We said goodbye to the awesome grandparents and found I-80 East (one of the first eastern roads of the trip). We were informed the drive along the south rim of Lake Tahoe is quite amazing, so we did it.
Lake Tahoe
It was true! Lake Tahoe is gorgeous. As my family can attest, I used to say "I'd love to live here" at nearly every stop on our vacations. Over the years, my fantasies subsided, and I became attached to the feel of Cincinnati and the thought of keeping the West exciting by living in the East.I didn't speak those words while driving around Lake Tahoe, although I did say "I'd love to have a vacation house here!" And after I make a few million in spare change, I'll do it!
The Lake Tahoe album
The Loneliest Road In America
I may have failed to mention one of my stipulations for the trip was that we figured out every route via maps before consulting a GPS device. As such, my plan was to stick to interstates (I-80 to I-15 to I-70 to I-74) to get home. We plugged the GPS in just for fun (mostly to race the time to our stops) and didn't notice, until it told me to exit, it was taking us a different way (US-50). We consulted a map. It was definitely fewer miles and, accordingly to the intelligent device, it was also fewer hours. So we tried it.
Not until we were on the road did we come to find it is termed The Loneliest Road In America. And rightly so. At one point, I went more than 100 miles between paved intersections. That's not a joke. Those green signs would say three town names and the corresponding miles to each. One such sign had miles of about 90, 120, 180. These weren't to the next big towns; they were to the next town of any size.
I loved this road! It's difficult to beat the roads through Glacier, Yellowstone and Yellowstone, but these secluded stretches came close.
The human tendency on such long, straight stretches with no cars is to drive a little bit faster than usual. I was doing so and, after topping a small hill I zoomed past a white pickup truck, not thinking anything about it. Until I saw the painting on the side and the lights on top. I thought, "Well, good thing I slowed down and got over." And as I nervously stared into my rear-view mirror, I saw the truck pull onto the road. How terrible it is to go the speed limit on this road - it feels as though you're crawling. And what was worse was the next town was still 30 miles away!I was followed until the outskirts of the next town and never pulled over. Then, as I was coming out of the town, I turned a corner and a police car flew past me, lights blazing. I continued on. A few minutes later I looked ahead and saw another police car with its lights on. And it was in my lane! And it was facing my direction! As I approached the car, the officer had his hand pointed to the shoulder - I was certainly toast. That is, until I learned there was a wide load approaching and it needed both lanes. Crisis averted!
We continued on the road for what seemed like days but just a few hours. There was a stretch where the dusty desert had rocks randomly lying on the its surface. Over the years, people had gotten out of their cars, collected rocks and put them on this perfectly sloped embankment on the side of the road, spelling various names and words. It went on for miles! Unfortunately, the photo I had didn't turn out. But, we also saw a double rainbow!
Great Basin National Park
Throughout our lonely drive, we continued to see signs for Great Basin National Park. I had read about it and knew it was in Nevada, but wasn't sure where (since I had planned on driving through I-80 through Nevada I saw there were no parks on our route and ignored the rest of the state). We consulted a map and found it was practically on US-50!
We had some time, so we decided to do a quick drive-through and continue. Great Basin holds the only glacier between the Sierra Nevada and Rocky mountain ranges. Unfortunately (again!), the road wasn't open all the way to the top. We did get a few good photos, though.Album of Great Basin and US-50
Arches National Park
It was sunset when we were in Great Basin, but we wanted to continue on the drive to get to Arches NP. We arrived sometime between 2-3 a.m. The campground was full, so we parked at the visitors center, got out our sleeping pads and lied on the parking lot. There were two problems. First, it was 88 degrees! I thought it got cold in the desert at night - not here apparently. Second, there were a lot of mosquitoes! Mosquitoes? In the desert? Apparently.
Needless to type, not too many Zs were caught, and by 5:30 a.m. we'd had enough. But we didn't mind (or at least I didn't), because it meant we got to see the sunrise in the park! Here's a shot around 6 a.m. (taken from inside one of the arches).I've yet to see the other parks in Utah, so I can't say whether there is much of a difference between them. However, Arches NP is gorgeous! I'll let you know if I still think it is unique when I get back out there in three weeks or so, but for now I say it rocks!
One thing I can say is unlike Glacier, Yellowstone, Olympic and Redwood, there isn't a ton to do here. It's very, very, very easy on the eye and camera lens, but its size and location in the middle of the desert would hinder me from an extended, versatile stay.With that said, we still got some great photos. I'd pick them out, but I'd rather just point you to the entire album. However, this photo would make my top five from leg one.
The End
From Arches NP we drove the rest of the way home without stopping. And with that, I concluded Leg 1!
Next Post: Leg 1 Summary
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