15, 16, and 17 September 2013 Wyoming, Utah, and Farewell to Jerry and Marge

Sunday, the 15th, we traveled 225 miles from Rawlins, Wyoming, to Coalville, Utah. It was a partly cloudy day with many sun breaks, and we dodged several thunderstorms. After we crossed the Continental Divide, we went through amazing layered walls and wind-sculpted formations, near Rock Springs and Green River--green layers, huge massifs, and blocky hoo-doos. Patrice and I must have seen more than 200 antelope in small groups in fields close to the highway.

We stopped for our picnic lunch at Little America, a mega truck stop, with a motel and gift shop. It had been advertised from far down I-80, "50-cent ice cream cones." Much to our surprise it is listed as Little America on our road map, and the population is 68.

Near the end of our travel day, we passed through a wondrous canyon that ran all the way down to where 1-80 is joined by I-84. There were huge red cliffs that were eroded into fantastic shapes--toothy skulls, bad dentures, hollow eyes, ragged windows, and lots of crooked spires! With the narrow canyon, there was absolutely no safe place to take pictures.

We camped at the Holiday Hills RV Park in Coalville, Utah. This is a strange but adequate little park. The check-in was at the office right next to a filling station, and the entrance to the park was around and next to a motel. The sites were on curved concrete pads, parallel and on either side of the road.

Monday, the 16th, Marge, Jerry, Patrice, and I drove about 15 miles into Park City, Utah. Park City hosted the Winter Olympics in 2002; there are many reminders of that along Main Street. Main Street runs straight uphill, parallel to and at the base of the huge ski area. Many art galleries, clothing boutiques, antique stores, cafes and restaurants, and other shops lined the streets. We browsed a bit, and bought some chocolate.

Us with me eating chocolate

The hills were alive with fancy homes, condos, apartments and hotels! A very pricey atmosphere prevailed in the decor and landscaping of the homes.

We stopped for some groceries before we headed for home--from the store's parking lot we had a clear view of the Olympic ski jumps.

Back at the park we had our last "happy hour" together on this trip. Jerry and Marge brought out a bottle of champaign--we toasted each other for an awesome trip to the Maritime Provinces. It was a great trip to share with good friends and we will always remember it.

As an aside, I calculated that we had put 15,433 miles on our pickup from North Palm Springs, California, to Coalville, Utah, and 8,229 miles of that was in the Maritimes. I will calculate and enter the miles put on our fifth wheel later. We are fortunate to have traveled across the "tornado alley" area of the U.S. twice without encountering any, and to have avoided any hurricane activity while on the East Coast and in the Maritimes.

We went into Coalville for some gas and looked for a restaurant--there wasn't much there, so we went to the Subway. The cashier asked us if we had a points card, and when we told her we were just passing through she said, "Well, when you have the best food in town, most everyone in town has one because they eat here at least once a week." It was pretty good, too, for a Subway. 

We had our last Gramma Marge's ice cream social tonight also.

Marge

Jerry

Today, Tuesday the 17th, we left Coalville, Utah and drove to Declo, Idaho. Leaving this morning was kinda sad, saying goodbye to Marge and Jerry who are headed west and south toward their home in Banning, California, and Patrice and I are headed north and east to visit relatives and friends in Idaho, Washington, and Oregon, Nevada, and California before returning to our winter lot in North Palm Springs, California. We will miss sharing our adventures with them and Carlos is already moping around not seeing them every day.

Our trip today began with some spectacular scenery on I-84 north and around Salt Lake City. There were more red cliffs, and layered monoliths jutting out of the rounded hills. Patrice spotted two small natural arch bridges (!) on either side of the highway up in the cliffs.

The road took us through some deep and narrow canyons with geologic formations we've never seen. One particularly awesome scene is called the Devil's Slide. Luckily there was a small roadside stop directly across from it in this narrow canyon.

Devil's Slide - side view from the west

Straight on view

A truck passes, notice the barrier narrowly separating the small parking area

There were many similar ridges like those of the Devil's Slide up and down this canyon, and the hills had rounded white tracks of this type of rock, as if the layers had been laid sideways in the earth--the trees and shrubs grew in the ground in the rows between.

After turning north at Ogden, Utah, we traveled through about 30 miles of commercial development along the Great Salt Lake then through about 70 miles of farm lands and mountains in Utah and Idaho. At the rest stop just north of the Idaho border we learned about the ancient Bonneville Lake that was created about 20,000 years ago. It had no river outlet leading to the ocean, and sat in the surrounding basin. Eventually it filled up and overflowed into the Snake River. Much later the lake dried up and left the desert area and the Great Salt Lake as a remnant.

As we continued, we saw thunderstorms developing. Our weather ap on our phone signaled that we were in an area of strong thunderstorm activity. We skirted around two storms areas (fortunate again) with only a few drops of rain before reaching our RV park, Village of the Trees RV Resort in Declo, Idaho, for the night. After setting up we received a tornado warning--none occurred and all was well.

On to Caldwell tomorrow.