After a brief but excellent time in Salt Lake City, we were finally heading south -- the right direction for us most of the time! The scenery on the drive was absolutely gorgeous. I just love the dramatic, rocky topography of this area, probably because it is so very different from the green, tree-covered east and midwest I'm so used to. Rather abruptly, the rock formations changed from a sandy tan color to the brilliant red that this area is so well-known for. Ahhhhhhh....gorgeous! We took a quick pit stop at the "Hole in the Rock" rest stop south of Moab where we remember stopping (heading north) on our southwest trip in 2006. Back then, we spent quite awhile there watching many birds in the trees, including brilliant orange orioles. But that was in the spring, and today was much less "birdy". Before long, we were in Colorado. In contrast to southern Utah, the topography of this part of the state was much greener, with huge stands of evergreen trees flanked by distant snow-capped mountain peaks. Where there were deciduous trees, they were starting to get some fall color -- but nothing like what we'd see in just a day later. This was our first time in Durango, a very pretty city. That evening we met another former Nortel co-worker and cycling buddy from North Carolina for dinner at Zia Taqueria, right across the road from our hotel. Carson and his wife Carol have recently become traveling nomads like us and are spending the month of October in Durango in a rental home. It was an unexpected surprise to find that we would be crossing paths with them briefly as we zipped through town. We really liked this spot, with its "fresh Mex" style food, featuring plenty of unique, flavorful salsas. My fish tacos (below) were some of the best I've had, especially when topped with hot mango-habanero salsa. Barry went with a massive chicken/bean burrito, his favorite. And we had a trio of salsas to dip our chips into. The white one is a pineapple cream cheese variety that I dubbed a "dessert salsa". Yummy! Carol was feeling a little under the weather, unfortunately, so it was just us and Carson for dinner. It was a lot of fun to catch up, talk about traveling, and plan a bike ride for the next day. More to come from beautiful Durango!
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We only had one full day to check out Salt Lake City, but we packed a lot in. We rode a plethora of bike trails this day. Although a bit chilly, we had a nice clear day for riding and viewing the gorgeous Utah scenery. We started the morning riding from our hotel on the Airport Trail over to the Jordan River Parkway Trail. The Jordan River Parkway Trail led us to the Legacy Parkway Trail, a lovely trail that took us north of the city. The Legacy trail has no road crossings for miles, which makes it really fast and fun. After going quite a few miles, we missed a hard right turn on the Legacy Trail and ended up on a rail trail up in the Farmington area. This one was also nice but had a lot of road crossings, every one with a gate to go around. We continued on this trail until we finally decided to stop so we'd have enough time to ride around downtown. Barry had read about a "Cycle the City" loop that sounded fun. So, we turned around and headed south to downtown Salt Lake City. These signs marked the cycle route, but they weren't always quite as easy to find as we'd hoped. We took a few wrong turns but managed to get back on course pretty quickly. There was a fair amount of traffic and some construction in areas where we couldn't ride bike lanes, but overall, the city was more bike friendly than I expected. And there were plenty of sights to see. You'll have to squint to see me in this photo of the capital building. Can you find me? We walked our bikes respectfully through Temple Square, the centerpiece of the LDS church in Salt Lake City, but somehow did not get any photos of the main LDS temple. Here's a photo from Wikipedia. We had to cut our downtown exploration a little short as we realized that it was getting a bit late and we were already going to have 60 miles in by the time we got back to the hotel. So, we headed back. Looking beyond the airport, the majestic snow-capped peaks are evident. I can see why Utah is such a prime ski destination. After putting the bikes away and cleaning up, we met a co-worker from the old Nortel days in Research Triangle Park (North Carolina) at a Mexican restaurant he recommended. John is living and working in Salt Lake City now, and it was so much fun to see him again since we rarely have the opportunity to reconnect with friends while we are on the road. I love this photo he took of the two of us. Even though we are still holdouts, I gotta admit, those new-fangled iPhones (he has an iPhone 6) do take good photos! His photo is much crisper than the one our server took of us with my camera, but that may have just been a bad setting (I hope). The Red Iguana specializes in mole, so our server brought us out a small plate with a dab of each of the different moles so we could try them. They were all good, making for a very difficult choice. I ended up with pork enchiladas with mango mole, and Barry ordered chicken with their very spiciest mole! Both were very, very good. If you're in Salt Lake, don't miss the Red Iguana! A dinner out with an old friend was a wonderful way to wind up our time in Salt Lake City -- thanks John!
Next up, we point our car southward and land in Durango, Colorado, where we hook up with another old work friend and have another fantastic bike ride. Stay tuned! The drive from Elko, Nevada to our next destination Salt Lake City, Utah was interesting, with some very unique geological features. Rolling down Interstate 80, we got to see the Bonneville Salt Flats for the first time. To be honest, I am not sure I'd ever even heard of them before we stopped at a rest stop highlighting the this unique area west of Salt Lake City. But apparently they are a pretty big deal. Barry, of course, was familiar with them! Here's some more information about them from Utah.com: Imagine a place so flat you seem to see the curvature of the planet, so barren not even the simplest life forms can exist. Imagine the passing thunder of strange vehicles hurtling by on a vast dazzling white plain. This is not an alien world far from earth; it is Utah's famous Bonneville Salt Flats. The Bonneville Speedway, located in the salt flats, is a site where numerous land-speed records have been made and broken. I think I actually may have seen a segment of The Amazing Race once where the contestants had a racing challenge there, but it's only a vague memory! As we continued driving through the salt flats to Salt Lake City, this interesting "tree" appeared; it's the only tall protrusion for miles, so you can't miss it. A fellow traveler we'd met back in Elko had actually told us about it and to watch for it during our drive. From Wikipedia I learned that it is called Metaphor or the Tree of Life, is 87 feet high, and was created by Swedish artist Karl Momen in the 1980s. The Christmas-ball like spheres are coated with rock and mineral native to Utah. For more information on this interesting piece of art, visit Wikipedia. As we drew ever closer to Salt Lake City, we saw huge salt piles off the highway and then realized they were a part of a huge Morton Salt plant. The salt is blindingly white. Just outside of Salt Lake City now, the Oquirrh Mountains laid directly in our path. Very pretty. The road curved to the left to go in between them. And as we bypassed the mountains, we saw it -- the Great Salt Lake! It was pretty, but since it's so incredibly big, it's very hard to get a good photo from the ground. Honestly, we didn't even stop. I suppose we should have, but at least we can say we've seen a small portion of the huge (1699 square miles!) lake. In our next post we'll show you what we did on our full day in Salt Lake City....
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Emily & BarryWe're a long-married, early-retired couple who are currently traveling as nomads with no fixed home base. After years of living in North Carolina (Emily's home state), we spent 18 months living oceanfront on Ambergris Caye, Belize, a year road-tripping the US in a Honda CR-V, a year in Playa del Carmen, Mexico, and are now roaming North America in our 32' motorhome, Pearl, following warm weather whenever possible. Archives
July 2019
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