the room. However, my clever companion noticed that the air conditioning provided consisted of a fan, which she placed in front of the open window, to great improvement. That didn't improve my mood over someone's leftover food found filling the refrigerator. But that brings us back to the plus side. There was a refrigerator,...

My husband actually stayed and he wanted me to write a review for him. He is an over the road truck driver that was in the area looking for a hotel to shower and get food when he came across this hotel. He said the lady who checked him in was very friendly as well as the staff. He enjoyed his meal at the restaurant and heard stories from locals about the hotel. He was given a room(room 17) and upon entering he found another occupant in the room. He said with all the noise he made coming in the room you would have thought the gentleman would have woke up but he never knew my husband was in the room. My husband went back to where you check in and was provided another room in the area where the bank was. He showered and was getting ready for bed. He had his dog with him and the dog was unsettled as well as he is 6 foot and hung off both ends of the bed and he stated it felt as if something kept touching his hand. The dog would not leave the window so my husband looked out the window and just snapped a photo and didn’t see anything. The dog continued to be unsettled even with the lights off and kept growling so they ended up just sleeping in the big rig. He said he was just grateful for food and shower. I’m going to include the picture he snapped… as we looked at it later we noticed something in the picture. When he left the hotel and stopped at the gas station near by the guy working asked about his stay. As he was telling about his stay to the guy the guy said “was it room 17 they gave you?” … well he never told my husband anything else but I guess they must use that room a lot. Anyhow overall he was thankful for the hospitality and being able to get some...