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Published: September 21st 2009
Wednesday, we drove just out of Salt Lake City to the Salt Lake. We were planning on going for a swim in it as it has 16% salt in it as apposed to the sea that has 3%. So we got our togs on and trundled off down to the beach. Pooh !!, It stinks, I’m not swimming in that they said !! Yes it wasn’t the nicest smelling place in the world, so we just wading in up to our ankles. Its spose to have small Shrimp in there somewhere but we didn’t see any. They are the only fish that can handle the high salt content. After we washed ourselves off we hit the road again. Across the road from the Marina we stopped at is a copper mine plant, Its huge. Second largest copper mine behind one in Argentina. They process 8,000 tonnes of ore a day. He didn’t say how much copper they get out of that thou. It must be a very big hole in the ground somewhere.Around the lake , they have a couple of sites producing salt, they have these small ponds 100m x 100m , they fill them with the water from the
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Wendover Will.lake then let them dry out , scrapping up the salt left behind, then process ing it into huge mounds. Two hours west of Salt Lake City is the big smoke of Wendover famous for not much. The lady in the visitor center was having trouble telling us things to do with a family in Wendover. Its right on the Nevada border, Wendover west is in Nevada. So yes they are allowed to gamble , so the west side of the town is all casino etc. Found our KOA, set up the trailer and headed 5 miles east of town to Bonneville !!! Not much was happening out there as during the weekend they had had a lot of rain, very unusual for this place. Of its 49 years of going its only been cancelled once due to the weather. So they were a day behind basically. We watched them scruiteneering some of the cars and that was about all they were going to do today. So we had a very nice quiet night in Wendover.
Thursday, Josh and I went and played mini golf at the campground. That was a laugh to see Josh nearly jump out of his
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Bonneville. skin when he reached in the hole to grab his ball and a salamanda came running out !!! they are these little lizard things they have in all the hot places of America. After lunch we headed out onto the Salt flats, $20 for adults for the week and kids free to the World of speed, Speedweek was last month. Just at the end of the road we had to drive thru a big puddle about 100m long and about 100mm deep of pure salt, Well you can imagine the state of the car by the time everyone got to the other side. My poor Dodge !!. During the winter with all the snow and rain, the salt flats fill up. When they all dry up in summer it leaves a perfectly flat layer of salt. We drove out onto the salt, The start line was filled with cars lining up to go for their run. There are cones along the track up to the 3 mile marker. The track is officially 8 miles long, but a guy I was talking to said its actually 15 miles long, they only prepare and use 8 miles of it. We parked up
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Looking down the spectators. along the cones, got out our tarpoline as the reflection off the salt is just like being on the snow. Pulled out our deck chairs, MAN it was hot !! , so we retreated to the rear of the Dodge with the seats put down. Not quite enough room for four of us. On the AM station , you get coverage of the course starter talking to the announcer and the guys down the track. They announce who the next person is, their number, what they are on / driving, What class they are in and the record they are trying to beat. The starter gives them the all go and some start by themselves, some have to be push started as they are so highly geared. They build up speed , some still changing into high gear at the 1 mile mark. Down the track they barrell. We get their time and speed at each mile marker. Somewhere around the 3 mile marker they run thru the official 1 mile section, from which their record is done from. Every car or bike is going for their own record, so some bikes are lucky to go 120 MPH, some cars
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One of the cars. were doing 230 MPH. Theres no order, just whoever is next in line. Josh and I went for a walk around the pits. You definitely need your hat and sunglasses. The difference in the teams is a dag. From the wealthy ones with the big rigs and all the gears, parked next to the guys with an old pick-up truck with a trailer on the back with a tarp out like ours working on their car. Tool box and tools spread all over the trailer. But here it doesn’t really matter because everyone has their own record to beat. The guys are really friendly and happy to talk to anyone whose interested, they borrow gear off each other and are quite happy to help other competitors. The track was still abit wet for the big boys. There was a car there that did 350 MPH last month at speedweek and was trying to better that, but they weren’t going to go out until tomorrow at least. Got back to the car and watched a few more runs until the radio stopped. Bugger , so I went to see why and YES, with the doors open and the radio on we
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Guys working on their car. had flattened the battery !! Ameteurs aye !! So I bowled down to one of the trailers and asked them for some jumper leads, No worries. Then I asked the guy next to me for a hand , No worries, he happened to be a mechanic as well. So after a few goes we got the old beast going again. Sat there for a little while before we thought we should take the car for a run maybe to charge the battery up. So we headed thru the pond on the way out again. There were acouple of guys with a water tank on a trailer and charging $10 bucks to water blast your car, so yes we lined up. Good on them I thought. We cant get internet in our trailer, so the lady in the office said bring your laptop over there and use it in there. Yeh that’s easier said than done, we looked a right sight coming in with our laptop and monitor and a bunch of leads and setting up on the bench by the coffee machine. Hey, whatever works !! LOL. Just as it was going dark , we jumped in the car to
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One of the 'dressed' motorbikes. go and see one of the highlights of Wendover, from the lady at the visitors center said. We drove up on top of the hill over looking the town, turned around by the town water tower and looked back. As the cars come along I 80 across the dead flat salt flats, you can use their lights to see the curvature of the earth, HEY that’s great !! Well after all that excitement we headed back to camp. On the way back from an early shower to get all the sun tan lotion off, I said Hi to some people sitting out in front of their camper, well about an hour later, when I got away from them ( or they got sick of listening to me !!) I got back to our trailer, they were all in bed and asleep, oopps.
