Advertisement
Harley vs. Bird
Harley wins, here's the aftermath. The last big day on the road was a good one with beautiful weather and clear skies. We left Craig this morning early and got some good miles behind us before getting to Dinosaur National Monument, which would be our last national park for the trip. Unfortunately we ran into some bad GPS directions and thought we would miss it for the day because the GPS kept trying to take us down dirt and gravel roads. So we pushed on and made our way to Dinosaur, CO where we stopped at the park information center and learned that the main area of the park is actually on the western side of the park in Utah.
At a gas stop along the way, I chatted with a guy riding from Grand Rapids, MI to northern California on an older Yamaha Razz. This was really impressive because the Yamaha Razz is a 50cc scooter, and he had it loaded up with his camping gear and was wearing all of his rain gear. We talked for a few minutes, and he hit the road. A few miles down the road, I passed him as he rode the shoulder at about 30mph. It's really
impressive to think he's riding across so much of the country on such a small, old bike.
Also on the way to Dinosaur, we had our first road causualty. It was between a bird and a Harley riding at 70mph, and the Harley prevailed. The bird was in the road and took off a bit too late, and couldn't get out of the way. It hit the windshield with a thud (thankfully I added a windshield just for this trip!) and tumbled off to the side of the road. Maybe in another 65 million years, fossil hunters will be searching the area and find the bird. Harley: 1, Bird: 0.
We made it into Utah and got to the western entrance to Dinosaur National Monument, and it was a really cool park. You have to take a shuttle for 1/4 mile to the quarry, and then you enter the building to see the dinosaur fossils. While I expected this to be a small park with a few fossils here and there, I was completely blown away by what it truly was. In 1909 a single dinosaur fossil was found here, and it was then uncovered that this used
Welcome to Vernal
Home of the big pink sauropod. to be a river area where a lot of dinosaurs died and their bodies collected. The area is called the 'dinosaur logjam' where a lot of the bones piled up and became fossilized. In order to protect the area, they built a building over it to put what's left on display. Some of the most complete and intact fossilized dinosaur bodies ever found were unearthed.
We left Dinosaur and continued west to Salt Lake City. We didn't see too much along the way except for a lot more roadkill. There were a ton of prairie dogs that didn't make it across the road, and we saw a moose that had gotten hit and it was enormous. Our final run-in with local wildlife was after dinner on the ride back to the hotel in Salt Lake City. As we came to an intersection where we had the green light. I was in the right lane, and there was a car slightly ahead of me in the left. That car slowed down quickly at the intersection even though we had the green, and as I came up alongside, I realized a woman was crossing the street in front of us with
Dinosaur National Monument
After avoiding some dirt roads, we made it! traffic. I had to slam on the brakes, lock-up the rear tire, lay on the horn, and come screeching up to her and almost hitting her as she looked at me obliviously, and then hurried across the street in front of me. Luckily I kept the shiny side up and avoided hitting her, and we made it back to the hotel.
The dinner we had was excellent. We found another Diner, Drive In and Dive location near the hotel called the Blue Plate Diner. They specialize in breakfast, and we decided that since we've been having breakfasts at the hotel, having a good breakfast for dinner would be nice. Dad had the benedict omelet, which had peppered bacon, cheese and hollandaise sauce, and it was an enormous omelet. I had the huevos rancheros which was also enormous.
We finished the evening with a swim in the pool and a soak in the hot tub. It was a great end to our last long day on the bikes. Tomorrow we'll tour around Salt Lake City, find the shipping depot where we'll drop the bikes on Friday, and reserve a rental car for Friday so that we'll be all set
for the final day and the trip to the airport on Saturday. Luckily with an easy sightseeing day tomorrow, we're getting to bed and sleeping in for the morning.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.045s; Tpl: 0.013s; cc: 10; qc: 25; dbt: 0.0228s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1mb