Sunday, July 25, 2021 - From Utah to Nevada; with Beautiful Scenery to Share

Sunday, July 25, 2021 - Utah to Nevada and Lots of Scenery to Share

Before I get started on today's travels I wanted to share a few pictures I took last night between 10-10:30p.m.  When we arrived at Aspen Grove RV Park on Saturday they told us that the area was under a high fire watch and that we could not have any open fires.  That was fine with us....at 102 degrees who wants a fire.  We just wanted air conditioning.  Lol!

We never thought about that again until about 9:00 or so where fireworks started going off left and right all around us.  We were surprised they were allowing fireworks if they were under a high fire watch.  We remembered everywhere we traveled yesterday there were signs saying Extreme High Alert for fires.  

Finally at 10pm or so I stepped outside to see where the fireworks were coming from - well, it didn't take long to see why they were so loud.  They were practically in our backyard - just down the road a bit from the RV Park.  I believe it might have been a community event.  When the fireworks quit lots of people started cheering and clapping and then it was over.

The fireworks were pretty though.  We were just tired and ready to retire for the night, and that's exactly what we did when they were finished.

I was up near 5:30, so I started the coffeepot.  Dean joined me about the time it was done, so we enjoyed our coffee together.  We weren't in a big hurry this morning.  According to RV Parky it was less than 200 miles to our next stop in Wells, NV.  We decided to take I-89 and I-15 south so we could go around the Great Salt Lake. 

Pictures of our park - this is across the street from us - you can barely see the mountains in the background due to the heavy smoke in the area.

Bentley

The area behind us.

As we left - I had to quickly snap this picture of the American flag behind the RV Park's fence.

It was 9:53 Mountain Time when we left Tremonton, UT and it was already 75 degrees.  Fortunately the traffic wasn't too bad.  We were anxious to see the Lake, and was beginning to think we would miss it altogether when I finally got a few pictures.  I was disappointed we didn't get to see anymore than what we did.  The water was so far away from the highway I only managed a few glimpses of it.

These are our views of the Great Salt Lake.  If we happen to come back through Salt Lake City, we may stay for a few days so we can check out some of the sights.

We were both surprised how long we drove along the highway with white salt either side of us for miles and miles.  

Cargil Salt Operation

The Tree of Life - read more here:   https://utah.com/bonneville-salt-flats/tree-of-life-sculpture

A close up as we drove by. 

We saw several sculptures in the sand along the way as people stopped to walk and play in the salt area.  This is the only one I managed to get a picture of. 

It was almost 1pm when we arrived at the rest stop right next to this large salt flat.  It was already 92 degrees.  Several cars were driving and people were walking out on the salt flats.  I walked out to scoop a little bit of salt up into a cup I had.

We continued to see salt either side of the road for several miles.  The scenery began to change a short while before we arrived in Nevada.

We enjoyed seeing these hills and greenery again.

We are not sure what this tunnel was built for.  There is fence from the bottom of this structure all across the top and down the other side.  Any ideas why?   

We made it to Nevada!

We arrived at Mountain Shadows RV Park in Wells, Nevada at 1:30pm Pacific Standard Time.  After we were set up for the day/night, I made us each a sandwich.  While we were eating, I noticed our thermometer said it was 79.3 in Bentley.  We have reflective insulation in all of our windows and I think it has helped keep it cooler inside.  It was 93.4  outside.  It doesn't take too long for the air conditioner to reach a comfortable temperature once we are parked and hooked up to electric.

When we were finished eating, Dean wanted to get fuel so we set out to find a gas station, and I was looking for things to do while we are here in Wells.  I found a couple of interesting things to visit today.

The first was Angel Lake.  All I can say is WOW.  Here's a map of our drive.

We started at the top right, making our way down to all of the squiggly lines through the mountains to reach Angel Lake.

Here are the pictures - it is overload I know, but it was just too beautiful not to share these:  

That is the road winding around to get to this point, you can see it from the back and moving toward the grassy area.  There is still a lot of smoke coming into the area.  It gets a little worse as we move further west.

When we reached this area - it looked as if God had just thrown a few small boulders here and there.  (The white spots up on the green hillside).

And the grand finale:

Angel Lake
It was fun watching all of the families out on the lake.  There were a number of kayaks, kids floating, etc.

Now, it was time to start our way back down the mountain!

It looks like the road just ended.   Coming up the hill, with me on the outside, I told Dean this felt worse than when we were at Pike's Peak.  I'm sure this road wasn't as wide as the one at Pike's Peak.

Lots of smoke 

Beautiful vistas everywhere we looked - even with the smoke it was gorgeous.

One last look back where we had been.

And then we had surprise visitors!

We made our way back to I-80, making a quick stop at the RV so we could use the restroom before we headed out on the next adventure.  This was another drive - Clover Valley Scenic Drive.  Here's a link giving an explanation of the drive and its impact on the area.https://www.exploringnevada.com/scenic-drives/clover-valley-scenic-drive.php

Here are a few pictures we took as we drove this route.

See the colt on the right side.  We saw a couple more at another location but I wasn't able to get pictures of them.

Quite a bit of cattle in this area.

Most of the farm homes along here had these large trees around their homes, barns, corrals, etc.

Looking back at the Humboldt Mountains.

It was almost 6pm when we returned to Bentley.  I made sandwiches for our dinner.  Dean has spent the evening watching TV while I work on this post.d

It has been a great day!  We were pretty disappointed we didn't see more of the Great Salt Lake, but the drive to Angel Lake more than made up for it.  

