Wide Open Spaces

Another long day of driving. Woo, this country is big--my jaw spent the day dropped onto my chest as I traversed parts of the nation I've never seen from the ground. //And those deer I saw yesterday? Not. They were antelope. I thought they'd looked like strange deer, too chubby, and out in the open during the day, which isn't deer behavior. Anyway the frolicking flock bounded off away from the highway, obviously on their way to a play date with the deer. //Today's drive started about 7:30 in Rawlins, Wyoming. Shortly west of there, the landscape opens wide. It's called the Great Divide Basin, and lies up there about 7,000 feet above sea level. And it is about 100 miles in diameter. At 80 miles per hour, that's more than an hour to cross it. In the distance clouds and mist obscured the mountains, but I was puzzled by the many dark clouds. Not thunderheads, they were just long blobby things. As I approached the Bridger Power Plant, I was thunderstruck by the size of the smoke stack--and by the clouds of coal smoke it was belching into the sky. What I'd seen from the distance of close to 100 miles were the burps from that stack. With all the wind that Wyoming has, I wonder why (rhetorcially) there aren't more windfarms than there are. //The road twists and turns quite spectacularly around Rock Springs and Green River, goes back up onto a plateau, past an enormous wind farm (I only saw two in southern Wyoming) and on into Evanston. That town sits at 6,748 feet above sea level. From there it is about 80 miles to Salt Lake City, which sits at 4,266 feet above sea level. You do the math! //I-80 slaloms down down down from Evanston to about Park City, then climbs up up up to go through the Wasatch, then chutes down to northern Utah's floor, where it clots up with traffic. After 2-1/2 days without city traffic, this was not a welcome noontime...so I got off the road and had some lunch. //What happens then is revealed in the signs admonishing "drowsy drivers" to perk up or pull over and sleep. The road speeds west past the lake, out onto flat, flat, flat...er...flats. Salt flats. Aka the Great Salt Lake Desert, home to the DugwayProving Grounds and the Bonneville Speedway. Not a tree in sight; the tallest things are the fenceposts alongside the road. And the road is straight. For 50 miles at least, probably more. I wish I could say parts of it were pretty, but it's flat, the water--where it hasn't evaporated--is green. In the distance you can see mountains; in the rear-view mirror you can see mountains. But from the north to the south, all you can see is flat. //Eventually you reach Wendover, climb into Nevada (more rapidly than you climb into Wyoming from Nebraska), and gain another hour. Take that Daylight Savings Time! Again, I wish I could say it was pretty. The road is up to 6,900+ feet again, and everything you see east of Elko is the same shade of dry, dusty tan. Lots of rocks. I think Nevada wins on rocks, but it has to yield to Wyoming's wind. And mountain ranges, all running north-south, which means you chug up 'em and schuss down the other side. If Lewis and Clark had seen eastern Nevada, I think they'd have thrown up their hands and said, "If Tom wants it that badly, he can come claim it." //At Elko, the Humboldt River shows up, and you rub your eyes because there, on the hillsides, look! It's green! Vegetation follows the river, and even this early in Spring, there are signs that the desert is greening up. But lest the driver be dazzled by these glimpses of incipient seasonal change, the highway promptly twists and turns along the river canyon (Trucks Use Left Lane direct the signs--probably to avoid the fallen rocks at the side of the road), slams into a tunnel, bursts out at the other end...into the same dry, dusty tan back before the river came on the scene. //But to be truthful, not that I was exaggerating at all, but honestly now.... I am in complete awe as I drive. I have long known that these united states are many, collectively large, and shelter an unimaginable diversity of climate, flora, and fauna. And altitudes. And attitudes. On road trips northwest through the Dakotas and across Saskatchewan and Alberta, I'm continually impressed with the expanse of the Plains. But to drive where I've never been--even on an Interstate--is to be exposed to exactly what comprises those myriad differences. Whether these lands were wrested or ceded, they are magnificent. Wind erodes more than water, elevation and rainfall determine what vegetation will grow. We from the East, where water is plentiful, forget that. //So tomorrow I'll get to Carmel and see the Pacific Ocean. From 8,000 feet to sea level; from alfalfa to avocado! For the moment, I'll take my musing over to the comfy chair, read a while, and then go to bed. It's been an amazing day.