![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Pics for the day (Page 2 includes shots of the front grill of the truck. We had a really impressive collection of bugs. Monarch butterfly, a variety of bees, some beetles... Later, we came back to the truck to find a couple of sparrows taking advantage of the buffet.)
The day's drive took us through Wyoming and Utah. Another day, another 500 miles.
We drove through several patches of road under construction. Actually, we hit a lot of construction throughout the trip. Summer is the season for paving (you want it to set during the warmer times, or else you'd have more trouble with cracks and potholes from heat expansion), and the stimulus specifically included extra funds for highway roadwork.
There was a scary bit. I was driving the truck. We were coming down a mountain side. I was focusing on my left mirror, watching a car in the next lane over (and I think I was preparing to change lanes). There was a curve coming up, but it came up faster than I'd realized, somehow. Dan called a warning. I turned to keep us on the road (and away from the mountainside, which wasn't too far off the road, though there was a big shoulder) and somehow cut it too sharply. The trailer swung out, pulling the truck. I steered to correct, and the trailer swung the other way, back and forth like a pendulum. It was really scary, but I did manage to get the truck back under control. Fortunately, the car I'd been watching had noticed and dropped back to give me room. Got things straightened out, pulled over at the next exit. The truck was fine, but Dan and I were both pretty shaky. He took over driving, and thankfully we were fine from there. (The incident also served as a warning for us, so we were more careful coming over the mountains the next day.)
Passed the southern end of the Salt Lake, but didn't get to see too much of it. Still, more of it than I'd seen during my last trip to Salt Lake City (for my roommate's wedding). We also drove across the salt flats (smooth land with salty, sandy soil, the former bed of what was once a much larger salt lake), a perfectly straight shot of road that went on for about 50 miles with nothing by the roadside. We were glad we'd filled up not too far outside of SLC.
We did see this thing in the middle of the salt flats, though I still have no idea what it is or why it's there:
Also saw this:
It's a Morton's Salt factory. Seems that at least some of the salt you find on the grocery store's shelves comes from dredging up and processing the salt flats.
If you want, you can see a video of a train. I took pictures of the first couple of trains we saw, but as I started to take in the size of them, I switched to video. It's incredible. This wasn't even the biggest one we saw, and some of them had containers piled two or three high. (I hear from a friend of a friend that much of what's in those containers is the stuff that's too hazardous to legally transport on the highway. So you get all sorts of creepy, disgusting, and scary things in the mix.) I showed my nephew this video after I got back. At first he was just happy to see a real train. Then, as he started to taken in the size of the thing, his jaw dropped. Then he started making these funny gasping noises, which turned to full-out laughter as the train just kept coming. Made me glad I'd taken the video (something I'd done specifically with him in mind, though I'd never expected that much of a reaction).
We also passed some (more) wind farms. Modern day windmills are things of surprising grace and elegance (when in the proper setting).
They're also friggin huge. Take a look at one a little closer:
And now take a look at a single blade, being transported on an oversized flatbed truck:
Amazing.
But, back to the salt flats... People drive on them. I mean, duh. That's what they're best known for. That's where people come every year to try to break the world landspeed records using rocket cars and all sorts of funky things. But we saw a lot of tire tracks just leading off the highway. People who just drove off the middle of the highway to camp out on the flats. Sometimes, they left messages behind. Their names or something. Sometimes a phrase:
They also left other things behind:
That is apparantly Utah's answer to the fairy ring. It's a ring of beer bottles, pushed upside-down into the salt. We saw a few of them. I managed to take this picture on the first try, out the side window of a truck moving at highway speed using a digital camera with a noticeable delay between pressing the button and triggering the shutter, and I even got the ring almost centered. Dan was very impressed. (You should be, too. ;) )
There are a few more sights of possible interest in the pics, but their captions tell the story. I won't clutter this post up too much more. We drove on past the salt flats and over the mountains and stopped for the night in West Wendover, NV. It's just over the border. You can walk from there to Wendover, UT. But the two towns are very different. And, actually, West Wendover is a bit of a study in contrasts, too.
See, West Wendover has casinos. They don't have those in Utah, of course. Not so much with the drinking, either. So Wendover is very much the poor side of town. It's where people stay before sneaking across the border to drink and gamble and what have you. The casinos (and there are 4 in the little town) are, of course, lavishly decorated and prepared to offer all sorts of luxuries. Outside the casinos... it's like I've heard about Vegas. You go off the strip, and you're suddenly in the area that belongs to the people who work for the casinos. The ones who scrape by on low wages to help create this atmosphere of luxury for the people who have money to throw away. (Or who don't have the money to throw away, but are desperately hoping to beat the odds. Or just can't help themselves.)
