On to Utah – Change of Scenery, not a change of heart

Made it to Lake Jordanelle State Park today, which is where we like to stay when we visit my daughter who lives in the Salt Lake City area.  This is a huge change of scenery since our month long stay in the Sacramento area…but as the dogs say…

       

These two above are having “heart-ache” over being gone…especially Bubba who simply adores his Uncle Arny.  This scene, which was Monday Morning of this past week, took place many times…except they typically did not have to wait for Arny to open the drapes which are typically open when I let them out around 7 am.  But on Sunday Arny and Sandy were at the Reno Air Races, in fact, sister Patti and I talked them into going for the entire weekend as we took over the watch and care of Arny’s mom…so on Monday morning they slept in just a bit, and it was 7:15 when the drapes open, Skruffy noses her way through the door leading her and Bubba to the back door, and Arny starts their morning off with a dog treat for Bubba, and pork which I have cooked up for Skruffy.  Then Skruffy comes back into the motorhome, after doing her business, to eat her diabetic breakfast, while Bubba takes his breakfast outside before spending the rest of the day with Arny (and Sandy on this day since she took a day off to recoup from the Air Races.)

     

A bit about our trip to Utah…  We left Tuesday evening around 5:30 pm.  WHY so late?  Our destination was not too far away…just 47 miles (53 the route we took since I wanted to fill up at Sams Club first), to a rest area above the 3,000 foot elevation.  Gold Run Rest Area, on the West Bound side, is just the ideal place for this.  Cooler weather, and there is separate RV parking away from the big trucks.  As you can see by the sign above, you have 8 hours of parking time…we were there for more like 10 hours, and the ONLY RV around.  90% of the truck noise and highway noise is muffled out by the isolated location.  This is the first, but probably not the last, stay at this rest area.  When we left, you don’t even get on the west bound I-80, the access road leads to an overpass, and you hop onto the eastbound lanes and off you go, no traffic, no headaches.

I told Marcia as we were driving near Emigrant Gap that the Sierra’s were my first “Nature” love, and that all of our travels have never taken that spark out of my eyes…that is, until the trip to Alaska.  Yes, I still love the Sierra’s…home to Yosemite, Lake Tahoe, the “Big Trees” (Calaveras, Kings Canyon, Sequoia), Mount Whitney and many other areas.  Colorado nearly took the spark out…but Alaska certainly did. 

    

But I sure like this ride up and over Donner Summit, that’s for sure!

    

Saw a couple of interesting older vehicles on our way through California and Nevada.  I am sure Arny would love this old GM Truck, and the MG hatchback reminds me of the 1965 Austin Healy sports car, my first car, that I had way back when.

    

Traveling through Nevada was not as boring as I usually find it with interesting clouds, a few fall colors, and the rainbow which Marcia caught while I was fighting wind and the start of rain.

    

In Elko we stopped to catch our Wednesday night church from back in Florida over the Internet.  Our Pastor, Brett Robinson, is interesting in person and over the Internet…except to Skruffy who was sitting on my lap looking out the window the entire time.  At least she did not bark at anyone, which for her is amazing.  As we left, the rain storm we had already driven through was catching up to us…but the wind, as shown by the flag, had died down a bit…it would be nightfall before we found our stop in Wendover for the night in a large parking lot near Pilot Truck Stop and the Peppermill Casino.  We stayed here in May as we traveled to Utah before turning north to Alaska…and this time I found a much quieter area of this huge lot, but not as quiet as the previous night at the rest area in California.

We got an early start again after getting gas at Pilot along with some coffee, and this, of course, after we fed the critters.  Skruffy eats twice per day, 12 hours apart.  She is a very good eater, and she is very good about allowing me to prick her with a needle twice a day and give her the insulin.  She currently is getting 2.5 units in the morning, and 2 units at night, and her blood sugar level is between 150 and 200 mid-day, which has been a good level during her extremely active lifestyle in Sandy and Arny’s backyard.  Now that we are gone, I am cutting back her food a bit, and keeping her insulin the same.  She was at 165 today, so all is going well.    

Speaking of “going well”, the drive along the Salt Flats was more like a drive along the water reflections…between the clouds, and the reflections…wow….what else could we ask for?

Well, how about that!  Reminds me of Genesis:

And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light....God called the dry ground “land,” and the gathered waters he called “seas.” And God saw that it was good.

We finally made it to Lake Jordanelle State Park.  $30 per night, but we got the last sewer connection, so we have full service except for no TV…back to the Amazon movies.  Big OPPs on that one…I forgot to load up with new movies…so we just watch a few movies again, no big deal.  First thing, line up a moving van so I can help move my daughter into a new place Saturday.  Second thing…find a Cracker Barrel which we have not had for some six or seven months now.  So off to West Valley we go…

We come out of Cracker Barrel, and I see DARK DARK skies to the west.  We QUICKLY head east and back up and over the mountain.  Got this image above off of one of the weather sites showing where the storm was when we left the restaurant. 

Got this from a video posted by KSL news, of the tornado that went through southern Ogden…just 30 miles north of where we were.  We literally got through Salt Lake and up the mountain just in the nick of time.  Just five minutes later and we would have had to sit on the freeway which got instantly clogged due to the storm.  Even as we headed up the canyon, the winds were blowing debris across the roadway.  Thank goodness things were much quieter up by the lake when we got back to the motorhome.

 

Nice exciting first day of fall in Utah…