After a summer of finding places to hide from the heat, the weather has turned! Fall is in the air and snow is on the Utah peaks! We are headed south towards Salt Lake City and found a campground at Crystal Hot Springs. It is now “off season” and the park is virtually empty. Of the 70 odd sites there are only a few other campers. We set up the Wee Rover and head over to soak. Ahhhhh…just what we needed.
The springs have a long history, from Native Americans, to WWII vets returning to recuperate from injuries. Today, the springs draw people from all over the world for the reported healing powers of the water’s high mineral content. Seeing just how ill many of our fellow soakers were reminded us, again, how fortunate we are. We planned on a 1 night pass through, but stayed 3 nights!
Lots of pools of different sizes and temperatures…the waterfall pool was our favorite.
At the Utah border we headed south towards Salt Lake City. We quickly tired of the straight, paved road and found an alternate 70 mile dirt road south towards the shore of the Great Salt Lake. We picked up more dust, saw many Pronghorn Antelope, and acres and acres of farmland carved out of the scrub brush. We are still amazed, while driving through this barren landscape, that people traversed it walking behind covered wagons and ox carts.
The dirt ended at a paved intersection with quite a few cars heading west. The little sign said Promontory. We shrugged our shoulders and joined in. We quickly came to a small National Historic Park visitor center with 2 steam locomotives belching smoke, nose to nose. We pulled out our National Park Pass and ventured inside.
It turns out Promontory was where the Golden Spike was driven to join the Central Pacific Railroad coming from the west and the Union Pacific Railroad coming from the east on May 10th, 1869.
What a great oops!
Miles of gravel road through the sage brush.A bit of occasional heavy traffic.The Great Salt Lake in the distance.The flag shows the final railroad tie and placement of the golden spike (now safely stored at Stanford) which completed the transcontinental railroad officially connecting the east and west coasts for the first time.My little boy checking out the big toys.There is something in the clickety clack of the rails and the sound of the whistle that makes you want to through your bag over your shoulder and hop a ride.
A 30 mile dirt road from Alma, ID took us through the high desert to the Utah border on a section of the old California Trail. We didn’t see a single vehicle, gold miner heading west for fortune or a family with their covered wagon seeking a better life, but we did pick up a new batch of dust and experience the quiet desolation of the high desert these hardy people walked across.
Miles of sage brush in all directions.The Wee Rover was very excited to place her wheels where covered wagon wheels had rolled before.The eerie silence of the high desert. Imagine walking across this hour after hour, day after day…hoping the reports of fresh water and shade ahead were accurate.
Camp Rock was a big milestone on the California Trail here on the Idaho Utah border. Travelers, including the ill fated Donner Party, used axle grease from their ox carts to mark their passage. Weather and Time has erased most. Hopefully, they found the better life they were walking to!
Camp Rock (and the City of Rocks) was a welcome sight after miles of scrub and sage across the high desert.Travelers left their mark here, but time and weather have slowly been erasing them away.Today we would call this graffiti, but really what difference is there? We all want to leave something of ourselves to mark our passage..
A rock climbing place known around the world, a pleasant rest stop for travelers along the California Trail, an area that has its own energy and ethereal beauty. All of this describes the City of Rocks.
Traveling from Oregon to Utah, Darrin looked at the map, found the cool name City of Rocks, and declared we needed to stop there. Five nights later, we finally left.
These pictures do not in any way represent the majestic otherworldly spirit of this place. They are a mere human representation of Mother Nature.
The view from our campsite. 14,000 acres of rock formations creating an ethereal beautyA peak into the formation of Mother EarthThe Ancient Overseer Oye…always the ham…but he’s my hamIt is easy to imagine these rocks were once inside Mother Earth…what stories they could tell if only we knew how to listen.It seems almost sacrilegious of man to dare climb, but how can he not when presented with such a challenge?
Are you brave enough to step off a bridge spanning the 486 foot deep canyon that Evil Knievel attempted to rocket himself across in 1974?
Me? Hell no.
For the individuals that come from all corners of the world to legally base jump off the Perrine Bridge over the Snake River Gorge in Twin Falls, Idaho the answer is Woo hoo! Lets go! And they do. Jumper after jumper strides across the bridge to the middle with their tiny little parachute packs, steps over the railing….and jumps.
Me? I am very content to stand on the canyon rim and take photos.
