Road Trip 2025 – Day 7 – Heading Home

Posted on September 2, 2025 by Robin

We were gone from July 29 to August 4 and I wrote the first blog post about it August 8. I am finally finishing the trip today, September 2, and soon will get back to sheep and weaving posts…hopefully.

Highway stretching out towards desert hills. Blue sky above.

We spent Sunday night at a motel in Green River, Utah. I don’t remember when we got on the road, but this photo was at 8:50 a.m. At this point I don’t remember much about any of the photos I took, but it’s one way I keep myself entertained while being a passenger. Most of these photos were taken in Utah.

Trinidad is over 1200 miles from Vacaville and we didn’t always take the most direct route. That’s a lot of time in the car. Dan likes the driving part so I am happy to be a passenger. I had taken a dozen magazines and books and a couple of fiber projects to keep myself occupied. I barely looked at any of them. What’s the point of a “road trip” if you don’t experience the road? This scenery is beautiful..

,,,and vast.

We didn’t make many stops so most of these are “drive-by” photos.

Highway in Utah with cement silos along the road.

Sign that says Pony Express National Historic Trail.

We did stop here because this marker was a short distance off the highway. The story of the Pony Express is fascinating but it was only a fragment of our history. The third photo of this blog series back on Day 1 shows one of the stations that were located about every ten miles. That’s a huge undertaking when I think of our drive of over 1200 miles that followed some of the Pony Express route. From the Pony Express National Historic Trail site: “It is hard to believe that young men once rode horses to carry mail from Missouri to California in the unprecedented time of only 10 days. This relay system along the Pony Express National Historic Trail in eight states was the most direct and practical means of east-west communications before the telegraph.”

Driving across the salt flats of Utah.

Utah Salt Flats with mountains in the distance and blue sky.

Highway overpass with art work of cattle and words Battle Mountain.

It seems that this was the last photo I took during the drive. This is 4:30 p.m. Unlike last year’s road trip, we didn’t have vehicle or traffic issues through the whole trip until we got near home. Just west of Sacramento the Causeway (I-80) was narrowing to one west-bound lane for the never ending highway work. We drove in the driveway about 11 p.m.

Map of the western U.S. with green and red marker showing routes from California to Colorado.

The green line is the 2024 road trip and pink is this year.

Road Trip 2025 – Day 3, continued

Posted on August 16, 2025 by Robin

I explained in the last post that I try to limit the number of photos in each post. That is partly because I think it helps the post to load better and I also want to keep whatever audience I may have. That’s you! However, I guess I’m sort of cheating because now I’m writing two posts for each day if there are just too many photos that I want to remember.

We headed north from Bryce Canyon National Park with the plan to get to Hwy. 50 and drive east as far as was practical.

Road through the high desert with blue sky. There are two plumes of smoke over the mountains.

As we turned north we saw plumes of smoke on the horizon.

Smoke plumes over high desert landscape with road in the middle.

About an hour later those plumes were much closer. This was the Monroe Canyon fire. It started burning July 13 and had now (August 16) burned almost 74,000 acres.

Blue sky with small clouds over high desert fire camp.

We passed the a fire camp.

Wild fire moke backlit from the sun with two helicopters flying water drops.

This view shows two helicopters making water drops.

Yellow helicopter hovering over stock pond with bucket to scoop water.

They are filling the buckets from a small reservoir on the other side of the highway.

Backlit wild fire smoke over sagebrush hits

There is a helicopter in the middle of this photo.

Fire vehicles parked off the highway with smoke filled ksy.

ireBy the time we were in eastern Utah we had left the smoke behind. We continued on to Montrose where we got a motel room for the night.

Road Trip 2025 – Day 3

Posted on August 16, 2025 by Robin

I left off in the last post when we arrived at Bryce Canyon and secured the last tent campsite in the park.

After looking over the landscape from the rim that evening Dan studied the park map and planned a hike. We started at the Queen’s Garden Trail, so called because of one of the hoodoos that looks like a statue of Queen Victoria.

We followed the trail down, which gave a different perspective than the view from the rim.

We came across a sign that explained the Hike the Hoodoos Challenge. If you photograph yourself with three of the benchmarks along these trails you get a prize! We found four. The prize is a sticker from the visitor center.

