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....
2 Comments
10/18/2014 01:31:04 pm
Hi Emily,
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Emily
10/18/2014 02:22:36 pm
Hi Tamara! Thanks so much for your kind comments -- it is nice to know that our efforts are appreciated. Sometimes I think only my mom reads our blog. :-) As for the shoes, they are Naturalizer brand, and I got them for a song at Ross Dress for Less back in the spring. This means they were probably left over from 2013 and will thus be very hard to find. They are cute and just the colors I like, but unfortunately NOT super comfortable for walking more than a short distance. I am always looking for sandals that can actually be walked in, and I have had very poor luck with finding ones that are 1) cute and 2) comfortable. Perhaps if I were willing to spend a lot, I might have better luck! P.S. We have still not ruled out an RV; but it is a big purchase, and we are being cautious, so we haven't been able to pull the trigger quite yet!
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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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