Life, family, and travel

The Great American Desert

July 28th
Left Utah, entered WY.  We drove up to Interstate 80 heading for Cheyenne. We decided that we were going to take 2 days to get there so we just took our time. The vegetation seemed even drier than in Utah except right along a
river or where they were irrigating.

We saw quite a few interesting rock formations that were eroded from the wind / water, in UT.

 

 The terrain we're crossing, in far eastern UT and most of southern WY, was referred to as the big American desert by the pioneers on the OR Trail - though it isn't actually a desert.  Where it isn't rock, it's thin, poor soil, not good for much.  There aren't very many water sources across southern WY, generally speaking. We made it to Rawlins WY and decided to make a day of it. We’re both pretty sure we can make it to Cheyenne tomorrow. We stopped at Western Hills RV Campground because it was close to the road and had Wi-Fi so we could catch up on my log. So far, it hasn’t been extremely hot. Maybe in the mid to
upper 80’s but remember, “It’s a dry heat”.

Utah

July 27^th

Not too much to write about again today- a lot of driving plus a surprise visit with some old friends in SLC (Salt Lake City). We had a leisurely breakfast, showers etc and left 3 Island State Park around 9:30. We stopped for coffee in Twin Falls Idaho and saw where the Snake River had cut a pretty spectacular gorge.

 

Typically we saw some awesome scenery along the way. Notice how dry everything is?

 

 

We made it into Salt Lake City, Ut in time to stop by our Hamon Custodis office. I had done a little checking on chimneys and stacks while I was in Alaska and wanted to submit my report to Curt. As luck would have it, Dave Durham was down from his satellite office and I spoke to him for quite a while also. I told Curt about the work situation in Alaska and it was time to go. For some reason I didn’t take a photo of the guys at the office, nor of the outside of the office. I did get a long range view of the Great Salt Lake and the mountains around it.

 

We went down to Orem and took route 189 through the Wasatch National Forest. We thought we would stay at the Wasatch State Park near Heber City. It was a pretty drive with a lot of scenery photos taken.

 

We finally made it to Wasatch State Park. This was not one of our better choices. Cindy and JJ took a long hike and seemed to really enjoy the area, but for me it was a bit confining, with underbrush growing thickly right up to the picnic table and no trees near us.