I took over 175 photos on this day and that’s one reason it’s taken me so long to write this post. I try to keep my blog posts to ten photos or fewer and that means a lot of sorting and decisions. I still didn’t meet that goal.

Two perspectives of the same formation (photo above and below).

The Queen’s Garden Trail led to the Peek-A-Boo Trail which connected with the Navajo Loop, part of which is what they have named Wall Street (below).

Its difficult to show how amazing this formation is.

This view is looking back towards the path with the stairs, through that slot and past the tree growing in the slot. There were a lot of people on this part of the trail. Look at what I just learned how to do:

I use Lightroom to edit photos and I was just able to remove all the people from this photo. That’s a great thing for ending up with pleasing photos, but it does make me realize that you can’t believe everything you see in print (or online).

A non-edited photo in which you get a feel for the scale of this place because I did not remove the people. .

View from the top after we finished the hike. You can see some of the trails–along a ridge in the center, and just below center on the left.

We hiked about 7 miles. That was significant because this is the first time Dan has hiked in a year and a half, after a knee injury in 2023. He’s had a new knee for just under four months!

Two other thoughts: 1. We stayed on the trails. I found myself wondering how many other formations there are like that slot canyon called Wall Street. 2. In this photo, what looks like clouds, is smoke, probably from the fire burning at the Grand Canyon. I’ve been following the progress of the fires because my kids’ involvement in wild land fire fighting.

Road Trip 2025 – Day 2, Continued

Posted on August 15, 2025 by Robin

We spent most of the day at Cedar Breaks National Monument and then headed to Bryce Canyon National Park.

Two lane road that leads through a arch cut in the red rock in Utah.

One of two tunnels cut through the red rock on the way to the Park entrance.

Sign that says Bryce Canyon National Park built with stone surrounding it.

We didn’t have reservations for camping but took our chances. We got the last space available for tent camping in the two campgrounds in the park.

Red rock canyons of Bryce Canyon National Park.

After securing our camping space we walked the trail along the rim for the views in the following photos.

Schematic diagram of layers of rock showing locations of some of the Utah National Parks.

I took this photo at Cedar Breaks. It shows the geology of this part of Utah and where some of the parks lie in relationship to each other. It is interesting to see the layers of the rock so clearly.

Bryce Canyon is not really a canyon, but a collection of giant natural amphitheaters.

Looking over Bryce Canyon National Park seeing canyons below and cliffs in the distance.

The towering formations are known as HooDoos. They are created as a result of water freezing and thawing and opening cracks in the rock, following by erosion. Bryce Canyon is known to have the greatest concentration of hoodoos in the world.

Bristlecone pine tree with root system exposed.

Bristlcone Pine along the rim.

Deer in dry grass with pine trees behind her.

On the way bak to the campsite we found a family of deer.

The doe had twins.

There was a buck nearby. In fact, there were 4 bucks, mostly younger than this one.

Road Trip – 2025 – Day 2

Posted on August 9, 2025 by Robin

We left home Tuesday morning and I shared photos in this post. It was getting late in the day when we got gas in Ely, Nevada and we took time to look at the map. We found a place to camp in the Ward Mountain Recreation Area a few miles out of town.

Campsite with picnic table in the middle. Juniper trees are around a brown tent and the car is parked in the front.

Here is the campsite in the morning. Dan was still in the tent.

High desert two-track road with sagebrush and juniper trees on the sides. Sun is shining on a mountain in the background.

I went for a walk as the sun was coming up.

Roadside sign that says Welcome to Utah.

We packed up and got to Utah about 9:30.

Sign describing the aerial tramway used by mining in Pioche Utah.

We got off the main highway to drive the original road through the mining town of Pioche. This sign describes the tramway, the remnants of which are still here on the east side of the road.

Remnants of the aerial tramway used by mines in Pioche Utah.

This is the tramway that facilitated movement of ore from higher up the mountain (behind us) to the valley below.

Remnants of ore tramway showing cart that carried ore down the mountain.

This is a closer view showing the cogs that held the chain or cable that carried the buckets. The structure that is on the horizon towards the left of the photo is one of the buckets still on the cable.