All that said... we got our most luxurious room of the trip for the lowest price of the trip. Casinos are very happy to have people stay over.
The day's drive took us through Wyoming and Utah. Another day, another 500 miles.
We drove through several patches of road under construction. Actually, we hit a lot of construction throughout the trip. Summer is the season for paving (you want it to set during the warmer times, or else you'd have more trouble with cracks and potholes from heat expansion), and the stimulus specifically included extra funds for highway roadwork.
There was a scary bit. I was driving the truck. We were coming down a mountain side. I was focusing on my left mirror, watching a car in the next lane over (and I think I was preparing to change lanes). There was a curve coming up, but it came up faster than I'd realized, somehow. Dan called a warning. I turned to keep us on the road (and away from the mountainside, which wasn't too far off the road, though there was a big shoulder) and somehow cut it too sharply. The trailer swung out, pulling the truck. I steered to correct, and the trailer swung the other way, back and forth like a pendulum. It was really scary, but I did manage to get the truck back under control. Fortunately, the car I'd been watching had noticed and dropped back to give me room. Got things straightened out, pulled over at the next exit. The truck was fine, but Dan and I were both pretty shaky. He took over driving, and thankfully we were fine from there. (The incident also served as a warning for us, so we were more careful coming over the mountains the next day.)
Passed the southern end of the Salt Lake, but didn't get to see too much of it. Still, more of it than I'd seen during my last trip to Salt Lake City (for my roommate's wedding). We also drove across the salt flats (smooth land with salty, sandy soil, the former bed of what was once a much larger salt lake), a perfectly straight shot of road that went on for about 50 miles with nothing by the roadside. We were glad we'd filled up not too far outside of SLC.
We did see this thing in the middle of the salt flats, though I still have no idea what it is or why it's there:
Also saw this:
It's a Morton's Salt factory. Seems that at least some of the salt you find on the grocery store's shelves comes from dredging up and processing the salt flats.
If you want, you can see a video of a train. I took pictures of the first couple of trains we saw, but as I started to take in the size of them, I switched to video. It's incredible. This wasn't even the biggest one we saw, and some of them had containers piled two or three high. (I hear from a friend of a friend that much of what's in those containers is the stuff that's too hazardous to legally transport on the highway. So you get all sorts of creepy, disgusting, and scary things in the mix.) I showed my nephew this video after I got back. At first he was just happy to see a real train. Then, as he started to taken in the size of the thing, his jaw dropped. Then he started making these funny gasping noises, which turned to full-out laughter as the train just kept coming. Made me glad I'd taken the video (something I'd done specifically with him in mind, though I'd never expected that much of a reaction).
We also passed some (more) wind farms. Modern day windmills are things of surprising grace and elegance (when in the proper setting).
They're also friggin huge. Take a look at one a little closer:
And now take a look at a single blade, being transported on an oversized flatbed truck:
Amazing.
But, back to the salt flats... People drive on them. I mean, duh. That's what they're best known for. That's where people come every year to try to break the world landspeed records using rocket cars and all sorts of funky things. But we saw a lot of tire tracks just leading off the highway. People who just drove off the middle of the highway to camp out on the flats. Sometimes, they left messages behind. Their names or something. Sometimes a phrase:
They also left other things behind:
That is apparantly Utah's answer to the fairy ring. It's a ring of beer bottles, pushed upside-down into the salt. We saw a few of them. I managed to take this picture on the first try, out the side window of a truck moving at highway speed using a digital camera with a noticeable delay between pressing the button and triggering the shutter, and I even got the ring almost centered. Dan was very impressed. (You should be, too. ;) )
There are a few more sights of possible interest in the pics, but their captions tell the story. I won't clutter this post up too much more. We drove on past the salt flats and over the mountains and stopped for the night in West Wendover, NV. It's just over the border. You can walk from there to Wendover, UT. But the two towns are very different. And, actually, West Wendover is a bit of a study in contrasts, too.
See, West Wendover has casinos. They don't have those in Utah, of course. Not so much with the drinking, either. So Wendover is very much the poor side of town. It's where people stay before sneaking across the border to drink and gamble and what have you. The casinos (and there are 4 in the little town) are, of course, lavishly decorated and prepared to offer all sorts of luxuries. Outside the casinos... it's like I've heard about Vegas. You go off the strip, and you're suddenly in the area that belongs to the people who work for the casinos. The ones who scrape by on low wages to help create this atmosphere of luxury for the people who have money to throw away. (Or who don't have the money to throw away, but are desperately hoping to beat the odds. Or just can't help themselves.)
All that said... we got our most luxurious room of the trip for the lowest price of the trip. Casinos are very happy to have people stay over.
Tags: