From NV to UT

It was 10 am by the time I left Lake Tahoe. I couldn't sleep last night so it took me a while to wake up at 8 am. I showered, finished packing, loaded up the car and checked out. I didn't have to go all the way to the main tower. Sandy, the desk manager in my building, was on duty at the gate, so I just left my Express Checkout card with her.

The drive has been mostly hot. In fact, I have driven through desert from the time I hit Highway 329 after coming down the mountain, all the way to Salt Lake City. However, it's still high altitude (close to the 6000 level) so I kept seeing signs for snow chain installation areas.

I had a quick lunch at a McDonalds in Lovelock, NV, and took a quick stop at a rest area about 80 miles from Salt Lake City. Besides that and putting on gas, I pretty much drove straight through. Thankfully, I was wide awake and the highway was very easy to drive. It's mostly straight and, when it does go over a mountain, the grade is very gradual. There were only a couple of hills where I turned off my cruise control to keep the accelerator from gunning up the hill just to maintain the speed.

There was a brush fire on a mountain just after Elko, NV. I saw the plume of smoke at least 20 miles earlier in Carlin. I was going to wait until I got to Elko before filling up gas, but I figured the fire might require traffic to take a detour, so I filled up in Carlin instead.


The brush fire at Elko, NV. more pics

It turned out to be just a relatively small brush fire. You could see the black spot on the mountaintop with smoke coming out of it. There were small planes flying through the clouds, presumably trying to put out the fire. I didn't see them drop anything (well, I have to pay attention to the road, you know), but the smoke diminished soon after a pass. From the west, it looked like it was almost put out, but as I looked back after passing it, there was still fire visible on the eastern side of the mountain. A little further, I went under the cloud of smoke blown by the wind and the sun got an eerie yellow-orange color. It was like driving into the Twilight Zone, or some sci-fi fantasy movie.

By the way, I encountered three separate prison areas driving across Nevada. You could tell because there are numerous signs saying, "Prison area / Hitchhiking prohibited". So, even if you have smoke coming out from under your hood, you might wanna keep going for a few miles or so.

At 5 pm, I went over a ridge where I saw the signs signalling the start of Mountain Time Zone and the Utah border. As I went over the ridge, I saw the valley where the town of Wendover is, and, beyond the town, lay fields covered with a thin layer of snow. Snow?!? Then I thought it must be a mirage. After all, the temperatures are in the 90s! Well, it wasn't a mirage. The ground really was white. Like white sand in some places, like snow in other places. Then I thought it must be the salt. Maybe, the saltiness wasn't confined to the lake. Maybe the ground itself was salty. Well, I later studied the AAA TripTik map, which says it's the Great Salt Lake Desert, which probably used to be part of the Salt Lake before it shrank. It was several miles long -- at least ten.

I wonder if the grocery stores even bother to stock Morton Salt, since anyone could just stop at the side of the road and scoop up some....

When the actual lake came into view, it was actually nice. And it's blue. (I was expecting it to be white for some reason.) The sun was setting and I was tempted to stop at the marina (they have a marina!) to take pictures. The mountains in the east are turning a red then purple as the sun got lower. But I was worried about checking in before dark, so I didn't stop.


A quick peek at the Great Salt Lake. more pics

I got to Salt Lake City and onto the right street, but I couldn't find the Springhill Suites Hotel for the life of me. At the intersection where it was supposed to be, three corners were malls and one corner was an apartment complex. I called the hotel number and couldn't get a person. The message said that it was the Springhill Apartments and gave options for future tenants, current tenants, and emergency maintenance. I called Expedia and a very helpful Barry said it might be the apartments since the pictures online looked like apartments. He tried to call them too, as I went into the manager's office of the apartment complex to ask for the hotel. Well, it turned out that Springhill Suites is the same as the Springhill Apartments. They rent out some of the units, fully furnished.

I got into the unit and it's a good-sized unit but it doesn't feel safe. It's on the first floor. The front door has a deadbolt but the knob has no lock. The patio door doesn't seem very secure. The bedroom door has no lock. So, I pulled in one of the wrought-iron chairs from the dining room and propped it against the bedroom door.

I'm exhausted but I woke up at 3 am because of a sound in the plumbing system that startled me.

I think I'll switch hotels. I don't feel safe here.


PS: At one point, I saw a sign about a piece of the highway owned by the employees of Cargill Salt. Cargill? Aren't they a Minnesota company? And aren't they in biotech or something?
PPS: Apparently, they're worldwide. And they do dabble in salt.