Our first stop where we planned to spend some time was Cedar Breaks National Monument. We checked out the visitor center first and then went for a hike.

Circular formation of rock layers in red tones at Cedar Breaks. Blue sky overhead.

All the views of the breaks are incredible. Do you notice that light spot just right of center on the bottom of the photo. It sure looked like a rock for the longest time.

Then I saw it for what it was – a hole through that wall. I still see it as a boulder part of the time.

Layers of red rock across the canyon at Cedar Breaks. Other colors are almost white to purple.

Closer up view showing the colors in the rock walls.

Marmot holding stem of plant with white flowers.

Marmot along the trail.

View of red rock layers across the canyon at Cedar Breaks National Monument.

View of the ridge where we had been walking.

Horseback rider on palomino horse with dog following and flock of sheep in the background.

We left Cedar Breaks to get to Bryce Canyon before night. Flock of sheep and their herder along the road.

Road Trip 2024 – Day 8 – Heading Home

Posted on September 8, 2024 by Robin

This post describes what happened on Day 7 and why our week long road trip took eight days. If you’re just tuning in and would like to start from the beginning go back to this August 11 post.

First thing in the morning we walked from the hotel to Service Masters where our truck was. I spotted this bench in the waiting area. They confirmed that the alternator was the problem and that they have the best luck using a Ford manufactured Motorcraft part in a Ford truck (only about $300 more than the other one we bought). We walked back to the hotel to kill time until we needed to check out. Then we walked back to Service Masters where we waited until the truck was ready.

We got on the road just before 1 p.m.

I took this photo because of the Clown and how it relates to Day 2. I don’t understand the fascination with clowns, but after writing the first post in this story I have a new understanding of the Clown Hotel in Tonapah, so I guess I can accept it. In looking through my photos I noticed the gas price–$3.49 is a lot less from my last fill-up here at $4.79.

Mountains east of Salt Lake.

Heading west. The Kennecott Copper mine is to the south and the Tailings Pond is to the north.

Salt, “harvested” (or is it mined?) from the Great Salt Lake.

Metaphor: Tree of Utah, also called Tree of Life is described by http://www.utah.com: “Swedish artist Karl Momen created the 87-foot high tree between 1982-1986. He financed the project himself to bring bold color and beauty to the stark, flat, salty landscape. The sculpture is made of 225 tons of cement, almost 2,000 ceramic tiles and five tons of welding rod, and tons of minerals and rocks native to Utah.”

Not too many more photos. I spent most of the rest of this trip reading a weaving book that’s I’d had with me the whole way. Most of the time I wanted to see the scenery, but I’ve been on this highway enough that I didn’t need to watch the whole time.

We crossed the border to Home about 8 p.m. I think we made it home a little after 10.

That’s the trip in green. Too bad the odometer on this truck doesn’t show up most of the time so there is no mileage record.

I just came back to edit this post. I meant to thank my Farm Sitters for handling things while we were gone. Four different Farm Club members took shifts so we could be gone for this length of time. I am grateful to them!

Road Trip 2024 – Day 7 – Colorado NM, then Utah

Posted on September 8, 2024 by Robin

We are winding down this adventure and the stories about it. Yesterday’s part was Day 6. We made it to Colorado National Monument at dusk and found a campsite.

I woke up early and wanted to explore the area.

I walked to the nearby Visitor Center (closed at that hour), picked up a brochure and map, and started walking the Canyon Rim Trail.

This is a view of Monument Canyon as the sun comes up.

A view of the valley we’d driven through to get here. The towns of Fruita and Grand Junction are along the Colorado River. The road switchbacks its way along the canyon walls. It’s amazing to read the stories of how this road was built in the early 1900’s with one man, John Otto, the instigator and tireless promoter of this monument. After walking this trail I went back to the truck to see if Dan was up.

He and I walked the same trail later that morning.

Views of the canyon. Click to see them larger (I think).

Here is a panoramic view of he same landscape. There was more spectacular scenery as we drove the road that winds through the monument. We came in from the Fruita side on the east and left going to Grand Junction. This monument was designated in 1911 and I had never heard of it. I only found it by seeing it on our maps. It is well worth the visit. Maybe someday we’ll have the chance to go back and walk some of the trails.

