Five Minutes Too Late

Thursday, November 8, 2012

On the road by 7 am and expecting a fairly long travel day, we made it even longer.

Our overnight at the rest area midway through Wyoming on I 80 was just what you would expect with quite a lot of traffic noise. We hit the road for a couple of hours before stopping for breakfast at Denny’s, and fuel for the trucks.

  There are not a lot of scenic wonders to enjoy along the way, so audio books keep the boredom down. About 220 miles down the road, we entered Utah, and a few miles later stopped at the Echo Canyon Information Center and rest area. The attendant there was a very nice little older lady who was happy to help us with stamps for our books. First the date had to be changed, and she fiddled with one while Fred changed another. When the one she was working on was ready, she gave it a trial stamp and found it was November 80. Try again. Now it should be correct, and the trial stamp revealed it was November 9. Okay, next time she did get it right. But like I said, she was very nice to talk with.

At this point we decided to just keep driving and get home today, saving the stamps at City of Rocks for another day. We could be home by 9 pm.

Another stretch at a rest area and we’re still tossing around the idea of going to City of Rocks, spend the night at the campground, and get on home Friday morning. Yep, we turned off I 84 towards Malta. It was 37 miles, not 60 mph road conditions, and a few minutes to 4. The VC closes at 4:30. Oh well, we’ll spend the night and get our stamps in the morning.

At 4:35 we arrive at the closed VC. One car is just leaving, and a young couple is searching the outside of the building for a water faucet to fill their bottles. City of Rocks is a very popular rock climbing area that we have previously visited – before starting our stamp collections!

Barney went to check, but it really was closed. He was talking to the young couple searching for water when the door opened and the ranger allowed them to get water and us to get our stamps! It was so nice of him. We mentioned we were going to the campground, and he said there would be several inches of snow in the area before morning, and since the campground is a little higher, maybe a little more there.

Another conference and we high tailed it out of the area before the snow could hit. Back on I 84, we trekked on home, still arriving about 9 pm, glad to be out of the weather!  (And by Friday morning we were hearing it was still snowing there, and travel hazardous, and in fact, Boise was also getting snow flurries – so thankful we came on home.)

The rock pads will be put away now awaiting our next journey. Thanks for travelling along.