I love the geology of Utah. Look at those layers, and the thousands of years so clearly visible. We are just into Utah here. The red rock that I so love to see is coming.
Nature can make pyramids too, it seems.
Pinnacles of red rock as we start climbing a mountain pass, heading into Ogden, Utah.
Another pinnacle. Too bad there wasn't something in the photo, like a car or a house to give perspective on how big these really are.
As we continued to climb, there were many of these canyons cut through the rock. I love this one, especially with that thunderhead beginning to grow in the background.
This is a rest stop about midway down the mountain pass. I climbed a viewing hill to take this photo of where we'd just been. I don't know why the photo seems so dark. The sun kept going behind clouds, so maybe it screwed up my camera's light meter. Oh well. Click on the photo and view it larger; it might look better.
This is looking in the other direction; where we were headed after the rest stop.
Just to give some perspective on how far up I was: Way down there, by that white car, are the tiny little figures of Alan and Ozzy.
And with my handy-dandy telephoto, here they are. That fireplug is a dead giveaway that area is for the dogs.
Across the highway from the rest stop were these Scottish Highland mountains. I swear I saw these same ones in Glen Coe. Alan agreed.
Lovely, delicate wildflowers growing beside the highway.
We're out of the mountains and headed for Ogden. These are the Uintas Mountains. On the other side: Ogden and Salt Lake City. It was a long, though very beautiful drive with the mountains running on one side...
...and Mt Ogden growing bigger and bigger in front of us. The highway goes between these two photos. Such a great day. It beats corn any day of the week.
Ozzy has this routine he goes through every single time we get to a new hotel. He leaps on the bed and does these wild gyrations. I'm not sure if he's just happy to get out of the car, or thrilled to have a nice big bed to roll around on. Maybe both. Whatever. He does this every time.
Then he stands up and looks at me like, "What..?"
We got through Utah, after stopping in Ogden for a much-needed Starbucks break, but after crossing into Idaho, the thunderstorms predicted for the area hit with a vengeance. We were driving across the Snake River Plains with lightning flashing all around us, and hailstones that had us worried about the windshield and the finish on the car. It was pretty exciting (not) for a few minutes there with the hail slamming into the car like bullets, but we reached Twin Falls unscathed.
Our hotel is about half a block from the rim of the Snake River Canyon, in a lovely, quiet area of Twin Falls. Ozzy is in seventh heaven with all the grass and exotic smells and long walks.
This is the Perrine Bridge, which crosses the canyon. We drove over it to our hotel. It's an amazing construction.
This is a view down the canyon, though I have to say the photo doesn't do it justice. It is 500 feet deep and very beautiful. The area to the left is a golf course.
And that finishes today's tour of Utah and Idaho. Tomorrow we finish driving through Idaho and part of eastern Oregon where we will stop at Pendleton, Oregon for our last night. The journey is nearly over. Friday we will have a short drive (215 miles) to Vancouver and our 3,200 mile adventure across America will be over. Course, that's just the end of Part One, as we will next be buying a car before driving down to Roseburg, Oregon to see if that will actually be our new home, then it's another drive further south to visit my mother in Grants Pass. I guess that means the travel blog will continue on...and on...and on...
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