While we were driving through the monument Dan noticed that the battery warning light was blinking. We thought we had dealt with that with the alternator replacement less than 24 hours ago.

We drove into Grand Junction and found another O’Reilly’s. They tested the alternator and battery and declared them both OK. When you have the hood of the car up in front of an auto part store, other people (guys working on their own cars) come to see what’s going on and offer advice. There were a few who had opinions about the problem. One of them recommended that we go to Sparky’s to have it checked out. Sparky wasn’t there and the UPS driver, who was also looking for Sparky, sent us to ASAP, who sent us to Big O. That Big O send us to a different Big O that would have the equipment to check electronic stuff. They tested the alternator and some other electrical things and declared everything OK. That put us about three hours behind our plan for the day.

We got on the road, thinking it might be possible to make it home by early morning if we slept a few hours in a rest stop.

We were still driving through beautiful country. This is east of Green River.

At Green River we drove north towards Price, planning to take I-80 as the fastest way home. About half way to Salt Lake City there is a small town called Helper. If this wasn’t already Day 7 of a seven day trip I would have stopped at a museum there. I was intrigued by the name as well as the scenery through this canyon. I found out that Helper was a hub for coal mining and the railroad. From the Helper website: “Helper is named for the extra engines historically required to help trains up the steep mountain grade to Soldier Summit.” I may not have made it to the museum, but now I have spend some time on the website and found this video, Helper, UT, Where Coal Meets Canvas, that tells about the modern revival of a town that was on a steep decline with the end of the coal mining era. It is an 11 minute video that is an uplifting story.

That plan of driving almost straight through was short lived.

When we were between Provo and Salt Lake City the warning light came on again and the battery gauge showed that we were losing charge quickly. Dan pulled off the freeway at a shopping center in Draper and we called AAA. This was about 8:30 p.m. The tow truck driver recommended a mechanic who he said would fit us in first thing in the morning and he dropped us off at a motel that was near enough for us to walk to the mechanic.

To be continued again…

Road Trip 2024 – Day 3

Posted on August 15, 2024 by Robin

If you’re just tuning in you can see Days 1 and 2 here.

I woke up in time to see the sunrise at Great Basin National Park.

Here is another view of our campsite.

Sign with map of Wheeler Peak and trails.

The only paved road in the park winds up to the trailhead to Wheeler Peak (13,063′ elevation). We didn’t plan on hiking all the way to the peak but hiked to the lakes at the base. The hiking is all above 10,000′.

Stella Lake is the first of two lakes along this trail.

This doe posed nicely for the camera.

Wooden sign about Teresa Lake with the lake and trees in the background.

This sign indicates that we were about a mile from the trailhead where we started on this loop trail. However, there were signs that said the area was closed due to ongoing work. In fact, the road had been blocked before we got to the end and we’d parked lower than we first planned. Law-abiding citizens that we are, we didn’t take this trail back but took another fork and ended up back-tracking over most of the way we had already walked.

That just meant that we got to spend more time in this gorgeous area and put in about 6 miles that morning.

I’m always the one taking photos. Dan took this one so that I could prove I was there. Funny story, and maybe an example of things to come on this trip–there were two large trucks in this parking lot waiting to get past the gate that is just to the left of those porta-potties. They were full of rock or gravel or whatever they were using for the road surface. However the gate was locked and no one had a key. The drivers were trying to find the right tools to take the gate apart. I figured that one of the trucks could have just rammed the gate (being just a pipe) and driven through, but I wasn’t going to suggest that. We were able to move our truck around to get between the two big ones, but then the traffic was stopped on the way down until the pilot car that was with these trucks could make it down the mountain. So these was the first delay of the trip.

We planned to go to the visitor center and maybe see the Lehman Caves.

We spent a little time at the Visitor Center and I made a point of finding these Tempestry panels, knit by my friend, Lisa. They depict the daily high temperature for a given year and location, in this case 1916 and 2016 here at the park. You can find out more about the Tempestry Project here. This is the same idea I use in my Year to Remember blankets

This was Thursday afternoon and we needed to be in Trinidad Colorado by Friday afternoon. We didn’t have time to take a cave tour, so we’ll have to go back.

