The same disclaimer goes for today. I’ve gotten a little over four hours of sleep after being on the road for 14 hours. Any errors are completely out of my control. I’m lucky I remember how to transfer pictures onto my computer at this point.
As we drove out of Cheyenne, Wyoming, we found ourselves surrounded by rolling landscape, dotted with buttes and framed by mountains.
Although not as spectacular as the Alps which has fascinated Charles Dickens in the past. I think he found the view as interesting as we did.
Utah, was even lovelier, with the snow capped peaks of the Wasatch Range. We could see reminders of the 2002 Winter Olympics. The US Olympic team training center is here as well. The ski jump near Summit Park was awe inspiring and fear inducing. YIKES!
From there we descended from approximately 7000 ft. in elevation, to only 4000 ft. in Salt Lake City. Here we made a stop at the Great Salt Lake.
As we drove through the Great Salt Desert, it’s amazing to think of those early pioneers crossing such a vast, uninhabitable place. As I mentioned yesterday, our path is close, and sometimes the same as the Oregon, Mormon and California trails. This was part of the Hastings cut-off that the doomed Donner Party took.
There is salt stretching as far as the eye can see. Animal nor plant can survive here. There was no food or water for the animals. The waterholes were brackish and poisonous. Although the salt desert seems like it would be a nice hard surface for the wagons, there are places when the surface crust is thin and the horses, oxen and wagons would break through the crust and sink into the mud below.
We stopped at the Bonneville Salt Flats Speedway, where many a land speed record has been broken. Lunch was at the Salt Flats Cafe. The walls were covered by photos of racers with their rocket cars, and souped up motorcycles, many autographed
Besides the Ruby Mountains, there was not much beauty to behold. The remainder of Nevada was long and desolate, and made our journey less than thrilling. We were relieved when we finally pulled into Reno, Nevada.
I’m not too sure what Mr. Dickens thought of the bright lights and cacophony of sound from the slot machines, but we came out with a few more dollars in our pocket than we started with.
We are looking forward to more scenic mountain views tomorrow, along with a reunion with our daughter in San Francisco.
A Play on Words 