After a restless night's sleep in Cannonville, we woke before 7am, got some coffee from the minimal breakfast offerings at our motel and hit the road.
Highway 12 was a spectacular ride. Smooth pavement, almost nonexistent traffic, and incredible vistas. Kitty and I marveled at how beautiful the scenery was. I hope that the GoPro footage comes out OK when we get home since I can't preview or edit it here. There were a few spots where you're riding along right on the crest of the mountain and it drops off to either side. The scenery reminded me of Tioga pass somewhat, but without the confinement of the Sierra Nevada - the expanse of the terrain was huge here.
After that amazing ride, we rolled into the remote town of Boulder (Utah) and checked out Hell's Backbone Grill for breakfast. Holy hell, they make some fantastic food. Everything on both of our plates was delicious and was absolutely the best meal of the trip (thus far). I had the hungry haymaker and Kitty enjoyed the super spicy chile migas. Highly recommend dining here if you are in the area.
After our delicious meal, we continued north and climbed into the mountains. I was quite surprised that the trees weren't the usual conifers, but appeared to be birch. Kitty corrected me that they were aspen, which I had never seen before. I feel like I keep repeating myself here, but the scenery was fantastic. Much to our delight, the road wound through the forest like a roller-coaster. Ever since departing from our breakfast stop, we had noticed some dark clouds on the horizon. While descending the mountain and its aspen forest, those clouds made good on their threat. Kitty and I pulled over to close all of the vents on our jackets and helmets just in time before the rain hit. It felt like a microburst, though not as violent as the one that hit Santa Barbara a while back. The rain fell hard and we were buffeted by strong blasts of wind but our jackets kept us dry.
We got a brief reprieve from the rain as we started to head east on 24 into Capitol Reef National Park. Utah's famous red sandstone was on full display here, making us feel like we'd been transported to Mars. Stopping briefly for some photos, the rain caught up with us again and we headed out. I'm pretty sure it doesn't rain on Mars, but that's what was happening here. When it finally stopped, the Martian landscape was becoming lunar landscape with red becoming gray. This lasted until we reached Hanksville for our fuel stop.
The heat had come back at this point with my dash reading 85F; at least our jacket shells were drying off. Hanksville to I-70 was what I expected much of Utah to look like: a slightly better version of Nevada. Zion, Bryce, Grand Staircase and Capitol Reef had recalibrated my expectations.
Once on I-70, I dropped the hammer to try to get us to grand junction quickly. Surrounded by grasslands, we could see the Rockies beckoning us in the distance. After what seemed like several hours, we finally crossed into Colorado, hit the 1,000 mile mark for our trip and arrived in Grand Junction. Now to rest and refuel before our ride to Denver tomorrow.
No comments:
Post a Comment