We took Highway 50 across Utah. This highway is known as “The Loneliest Road in America”, at least in Nevada. It gets a bad rap because it can be desolate, but this area in Utah known as the San Rafael Swell is stunning. (Click on one of the photos to enlarge and scan through them.)

We were somewhere west of Green River when the traffic stopped. We spent about two hours in stop and go traffic, mostly stopped, with no where to pull off. A friend (the afore-mentioned Lisa) and I were texting at the time and she found a a clue to what was going on–there had been a police chase that ended in a fatality.

Later I searched for myself and found a local news report that confirmed a chase that followed an attempt at a traffic stop. The driver passed into the median and eventually wrecked the car killing himself and another person. By the time we got to this area where we’d be able to get to an offramp our truck indicators showed that it was overheating.

We finally got to the exit and were able to let the truck cool down. Fortunately it hadn’t caused damage.

We headed south towards Moab as the sun was setting.

Not long after we turned south two sheriff trucks passed with lights and sirens. One of them weaved back and forth, stopping traffic. We were the first vehicle behind the trucks. The deputy told us that there was a pursuit in progress and, if the vehicle being pursued hit their trucks, then we should “get out of here”. That was a little nerve wracking, especially after the last episode and seeing these cops with guns drawn. Eventually the car drove past in the northbound lane with at least a dozen cop cars following. The car was being driven on rims–there must have been a spike strip that the driver ignored. All those vehicles went by and then these two turned around and followed It seems as though for the next hour we continued to see law enforcement vehicles going that direction. I never did find out what that chase was about.

These stories are not the most significant ones of our trip, but the situations pop to the top when we think about the day.

We drove south on Hwy. 491 and into Colorado and then turned east on 160. I followed the big map book and found where the highway was bordered on both sides by USFS land. There were some roads shown on the map where we could get off of the main highway. We didn’t need a campground as long as we had a safe place to pull off. We were in the San Juan National Forest and found a road that turned north. We found a spot where we could pull off that road. I think we were still eating bagels and bagged salad that we brought from home. That was dinner. We rolled out the sleeping bags in the truck and went to bed.

On the Road to Estes Park Wool Market and AGM

Posted on June 15, 2023 by Robin

A week ago today we started the drive to Colorado for the Estes Park Wool Market and the JSBA AGM (Jacob Sheep Breeders Association Annual General Meeting–that’s why it’s easier to use acronyms). I just looked up acronym and JSBA is one when we say it “Jazba”, but AGM is an initialism. Just thought you might want to know that.

We got on the road at 8:30 with a trailer full of sheep.

Turbo, the yearling ram, was up front. A yearling ewe, Quince, with a single lamb and a two-year-old ewe, Quora, and her twins were on the left. The right compartment held 3 ewe lambs and 3 ram lambs. They were bigger than the lambs on the left who were still nursing.

We always bring our map books along, but there wasn’t going to be any National Park time on this trip.

Dan did all the driving. He likes to drive. I entertained myself in a variety of ways, often with my phone. We’re still seeing snow in the Sierras.

I haven’t been through the Sierras on I-80 in years. I think the flumes that follow the canyon are so interesting. And look at the water pouring out of this one.

Blue sky with clouds over the Nevada dessert, green from rain.

Nevada landscape. We were amazed at how green it was.

There are lots of “drive-by” scenery photos. As great as the iPhone is for photos, when zoomed in it can leave something to be desired. I left my regular camera home because I couldn’t find the battery charger and both batteries were almost dead.

More green landscape in Nevada. Amazing!

I think this is still Nevada, but I didn’t keep notes. Of course I assumed that I would remember. The photo info shows it was taken about 5:20. I guess I could do the math to figure out where we were.

Overcast sky over the Great Salt Lake, photo taken from the car on the freeway.

I know this is Utah because that is the Great Salt Lake. At this point it was 7:20 p.m.

Rainbow over hills with trees in foreground.

This was taken from a gas station in Lake Point, Utah, just past the Salt Lake.

