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| Ugh, Nevada. Beautiful in its own way. |
After a quick fast food breakfast I continued on to Interstate 80 and
my eastward trek. Pretty much the same as yesterday, scrub-sagebrush and
mountain range-valley-mountain range scenery all the way to Wendover.
Wendover seems like quite the desert hot spot with all the casinos. I
had no interest in stopping at this over-commercialized sin city called
Wendover. From what I could tell the place was jumping from all the cars
and tour buses.
Today's route was, I 80 to Utah State
Route 196 for 183 miles. Then down UT SR 196 for 19 miles and turning
left onto UT SR 199 for 22 miles. A right turn at the small town of Rush
Valley onto UT SR 36 for 39 miles. UT SR 36 ends and a left
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| Yellow highlight marks Day 3's travels |
turn onto
US Hwy 6 for 24 miles going through the towns of Eureka and Santaquinn,
Utah. Finally a left onto I 15 N to Provo (19 miles) and my planned stay
at the
Sleep Inn Motel. I chose this route which avoided Salt Lake City
for several reasons. One, was I wanted to avoid Interstate highway
driving as much as possible. It is just so boring. Two, I wanted to
avoid the high stress driving on Interstate highways when in cities.
There's just too many cars and trucks driving, entering, and exiting the
freeway. And three, it would get me to Provo too soon - well before
check-in time at the motel. What was I supposed to do while waiting in a
city that I was unfamiliar with? Sure driving this route was farther
and slower but it would meet my objectives and be more interesting.
Driving
from Elko to Wendover was, in a word, boring. Endless sagebrush and
only very distant mountains. I consumed at least a couple of cups of
coffee to stay alert. It was at this point when I started listening to
country music radio. There were no rock-n-roll stations that came in
clearly. The only other radio stations that seemed to come in clear were
religious. Ugh, I decided to take the lesser of two evils - country
music. It wasn't long when I, believe it or not, I started to like it.
What the? Country music? I found that country music told a story in
song. I liked that.
Coming down the hill into Wendover you
could see the impressive salt flats stretching for miles. Water
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| Bonneville salt flats as viewed from I 80 |
on the
salt flats was shimmering in the morning sun. I didn't expect to see so
much water. It didn't look deep, only a few inches. Then I thought well
duh, that's how the salt flats got there. I was enamored with gawking at
the salt flats that I missed the exit to the Bonneville
Speedway. Surely I thought there would be another exit but I was wrong.
There wasn't another exit for 22 miles. So all I could do was observe
from the truck the endless salt flats. There was no highway right-of-way
fence preventing you from cutting across the median or driving off the
freeway. You could see that several others had done so. I chose not to,
because I didn't want to risk getting stuck, so on I drove. I noticed
that folks had scribed in the salt-sand-mud things. There was even some
primitive artwork of bottles, sticks, and junk stuck into and arranged
in various patterns alongside the Interstate highway. I did so want to
touch or drive on the salt flats. I guess I'm going to have to come back
another time.
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| Interesting stone arch at the Wild Horse Hills rest area |
I pulled over at Wild Horse Hills rest
area just on the eastern edge of the salt flats. Rocky and I took a
short walk to some rocks in the distance. A sign said, "Beware of
rattlesnakes and scorpions" which had me a bit more observant on walking
through the rocks and brush. Rocky enjoyed the romp-about. We saw no
snakes or scorpions, nor did we see any wild horses.
We
continued on I 80 which was absolutely boring. So at the first chance to
get off and take a scenic route I jumped at it. The opportunity came to
go south on Utah 196 or Skull Valley Highway. It was just what I needed
a narrow two lane road with a beautiful range of mountains that had a
fresh topping of snow off to my left. Off to my right was a
scrub-sagebrush valley. I saw an interesting road sign that warned me
off free range buffalo. I never saw any buffalo but did see some prong
horn antelope. The road turned without warning right into the US Army
Dugway Weapons Proving Grounds. The only other structure was a large
Latter Day Saints church. No other buildings. Weird I thought, but then I
am in Utah. Rather than approach the gate I did a U-turn right in the
middle of the road. As I completed my turn, I noticed I could go onto
Utah 199. Huh? No sign or anything indicating Utah State Route 199.
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| Utah SR 199 looks like a 'road to no where' |
Utah
199 seemed to go straight into a mountain range. I started humming the Talking Heads song, "I'm On A Road To Nowhere." For miles you couldn't see any
sign of the road going over the mountains, but the road did. The road
went in to a canyon climbing and twisting through a juniper forest until
once again you came to pass. Just east of the pass there was a small
campground but it was empty. The road steeply and twistedly wound its
way down to the valley below. What I didn't realize was that I was on a
road called "the Mormon Trail." The road or trail ended in a small town
called Rush Valley.
I turned right on to Utah State
Route 36 going towards Vernon, Utah. To my left was another US Army
facilty the Tooelle Weapons Storage Dump. It looked very similar to the
Army weapons storage dump at Hermiston, Oregon - half underground
bunkers arranged in rows. I later found out that Tooelle was not
pronounced "too-lee" rather "too-ell-lah." Perhaps the residents didn't
want to be known as living in the "too-lees" because it looked like you
should pronounce it like that. Highway 36 wound its way past Vernon (a
former Pony Express stop) and through sparse sage and juniper country
until it came to its end at US Highway 6.
I turned left
onto US 6 and once again started a climb up and over a small mountain
range. This time at
 |
| A pass looking into another valley on the Mormon Trail |
the summit was the town of Eureka, a small former
mining town. The town proudly displayed some mining equipment to
celebrate its history. Curiously there were large gray rocks, about the
size of baseballs neatly distributed everywhere - hillsides, along the
road, around the school, in tiwn around businesses, and even around
homes. I wondered what mining would result in that rock as a tailing?
The rock did not resemble the surrounding rock. I pulled into a garishly
painted bright yellow and red cafe called the "
3 Prospectors Cafe." As I
entered there was a vigorous conversation going on about chainsaws,
chainsaw chains, and cutting wood. Seems that juniper is tough wood and
wears chainsaw chains down rapidly. So, if you are going to cut juniper,
bring spare chains. I ordered the special - beef tips, gravy, over
noodles. It was quite good and better than a hamburger. I asked about
the rocks all over town. They explained that gold, lead, and other
metals were mined in Eureka. The mine petered out in the late 60's.
Tests showed that the resulting tailings were toxic to people and the
environment. They thought of cleaning all the tailings up, but decided
the cheapest thing to do was bury it under rock. Wow, that's a lot of
rock. I asked what keeps the town alive now? Hunters and tourists.
After
Eureka, US 6 dropped rapidly into the Utah Valley. The seemingly
impenetrable Wasatch mountain range towered over and framed the eastern
side of the valley. The valley contained Utah Lake as well as several
towns and cities, namely Provo my destination. I drove through
Santaquinn and turned left onto I 15 headed for Provo. Once again it
took me a minute or two of adjustment from traveling two lane roads at
55 mph to four lane roads at 75 mph. Also from no traffic to bustling
traffic of cars, trucks, and semis.
I made it to my motel,
checked in, and prepared for the next adventure of the day - a
collegiate hockey game. I had traveled over 306 miles and once again saw
sights and scenery that was all new to me.