Tomorrow is the last leg of our trip to reach Winnemucca, Nevada.  We are looking forward to seeing Brett and his family for a week.  In the meantime, we'll be trying to decide where we will go from there.

Thank you to all of you who are following along.  We would love to hear from you, if you wish to comment.

Saturday, July 24, 2021 - WOW!!! We Had No Idea What Highway 30 Would Be Like....But, It Did Not Disappoint!

Saturday, July 24, 2021 - WOW!!!  We Had No Idea What Highway 30 Would Be Like...But, It Did Not Disappoint!

When we arrived at Red Desert Rose CG yesterday I'm don't think it was even close to half it's capacity.  By 9:30 the park was getting close to being full.  We went to bed about 10.  I was just drifting into lala land after having laid in bed for awhile, when someone starts yelling and laughing not far from our rig.  Who does that at 10:30 pm?  Their voices were raised enough I could hear what they were saying.  To drown them out, I got up and turned on the air conditioner fan on so it would run all night.  I did finally go back to sleep, but it wasn't a good one.  I was up at 4:15 with my neck hurting.  Once I get up it usually quits within 15-20 minutes.  I think I just lay wrong or something because it is not an every day occurrence - but I wish it wasn't an occurrence at all.  LOL!

I waited until I heard Dean stirring before turning on the coffeepot, around 5:30.  We do love that first cup of coffee in the morning.

We knew we had a long drive this morning so we were ready to pull out at 8:47am.  I was surprised how many rigs had already left before us.

I'm giving you fair warning, I've included many pictures.  It's hard to decide what to keep and what to toss.  I tossed A LOT!   

At 5:12am it was 62.8 here in Rawlins, WY.  We love these morning temperatures!

We had just passed the Continental Divide at 7,000 feet.  Notice the haze in the foreground - from the forest fires further west.

 

I'm so thankful that states place rest stops along the way.  They provide such a great service to travelers.  I love to see our country's flag flying, alongside Wyoming's flag.

I'm not sure what type of rock/material this was, but possibly a quarry of some kind.

First of many rock formations we'll see today.

We were on a two lane road for many miles.  It looked as if the closed lane was getting a new road bed.

The scenery is slowly getting better.

Same rock in the two above pictures - the first one, as we passed in front of it, the second from the side.

I love tunnels!

These rocks and the colors are really amazing.

We happened upon Little America, right before we transitioned from I-80 to Highway 30.  We pulled in to find a parking spot where we could eat our lunch.  I made chicken salad sandwiches for our lunch.  I think at least half of the traffic on I-80 stopped here to do the same thing.

Here's the link:  https://wyoming.littleamerica.com/about-little-america-wyoming/   if you want to check it out.

As we were pulling into the parking area.

Trucks, cars, semi's, RV's, FedEx, you name it they were here.

Beautiful trees throughout the large parking area.  We didn't drive around since we were pulling the RV, but I'd like to have seen what all was here.

Back on the road, almost immediately we turned off I-80 onto Highway 30 for the last leg of our trip to Tremonton, UT.

There wasn't much to see for quite awhile - much of the same earlier in the day.  You can see the haze in most of these pictures.  A few times we could smell smoke.

And then it was green.  We were both excited to see a change...a pretty green

The first town we'd seen since we left the area around Rock Springs.  Diamondville, WY.

,

Lots of lonely highway.

It's been a long time since we had seen open air cars on a train.

Finally, we have made it to Utah.  I believe this is my first visit to the state.  Dean had traveled through here many years ago when his brother lived in Washington state.

At 12:54pm and the temperatures are rising. 83 degrees

Pretty red rock

We knew we had been gradually rising in elevation.  Soon the roads begin to twist and turn as we continued to get higher.  When I saw this sign, and the steepness of the hill, I hoped no one ever had the need to use it.  I asked Dean, do you think a truck ever makes it up that hill from going so fast.  We both hoped not.

 

Then, around a few more turns, and this is what we had been waiting for  Big Bear Lake - and it did not disappoint.  We were parked here just off the road alongside a new (or improved) rest area that had not yet reopened.  The water was such a beautiful aqua blue.  The beaches were full from one end of the lake to the other.  Fun in the Sun for sure!

It was so beautiful!

Cabanas, four wheelers, paddleboards, etc. were all over the shore or in the water.

Look at the color - isn't it gorgeous!

This was closer to a community and beach homes.

Someone is carving this massive bear out of a huge tree trunk.

At the top of the mountain

Beautiful countryside - I'll let you just look at these pictures.

Here the scenery began to change with more rock involved.  I'm not sure how many miles we traveled but it was many!  Every turn was another amazing scene.  A beautiful stream ran alongside of the road for several miles as well.  

We arrived at Aspen Grove RV Park in Tremonton, UT at 3:08pm.  It was quite warm here.  Because of that, it didn't take us long to set up.  We talked about going to eat somewhere but later decided we'd rather just stay in and eat leftovers.  We originally thought we'd drive around and see some of the sights, but we decided we didn't want to fight Saturday afternoon/evening traffic. We were both tired and it's better we rest.  

Tomorrow we will be moving to Wells, NV, our last stop before arriving at Brett's in Winnemucca, NV.  We had originally planned to take Hwy 30, but since tomorrow is Sunday we are going to try and leave here early enough, hoping we'll miss a good portion of Interstate traffic..  We will be passing the Great Salt Lake, something I've always wanted to see.   Our drive tomorrow will take us approximately 3.5 to 4 hours.

At 5:53pm it was 105.2 here in Tremonton, UT!!  I sure hope it's cooler in the morning!