It was at this gas station that I watered and fed the sheep. We stayed in one spot for about a half hour to give the sheep a chance to eat. Then back on the road.

I was keeping track of miles, mileage, etc. We were dismayed to calculate after this gas stop that we were only getting 10.2 mpg. We’d had 12.6 from home to Loveland and 11.6 from Loveland to Elko. Pulling a loaded trailer, at elevation, and up hills is bad enough, but fighting a headwind made the mileage worse.

We drove into Wyoming. I say “we”. Dan drove into Wyoming and eventually had to stop. We stopped at a rest stop abour 2 a.m. and I gave the sheep a little more hay. I can’t say that we stretched out in the cab of the truck because there really wasn’t room to stretch out, but we covered up with our wool blankets and slept as best we could. I got out my ipad and finished editing the minutes of Tuesday night’s Artery meeting so I could send it when I had wifi. Then I slept.

Stay tuned for the next day!

Road Trip to SD – Day 7 – Golden Spike & Rockets

Posted on September 11, 2017 by Robin

My Road Trip blog posts keep getting longer and longer. I can’t decide which photos to leave out (and believe me, I’ve left out plenty) so I think each post has had more photos than the last. I know from feedback that at least some of you like the Road Trip posts so maybe you won’t give up on this one. This trip has got to end some time because I have lots more blog posts in my head (and my camera) from stuff around here. So rather than break this one into two posts it will just keep on going until it’s done.

We left off with Day 6 at dark trying to figure out where to stay. We had the map book spread out in the Subway where we had sandwiches for dinner. It was too far to any of the national forest land we were seeing north of Salt Lake City and it was dark by this time. That makes it more difficult to find a spot that is not a designated campground. I had seen, while perusing the map, the Golden Spike National Historic Site that we thought we’d check out in the morning but still we needed to sleep somewhere. Dan suggested a place off the frontage road where we’d seen climbers on our trip out.

This is what the place looked like in daylight the next morning. Except for the train track next to us and the highway next to that we weren’t disturbed. Can you read the sign that I saw the next morning? “Death’s Rock.”

We took Highway 84 to get around Salt Lake City and north of Brigham City turned west to go to the Golden Spike site.

Before you enter the area near the Visitor’s Center there are plenty of places to stop and read the interpretive signs. This was at the first site, looking back east.

I knew generally about the building of the railroad in the 1800’s but I never knew or had forgotten the details. By the time of the Civil War there were railroads linking states in the east. It was in 1862 that Congress authorized the Central Pacific Railroad in the west and the Union Pacific Railroad in the east to construct railroads that would meet somewhere in the middle.

The details make a fascinating story, and if you’re driving through Utah, this site is definitely worth your time. Before the meeting place of the railroads was finally chosen both companies continued to build grade ahead of where the track was laid. (The graders worked 5 to 20 miles ahead of the tracklaying gang.) The railroad companies were paid per mile depending on the difficulty of the terrain and they were given sections of land. So there was incentive to keep on going. The railroad grades overlapped by 250 miles before Promontory Summit was chosen as the meeting place. This photo shows the site of what is known as the Big Fill.

DSC_3361-2

Here is an enlargement of part of that. This was a ravine to be crossed and the grade could be no steeper than 116 feet per mile. Let your eye follow the slope of the rocks–that marks the ravine. The line of dirt above that is the Big Fill. The Central Pacific built that grade by blasting rock and building up that area. The Union Pacific’s solution was to build a trestle and you can see what’s left of the rocky abutment on the left and just below the Fill. There are photos of the huge trestle that was built to span the ravine (but used only four times because it wasn’t secure enough).

Here Dan is walking on the Central Pacific Grade and you can see the Union Pacific Grade to the left. When you walk on this trail you can use your cell phone at marked stations and hear the information about the points of interest along the way. I find it fascinating that these two crews would have been working this close to each other. And it is so hard to fathom the work involved. Shovels and picks, mule-drawn wagons. Other than using some dynamite, everything else was done by hand. I read that in the Sierra’s sometimes they only progressed 8″ in a day.

We got to the headquarters just after it opened and went to the Visitor’s Center.