Friday we got up early and had breakfast at McD’s along with a lot of other people with the same idea before heading out to the flats. This time we stopped at the start line for awhile. A lot of the guys that are serious about breaking records try to get an early start as the colder temperatures
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ready to go at the start line. seem to be better. We watched a couple of records get broken, One guy on a motorbike broke his record he was aiming for and his wife/girlfriend was jumping up and down as she listened to the times come over the radio with us. That was pretty cool. Two guys thanked everyone at the start line and a couple of other guys that must have helped them, as their guy broke a record, they were just stoked !! When you watch a car take off from the start , you hear it wind up, slowly gathering up speed as the revs get higher and higher. As its screaming off into the distance , it just becomes a dot and then you loose it into the water !! The ‘Mirage’ of the dessert is funny to watch. So we drove down past the pits to the furtherest we could go, just down from the 3 mile marker. From there you cant even see the start line, just a bunch of cars together. By the time they got to us though , they were full throttle. What a sight !! A guy with a race truck only got up to 210 MPH
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Cars doing over 200 MPH going down the track. when he was trying for 270. The car that went 350 MPH last month only went 230 as he reckoned the track was still a bit wet. Another of the long fast cars got up over the 250 MPH, that was cool to see !!. I got yakking to the guy next to us and he has his own world record. He went 12,000 miles on a snow mobile in 60 days, I didn’t ask him how his butt was after it !!!! He showed me the magazine article he was in and the Yamaha brochure he was in. He was here to set a world record speed on a snow mobile. He had taken off the sleds and replaced them with wheels, as no one has done it before , he said whatever his speed is , it will be a world record. Until someone else wants to come along and break it. We shot back to the campground as we were spose to be out by 11am, ahh, who cares, had lunch and heading back along the straight drive over the salt flats back to Salt Lake City. Quite a few people have stopped on the side of
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A bike dissappears off into the horizon. the road and made messages in the salt with whatever they have had available. Bottles, stones, sticks, etc have been used to write things from their names to ‘ God bless America’ . Back in SLC we went back to the KOA we stayed in a couple of days ago. They have a wash your own carwash by the entrance so $13 later, I think have got all the salt out of the car, I did underneath, wheel gaurds everwhere. Then I vacuumed it out too. We all went for a swim as its been up around 31 degrees today, jumped in the spa as the kids went in it the other day, nice but too hot at that time of the day. Kids hung out in the TV room for a while getting their dose of Mylie and other crap programmes that they’ve been missing, Poor hard done by kids !!!! Theyv’e worked out how to play basketball on their rip-stiks !! Talented bunch they are. A few people in the camps weve been to have commented on how good they are at getting out on those funny skateboards and playing with each other. That’s what happens when they’ve
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Josh on the luge. got no one else to play with. Most of the time they are good, then they have their spat at each other and go separate ways. It usually doesn’t last for long. Hey we all have our moments and need our little time alone, I think weve done really well so far. September 16 was our half way mark, weve been in the states for 3 ½ months now. Man how time flies when youre having fun, that means in 3 ½ months I have to go back to my normal life and get a Job !! No wonder Kylie likes this no work lifestyle !!!!!!!!!