Perrine Bridge over the Snake River Gorge.Step One: Step over the railing and throw yourself off a perfectly good bridgeStep Two: Reach back and pull your parachute cordStep Three: Pray it opensStep Four: GlideStep Five: EnjoyStep Six: Stick the landingAll in 22 seconds!
I was 14, and like every teen age boy in America, was glued to the TV! Evel Knievel was going to jump the Snake River Canyon in a rocket powered motorcycle! Rocket powered! History has shown Evel Knievel to be a deeply flawed man, like all of us, but during the early 70’s he was an American hero, at a time when America desperately needed heroes. The jump was a bust on that day, and only the earthen ramp can still be seen, but for a period of time many a kid jumped, and crashed, their Stingray bikes on a homemade wooden ramp due to Evel Knievel! (before bike helmets had been invented!)
The ruthless bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1941 created such fear that overnight anyone in America of Japanese descent suddenly became the enemy: neighbors, schoolmates, and local business owners all became possible spies.
Darrin and I often talk about how resilient we have become during this journey due to the constant change of moving from place to place and basically living outdoors in all types of weather, all kinds of environments, at all elevations, and around all types of animals and people. Today, we were once again humbled when we visited the Minidoka Relocation Center just north of Twin Falls, Idaho.
In 1942, months after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, President Roosevelt signed Executive order 9066 which forced over 120,000 west coast persons of Japanese descent into ten prison camps, Minidoka Relocation Center was one of the ten.
Hastily built, Minidoka housed approximately 10,000 individuals of Japanese descent from Alaska, Bainbridge Island, Washington and the west coast of Oregon. Placed in a deserted corner of the Idaho high desert, the tar and green wood structures of the camp gave the incarcerated individuals very little protection from the bitter cold winters and blazing hot summers.
What stuck with Darrin and I as we walked around the remains of Minidoka was the resiliency of the people incarcerated there. The camp had very little privacy, the bare necessities of a civilized life and weather unlike anything they had experienced on the west coast, yet they built a life in the camp. They created activities to relieve the boredom, turned the high desert into farmland for fresh food, and turned the tar covered barrack cubicles into homes.
The historic site said the Japanese had a saying, “Shikata ga nai” which means “it can’t be helped”. I guess in modern slang it would be similar to “shit happens”, so make the best of it and carry on. Once again we have come across people who have more resiliency then I could ever imagine. Sometimes it is really a struggle not to pass judgements on the past. We weren’t there, we didn’t walk in their shoes, but what the hell. How can such awful things happen in a supposedly civilized world.
Guard towers and barberd wire surrounded the camp.Tar paper that absorbed the hot sun, and green wood that shrank as it dried, provided very little privacy and protection from the elements.Sage brush and scrub turned into productive farmland to provide themselves with fresh food.A glimpse into the past that is easy to pass judgement on, except we weren’t there to understand the fear war induces into an otherwise civilized society.
We met Al & Anna last fall. Al has probably passed on by now, and we wanted to remember him.
When we stay in a campground, we like to take a walk around the park after dinner, we were doing so at a park last fall when we passed a site with an older couple. We looked over, they waved, we waved, so we stopped in to say hello. While we were chatting with Anna, I looked over and Al was doing the dishes. That’s what I wanted to remember, Al doing the dishes. I have never seen such a shear look of contentment and happiness, let alone on the fave of someone doing the dishes.
Al told me later that he was doing his bucket list. He wanted to go camping! They had a cheap Kmart tent, an air mattress, blankets, and a little fire for heat and cooking. He was loving it!
A few weeks earlier, Al had taken himself off of dialysis and he wanted to go camping before he got too sick. Anna was sad, but she was 100 percent supportive and put on a happy face as she was slowly losing her lifetime companion.
We talked a lot over the following days before they headed home to their very large extended family. Al is probably gone now, but we got to meet him when he was at peace. I probably will never do the dishes the same again; I can still see his happy face.
Traveling around the west, we noticed that the hay bales come in two sizes…extra large and small. Today, we had the chance to chat with a farmer when we stopped at a small coffee shop. We asked him why there were 2 sizes of hay bales. To our surprise, he told us they were the same hay bales. We were totally confused until he explained that they bale the hay in large bales but then put them through the Balinator to shrink them for winter storage. When it is time to use the hay during the winter months, they just reverse the process, and voila they have the full size bales and all that nice fresh hay for their stock.
Several large bales and one that has already been shrunk for winter storage.
If you believe this story, I have some ocean front property in Arizona I’d like to show you🤣.
