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I still worked a pseudo-full day of work on the day that I left, though, due to still loading the car and rain in the morning, I really only got to work around 10:30. It was a slow day, so I got some more planning out of the way, and ended up leaving around 4:30PM. Just before the monsoon hit.
Those Dunlop Star Specs did their job, though.
Once I got past Columbus, it was much better:
Crossing into Indiana was at night, so no pictures of the border crossing. But here's Illinois the next morning:
So, tonight there's a little more time to update this travel blog, so here goes.
There was really not a lot to report from the first several days. The long highway runs were not conducive to interesting anecdotes. I could tell you about the construction I hit, or the rest stop I stopped at, but I suspect I would get tuned out pretty quickly if I did.
That last stretch of road was pretty interesting, though (Yes, Kyras, that was your favorite road into Colorado Springs). Nothing on I-70 thus far has matched the uniformity of the landscape along this road. Such flatness, all the way to the horizon. I had only seen this before in the center of Australia, where you can see nothing larger than a softball all the way to the horizon in every direction. This was positively busy by comparison.
I made such good time on this stretch of road that I got to Colorado Springs several hours before Virginija was to fly in. I first found a self-wash car wash, and managed to get the worst of the bugs off, then spent some time at the local public library using their computers. I picked up Virginija at 6:15pm, had dinner at Jose Muldoon's in Colorado Springs (great Mexican food!) and headed to Canon City, a town about 45 miles out of Colorado Springs, and right at the entrance to the southern part of the Rockies.
The next day's drive took us through the Rockies - from Canon City to Gunnison to Montrose, then south through Ouray and Silverton to Durango.
The leaves are changing! Awesome!
Monarch Pass is the highest point of the drive - 11,312 feet.
Some nice roads!
You can really tell that the higher elevations rob power - anytime I was above about 7000 feet, the car seemed a bit sluggish. Of course, 2 people plus a trunk packed with luggage certainly don't help.
Finally, we arrived at S1997's place. For those of you who may not know, the Welcome Bear is famous in Vintage (yes, the one that says "Go Away!"). He was there to welcome us, along with Tara, a very sweet dog who owns the guy who owns the house.
Leaving S1997's place, I rolled over 40K miles (1,825.4 miles into the trip):
After that good rest under S1997's roof, we headed further west to......
Our first destination in Utah was Natural Bridges National Monument. With three bridges to visit, and only limited time, we chose the Sipapu Bridge for our hike into the river gorge. Here's the approach to the park:
Click on this one twice to see the full size panoramic shot of the entire valley:
The hike down includes climbing some crude ladders:
I think I'm framing this one!
The arch!
Our plan after leaving Natural Bridges was to drive about an hour to Hall's Crossing, UT where we would take the ferry across Lake Powell. Not because we had to, but because we thought it would be fun. On the other side, we would have a little over an hour's drive to our motel for the night. The ferry was to leave at 4pm, and, unfortunately, we just didn't make it. A 60 mile (hurried) drive resulted in us turning around and coming back most of the way, and required us to take an alternate route north. But the newfound lack of time constraints allowed us to get a few more pics:
(This is starting to look like a commercial for Honda!)
The upside of missing the ferry was that we ended up driving north on SR 95 from Natural Bridges to Hanksville, UT. This is absolutely the most spectacular stretch of road that Utah has to offer! Each corner revealed more of the most spectaculr scenery I've ever seen.
This bridge takes us over the Colorado River:
Potty stop in the middle of nowhere time!
Your intrepid reporter!
North of Hanksville, you'll find a lesser-known state park called Goblin Valley. If you have ver seen the film Galaxy Quest with Tim Allen & Sigourney Weaver, you'll recognize the place.
On the way there, we saw some very interesting clouds:
As it turns out, these were caused by the wildfires near Salt Lake City. As we got further north, we could smell the smoke. It did result in a very cool sunset, though. Here's the park: (some of the weirdest rock formations EVER!)
I left my GorillaPod tripod in the car, so we had to settle for balancing my camera on a rock.
Our first destination was Capitol Reef National Park. We had visited here back in 2001, so we decided to revisit the same hike - a formation called Chimney Rock. It's a pretty decent climb to the top, but not especially difficult. As it's been for the past few days, the weather was fantastic - low 80's and sunny.
Look out below!