Saturday, We went a Farmers market downtown. Because the City is very Morman orientated, a lot of the stalls were very arty and crafty stuff. Amazing what they can make, along with the usual fruit and vege stalls. The smell of the different foods being cooked up. Josh bought a cup of pulled pork which he thought was delicious as well as a shaved ice. Kylie bought a Mexican coloured blanket with a waterproof backing on it. That was pretty cool.I bought a frosty from Wendy’s across the road for 99c, that was the
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Tori on her one. bargain for the day. Then we drove out to the Olympic Park again. This time everything was operating. First Tori went on the zip line, like a flying fox but it was a controlled decent, Then Kylie went on the big zip-line.Next Josh, Tori and I went on the luge. Tori and I went on together and Josh came down behind us. It was a stainless steel shute and were on a trolley with a handle in the middle that controls a rubber brake. The trolley just runs on wheels. So off we go with Tori at the controls, shes like her mother and braked at every corner. I said just let it go. She did get a bit daring by the bottom, but it was a cool ride. Then came the moment I’d been waiting for. We drove up to the top of the bobsled ride, Had to watch a video on how to put your helmet on, sign your life away and head out to the line. Theres four in a bobsled, one guy is the driver who works for the park. So theres three of us in the back. While youre in line the guy asks if
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Kylie on her flying fox ride. anyone wants to help push of the next bobsled, OF COURSE. Every start is timed and it shows up on the screen as the bobsled dissappears off around the 1st corner. We watched as everyone had a go at this. I teamed up with a couple in front of me. Being Blokes we said “ We can beat those times” So out we go, most of the start times wee around the 6.1 - 6.4 sec mark. 5.86 was our push off time . That got the heart muscles going, next it was our turn to get in. At the Olympics the bobsled team run along beside the sled and jump in and off they go. On the tour the guy said it takes the tourists about 3 minutes to get in. Now I see why. I was 1st in at the back, they said the person at the back gets thrown around the most !! Right that’s me then !! I sink into the bench seat,long ways, buckle in, lift up my knees and hold the seatbelt for the next guy. He sits in my lap with his arms pushing my legs and then the driver gets in and
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Me heading off down the bobsled run. then the guys wife gets in , in front of him. What a performance. Well our push of time was 6.12, Pussies !!! after a couple of corners , we are speeding up , then into this sweeping left hander. The shaking of the sled is incredible. You can only really see the guy in front of you’se helmet and the wall of the track. The noise is really loud and then the G forces really start to push down on you. No sooner are you coming out of that corner and snap your’e going right. We were half way up the wall, flying at this time. My hands are white from holding onto the handles on the side. The sled just shudders all the way down and is really jerky, you cant stop your head from banging on the sides of the sled. They are padded but you can still feel it. Then over the finish line in 1.00.02 sec, YEH BABY !! fastest time of the day out of 20 runs so far. Josh said he could hear us yelling from up the top.Man you couldn’t help but be pumped up after that ride. We were just buzzing
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Our start of the bobsled ride. and the driver was ‘ oh yeh’ So we hop out, they take our photo next to the sled and then drag it onto a small truck. We all hop on the back of the truck and they take us back up to the top of the hill. The driver said we were pulling about 4G ,force on some of the turns, he has done over 1200 runs in 2 years. No wonder he thinks its just another day at the office !! For me that was definitely the best day of my trip anyway. It cost me $60 to go on that, they said in winter as its so expensive to make the ice and keep it on the track at the right temperature etc it cost $240 to go down on a sled with skates instead of wheels. But I will recommend that ride to anyone who ever comes close to this place. Im so glad we decided to come back here this weekend, we tossed up just heading west from Wendover but we felt we still had things we wanted to do here. After that we walked around and a couple of guys were doing jumps off
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Rank #1 for the day. the Nordic jumps. That’s the big ski jumps where you fly for a few seconds which happens to be about a hundred meters and you land on the hill going down. Well in summer you just land on the carpet type plastic surface. Its really cool to watch. The ski teams were in the pool again today. They were doing the learner slopes too. We did groceries on the way home , so was a bit late to cook tea so went out for a very nice meal at Denny’s. Well at least we can all eat there. Not the flashest place in town but nice. Quote of the day has to be Josh at the Olympic Park. I think this teenage thing or just lack of schooling over the last 3 months has fried his brain abit. “ Do you think it snows up here in Winter !!” Well I don’t think they would hold a winter Olympics here otherwise Josh. LOL.
Sunday morning we caught a shuttle from the campground to the Temple square in Downtown , Salt Lake City.Home of the Tabanacle choir. The dome shaped building built by the Mormans in 1860 seats 14,000 people. The
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Olympic Park. bottom floor was nearly full, we guessed there was about 10,000 people there. They were practising when we got there. There is 360 men and women in the choir aged from 25 to 60 years old. The pipe organ is huge ,it has 11,000 pipes in it ranging from 32 ft to 3/4 of an inch. At 9.30am they went live on TV and Radio to millions of viewers, The show has been running every sunday since 1929. Its called "The spoken word' in case anyone wants to tune in to it. LOL . It actually wasn't that bad. The guy who played the organ was pretty good, it had 5 layers of keyboards plus all the foot pedals he was pushing. Came back packed up headed West my friend . We drove past Bonneville again and onto thru more desert with huge hills. It seems since we hit South Dakota we havent seen any vegetation of sorts. Big mountains and stoney deserts, tussock grass in places and very hardy bushs. I'm sure there must be like 1 person to the acre out here, or maybe to the 100 acre. Theres just no houses for miles until we came across
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A skier at the top of the Nordic jump. a little town then nothing for another hour or so. We stopped about tea time at a little place called Winnemucca, Nevada. Hopefully by this time tomorow we will be able to se the Pacific Ocean.
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Gran &Poppie
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good one Josh.....now here is one of your dads at the same age........It was when we were in New Jersey one summer and it had been so hot, well this day we were racing a horse over at Brandywine, in Maryland, and it was up in th 90s there as well. Paul lent his face against this pipe that was cool, and looked at me and said" Do you think I will ever be cool again"......I know we all feel like that every summer, especially when the hunidity in NJ gets high, but it does snow most winters. sounds as though you guys had a great time on the rides.