September 21, 2010 (Tue) Dalles, OR to Mountain Home, ID (361/5949 miles) 60/84° - We were up at 6:00 and ate breakfast but we waited around until the sun was up enough to light the bluff to our West. The rock and earth formations were worth waiting for a good picture. Once under way we proceeded east on the Lewis and Clark Trail (I-84) through the Columbia River Gorge. Beautiful! The windmills must be producing plenty of power, there are enough of them. The trains along both sides of the gorge are long and plentiful. Much commerce being moved!
Once out of the gorge, we stopped at a "Space Age" truck stop to readjust our itinerary - we wanted to go further south than we were going. While Mark fired up the computer, a horse trailer pulled up next to us. It was loaded with black and white cows! One of them stared at Joy, and she at it, eyeball to eyeball for longer than she would have wished. (Do you wish for that kind of thing?)
Our drive alternated between mountains and plains, all very scenic though in different ways. At 12:31 we passed over the 45th parallel - the half way point between Equator and North Pole. There was no dotted line that we could see. We are now on Mountain Time which through us off schedule a bit - it's later than our bodies tell us it is.
The young lady in the Walmart Customer Service department said that we were only allowed to stay 3 nights in their parking lot. That seemed fine with us. Nothing to see from here anyway.
Q067422 Camp Walmart Mountain Home, ID
September 22, 2010 (Wed) Mountain Home, ID to Great Basin NP, NV (412/6361 miles) 50/70° - Well here we are perched 8000 feet up on the side of a mountain in a stand of trees (Aspen) rare in these parts. Q is tired, as we all are, and his butt is covered with a thick layer of road dust from the three mile washboard dusty gravel road to the campground.
Today started out normally, if waking up in Walmart parking lot can be considered normal. It was very quiet there and dimly lit, good for sleeping. Up before dawn and back onto I-84 at 7:30. At 9:00 we turned onto US93 south and headed for Nevada. US50 in Nevada has been named "The Loneliest Road" but US93 must be a close second - mile upon mile of nothing, no trees, no hills, no wildlife or livestock, no buildings and no traffic. If we passed more than one car every five miles, we were in a traffic jam. There was only sage brush, sand, puffy clouds in a blue sky, and the highway lined with miles and miles of clumps of yellow flowers called rabbitbrush. Luckily we stopped for gas in Wells because as we left town and got back on US93 there was a sign saying "No gas for the next 78 miles"! Then there was another 50 some miles to the next station - a lot like Alaska but less scenic.
The fellow at the Lehman Falls Visitors Center (in the Great Basin National Park) said "You're 24 feet long. No problem, You can get into any site in any of the campgrounds." Mark asked again are there any sites available?" "No problem. You can get into any of the sites." That non-answer should have sent up a flag for us but it didn't. He was wrong on both counts. Lower Lehman Creek was full - mostly class A motor homes and fifth wheels (how they fit into those small spaces is a mystery). Upper Lehman Creek campground, with access roads that would have been a challenge to 4 wheel drive ATVs, had two "available" sites, neither anywhere near flat. One had a hump so big Q would have bottomed out - if he could have gotten into the site at all. The other had possibilities even though it was about as big as Q's footprint (i.e. 24'x8') We tried but our rear step hit the severe steep slope into it. The next campground up the road is Wheeler peak - only vehicles of 24' and less are allowed up there - but it was 12 miles further on and at over 10,000 altitude! Our information was that the water had been shut off because it tends to freeze up there this time of year. We resisted the temptation to go there.
Baker Creek campground is at the end of another spur, a three mile long gravel road. We took the first empty site we came to even though it was far from ideal. Q is low in his dusty rump and lists to starboard a bit but we're calling it home for tonight. Sleeping with our heads low will be an adventure.
From the Great Basin brochure:
Q067834 Baker Creek CG, Great Basin National Park. #6 dry $6 C
September 23, 2010 (Thu) Great Basin NP to Bryce Canyon NP (UT) (201/6562 miles) 48/75° - We experienced the Great Basin described above in living detail both yesterday and today. After coming down off the mountain we stopped in Baker for gas at the only act in town. At $3.25 a gallon, we limited Q's intake to 10 gallons. We probably could have made the next 75 miles of nothing but didn't want to take the chance. Then it was across a wide flat plain, over a mountain pass, across a wide flat plain, over a mountain, etc. at least four times. The road was dead straight most of the time. As we came over the pass we could see it all the way to the top of the next pass, maybe 20 miles away. What a fantastic drive!
The campgrounds in Bryce Canyon National Park are first-come-first-served, meaning no reservations are accepted. We got here at about 2:00 and found one campground full and the other almost full. We should have started out earlier! Even so we have a good site and will stay for a few days.
September 24, 2010 (Fri) Bryce Canyon NP (2) 30/69° - It got cold last night! 31°. By the time we had eaten our breakfast and were ready to explore the canyon it had dropped to 30°. Then as we drove out to Rainbow Point, the end of the 18 mile rim road and 1000 ft+ higher, it had dropped even further to 27°. But the temperature was soon forgotten as we walked out onto the viewing platform. What a spectacular view. It was beyond awesome! Think Grand Canyon without the steroids but with spires and rock formations more imaginary than can be imagined. After 4 hours we had hundreds of pictures and very weary legs from hiking the trails. (the 9000 foot altitude thin air was slow to feed aging muscles use to sea level exercise.)
Q068035 Sunset Campground, Bryce Canyon National Park #239 dry $7.50 A
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