There was a display with watches. This is an example of one of those things that never would have occurred to me to wonder about. When did we start worrying about Time? This is from a sign in one of the displays: “With the completion of the transcontinental railway, marking and maintaining precision time became more important than ever before. Prior to standard railway time, each city and town had it’s own time, often connected to “sun time” which was based on the sun’s movement across the sky. As rail lines crossed various local standard times, scheduling became increasingly complicated. Timetables and timekeepers, therefore, were essential parts of railroad operations.”

This is a view along the track (a replica now) at Promontory Summit…

…and here is where the Golden Spike was symbolically tapped and the final iron spike was driven to complete the railroad. There can be many facets to every story and this is no exception. The material at the Visitors Center (as well as all the others that I’ve visited) speaks to the ramifications of our (humankind in general, and the White Man in the relatively recent history of the U.S.) relentless desire to control and often exploit our surroundings and each other. The achievement of this feat led to the decimation of the bison herds, destruction of the American Indians’ way of life, and “progress”. The West was opened up.

On that final day two locomotives met at Promontory Summit. The wood-powered Jupiter came from the West…

…and the coal-powered No. 119 came from the East.

These engines are fully-functional replicas of the originals made in 1979.

They weren’t in operation when we were there because the track was being repaired, but usually they are taken out during the summer…therefore they need wood and coal to operate them.

We spent some time in the No. 119 talking to the man who operates the engines.

We drove part of the Union Pacific grade, now a road, when leaving the site.

We made a couple of stops along the way. I didn’t take many flower photos on this trip. When you’re practicing 70 mph drive-by photography flowers usually aren’t the subjects of choice. I did love seeing the wild sunflowers that were everywhere.

Time to head home. The map app showed 10-1/4 hours. Go!

Wait! There was one more stop. From where we first got out to look at the railroad grades you could see what looked like industrial complexes covering the hills to the east. When we got back to the main road and turned north we saw that all the property to the east was part of the Orbital ATK complex. Their website says: “As a global leader in aerospace and defense technologies, Orbital ATK designs, builds and delivers space, defense and aviation-related systems … Our main products include launch vehicles and related propulsion systems, satellites and associated components…”

There was a Rocket Display outside the headquarters. Each piece was labeled with specs and details of use.

This is the reusable solid rocket motor from the Space Shuttle.

A sign that amused me is the one in red lettering that says “Please do not climb into the nozzle.” I guess that wouldn’t have occurred to me. The blue sign is shown below.

This one pointed out the railroad grades that we just visited (red for Union Pacific and blue for Central Pacific), site of the Big Fill, Promontory Summit, and the route of the pioneers, all of which were visible from here.

Now it was really time to start for home. These are alfalfa fields in Utah…

…and huge barns to store all that hay.

We had noticed these structures under construction when coming the other direction. I looked this up later and and found that they are overpasses for deer to try and reduce the high number of deer/auto collisions in this area. They’ll be filled in with dirt and vegetation and fences will be put along the freeway to funnel the deer to that area.

Usually when we drive on these trips I don’t do much reading or other activity even though I’m not the driver.

I enjoy watching the scenery. That is what a road trip is about. But driving home from Utah on I-80 isn’t new anymore. And it’s not as fun when you are driving straight through without stops.

I still appreciate this landscape, but I ended this trip reading through much of the travel on this day and I read parts of the book to Dan. I read Overdressed: The Shockingly High Cost of Cheap Fashion by Elizabeth Cline. From the cover: “Overdressed does for T-shirts and leggings what Fast Food Nation did for burgers and fries.”—Katha Pollit. I’ve been immersed in these ideas for a long time with my Fibershed involvement but it was relatively new to Dan. Now he sees the ads in the paper in a whole new light. I could go on about that topic but I won’t. I recommend that you read this book.

Heading west into the sunset. It was getting dark. No more reading.

A blurry photo as we entered California.

Here is a map of the trips we have taken over the last five years when we started our Road Trips. This year’s trip is in yellow. Now that Dan is retired maybe we’ll be able to do more than one a year. One of us isn’t retired though and has a lot of animals to take care of.

Meridian Jacobs' Blog

Life on the farm and at the loom.

Tag Archives: Utah