After Capitol Reef, we headed south through Boulder and Escalante. This road is listed as the most scenic drive in Utah, so we were eager to compare it to SR95 from the day before, which totally blew us away.
There was one stretch that followed the ridge of a mountain, with steep dropoffs on both sides (speed limit 35 )
Other than that stretch, there was nothing special about this route as far as I could see. Yes, it was very beautiful, but nothing as grand as the scenery along SR95.
We had wanted to stop at a restaurant in Boulder called 'Hell's Backbone Grill' on the advice of a friend, but once we found it, we discovered that it was only open for breakfast & dinner, and here it was 1:30pm. Onward to Escalante, where we found a mom & pop diner that had prett good burgers. That's often the trouble in Utah - it's tough to find a place to eat that looks good, at the time that you want to eat.
Our next stop was Bryce Canyon - the most colorful stop on our journey. Words cannot do it justice, so just have a look:
Apparently, the first words said upon seeing Bryce Canyon for the first time were something like "Helluva place to lose a cow!"
A quick 45 minute drive from Bryce, and we found our hotel. Bed that night was very welcome; the day's hiking left us pretty tired.
Near Bryce Canyon is a park that we drove through back in 2001, but didn't stop to explore - Zion National park. The sheer cliffs and imposing pinnacles of rock made an impression on me back then, and I really wanted to spend more time there this trip.
We headed out to reports of possible rain some time during the day - we made sure to pack our rain gear along with our usual water bottles and protein bars.
We had been hearing about some major construction on the road down from the motel to Zion. As it turned out, the road was completely closed nights from 8pm to 8am, and one lane in some of the tunnels during the day. We hoped it wouldn't slow us down too much.
It started OK - some workers with "SLOW" signs, and some fresh blacktop, but no big deal.
Then came the tunnel:
On the other side, the real construction started:
Mud. Ugh.
Finally past the construction, which doubled the 30 minute drive from the motel, the sights of Zion made the fight past the mud and cars worthwhile:
We decided to hike the Emerald Pool trails - not too strenuous, just a steady uphill. As we gained elevation, the sights became more breathtaking.
On the way back down, it started to rain. Bringing along the rain jackets paid off!
Rather than tackle the construction again, we drove around Zion via a southern route. The road through this area was almost as dull and flat as Kansas, believe it or not. But, with some rain clouds gathering, we entered Arizona.
Coming out of the hills, we came upon a rainbow! Not too bright, but visible:
It was drizzling on us the entire way through this valley. Good old Rain-X did its job very well.
Back where we came from, it was still raining, but the sun was out. It looked amazing - this picture really doesn't do it justice:
Some more of the road - we're approaching Marble Canyon, which is near the northernmost end of the Grand Canyon, where it is narrow enought for a bridge.
The other side of the bridge, with rain clouds gathering for another go.
Finally past the rain and approaching Flagstaff, Arizona, the sunset was awesome!
First thing in the morning, we headed out early to get some laundry done. Sorry, no pictures! (I know you're disappointed!)
On the recommendation of the cashier at the pizza place we went the night before, we drove up to the Lowell Observatory to check out the view.
Actually, the view was pretty disappointing. I didn't even take a picture.
Just 40 minutes east of Flagstaff is the famous Meteor Crater, as featured in the movie 'Starman'. This was definitely one of my 'Bucket List' items to see:
The guide, who is also the head guide at the site, was hilarious! Quite a character! You can see him in a Histopry Channel special about the crater that is supposedly airing these days.
Another angle of the crater (there';s no where to stand to get the whole crater into the picture without a panoramic mode!):
And finally, proof that we were there.
We then backtracked to Flagstaff, then south via Sedona, Arizona.
This place is very spacey - check out the Metaphysical Supermarket:
We saw numerous offers to have our 'auras adjusted' - I didn't know mine needed adjusting!
One of the more far-out residents:
Sedona is a very scenic town, though:
One the way to the freeway to head onwards, we stopped to call Anika at her bedtime. We haven't missed calling her at bedtime every night.
Beautiful sunset as we headed south to Phoenix:
After Phoenix, as we headed west towards Californai, Virginija saw a truck ahead and pointed and said "Look, a spaceman!" I looked, and replied "That's no spaceman, that's ASIMO!"
We arrived in Indio, CA pretty late, but we were in California at last!
09-20-2010, 05:54 AM
Homecoming 2010 Road Trip
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