Albany County named a must-visit destination for cowboy culture
LARAMIE (WNE) — Albany County received a significant boost in national visibility earlier this week as USA Today’s Go Escape West 2026 special edition highlighted Laramie as one of Wyoming’s top destinations for authentic cowboy culture.
The feature, titled “Wyoming’s cowboy culture thrives, attracting ‘Yellowstone’ fans,” is distributed nationally and highlights the best of Western heritage travel across the region.
The online feature can be viewed at: tinyurl.com/ USA-Today-Wyo-culture-story.
Sara Haugen, executive director of Visit Laramie, was quoted prominently in the story, describing Laramie as “the cowboy town” due to the University of Wyoming mascot, and guiding readers toward a range of one-of-a-kind western experiences available in Albany County, according to a news release.
The feature positions Laramie alongside Wyoming’s most celebrated cowboy destinations, including Cody, Sheridan, Cheyenne and Dubois.
Among the Albany County attractions highlighted in the feature were the Vee Bar Guest Ranch, the Rebel Ranch and the Deerwood Ranch.
Also listed as attractions were the Range Leather Co., a maker of handcrafted leather goods rooted in Western tradition; the Cowboy Saloon & Dance Hall and the Wyoming Territorial Prison State Historic Site, a former penitentiary where the legendary outlaw Butch Cassidy was once incarcerated.
The feature, written by journalist Matt Alderton, appears in USA Today’s Go Escape West 2026 special edition, on newsstands nationally through May 11, 2026, alongside coverage of Alaska, California, Hawaii, Oregon, Montana and other Western states.
Wyoming’s inclusion in this high-profile publication comes as the state recorded 8.8 million visitors in 2025, according to the Wyoming Office of Tourism, a figure driven in part by surging national interest in cowboy culture and Western heritage travel.
For more information about visiting Albany County and Laramie, go to visitlaramie.org or contact the Albany County Tourism Board at 307-745-4195.
This story was published on May 2, 2026.