(Sorry it’s been two days since I posted anything significant, it was a cross between “Aaaah! busybusybusy!” and “I am so tired I can’t move.” Let’s catch up, starting Friday.)
This morning we woke up in the Stepford Wives B&B with no real hurry to the day. We slowly cleaned things up. I straightened up the interior of the 4Runner and took a few more photos for the Craigslist ad.
Then Merlin, the host, came around to water the flowers and do some straightening up of the property. Given his presence, we accelerated our exit a bit, and shuffled off to the one restaurant in town, the Grub Box Drive-In, a bona fide old fashioned Pepsi store.
The afternoon drive to Salt Lake was pretty, but all highway, as we slowly transitioned from a tiny rural town, through steadily more concentrated areas with larger roadways until we rode over our final mountain pass and landed on the I-15 in the heart of Salt Lake City’s rush hour. The call to u-turn ourselves back to last week was strong, but we continued through and drove all the way out to Antelope Island, the state park on the island in the Great Salt Lake, our honorary finish line.
Last time we did this, the “end point” was Olympic National Park, the day before we went to Seattle. This year, it’s clear that our crowning “we did it and it is so pretty and we didn’t die in the process” overlook was the Grand Canyon, in the middle of the trip. But despite not being high on the mountains, Antelope Island was pretty, and there was quite a sense of accomplishment of having gotten this far.
I’ve had people ask me why we didn’t just rent a car for this. And in truth, while last trip was made by the cars as participants, the drive itself was rental-contract compatible. But one simply cannot go the places we were able to go in rented vehicles. But these three, bought for a relative pittance fifteen hundred miles behind us, each in questionable condition for the challenges that lay before them, carried us with determination, and then all three carried us back to civilization.
We stopped for our last round of family photos and snacks at the marina, then drove over to the historic ranch on the island to poke around a bit before heading back into Salt Lake City to the final AirBnB. After a fantastic dinner and margarita toast at the Red Iguana II, we called it a night. Tomorrow will be a busy day.