August 18, 2013
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Epic Road Trip, Day 7
My sister and BIL fixed us some breakfast, loaded us up with smackage, and waved us good bye. We stopped for a couple geocaches by their house to "mark the territory" of where we'd been and then put some miles on the car.
But before long we decided to stop for an earthcache at Monument Rock. Mostly cause I didn't know it was a long drive on a dirt road in the wrong direction followed by a long hike to the actual rock. But, once there, of course we were glad we'd stopped.
The kids enjoyed the time to goof off.
And to climb on the rock, of course.
Seriously, I can't keep them off of rocks.
Finally got everyone back into the car and on the road again, but it wasn't long before we had to stop and get a picture of the sign, which made us all laugh.
We drove till one of the wacky roadside attractions in the book sparked some interest and we got off the freeway and followed Jack to a 20' tall dog made of some 90,000 dog tags that blow in the wind.
Quin wanted to take a nap on the dog's tail.
But, we had mountains and snow to see! I don't really think about it much, but I see snow just about every day of the year due to my proximity to large mountains. Having gone a week without seeing any made it kinda shocking when we did, so I had to get a photo. And good thing, too, as they were quickly out of sight and we didn't see any snow again the rest of the trip.
But we did see waterfalls. Stopped here for a cache, surprised there was such a pretty waterfall.
Quin was kinda excited about having found the cache, but he really just wanted a bathroom.
Along the way we got to see a ginormously long tunnel. Or, if you want the Wikipedia version:
The Eisenhower Tunnelis a dual-bore, four-lane vehicular tunnel approximately 50 mi (80 km) west of Denver, Colorado, United States. The tunnel carries Interstate 70 under the Continental Divide in the Rocky Mountains. With a maximum elevation of 11,158 ft (3,401 m) above sea level, it is one of the highest vehicular tunnels in the world. The tunnel is the longest mountain tunnel and highest point on the Interstate Highway system.
1.693 miles of tunnel, and you'd think Unhappy Frog could crack a smile over the sound the horn made in it, but no. Maybe going to see Doc Holliday's grave would, but we'll never know cause I didn't get a picture of him there. I did, however, enjoy visiting it. Even if it was a half mile hike uphill to get to it. And, since no one really knows where he's buried I was really only going to his grave marker with the understanding he was around here somewhere. And I wanted to see what people had left at his marker, apparently it's a regular thing to tribute his memory by leaving money, whiskey, cigarettes, and playing cards.
There was another marker there, the face was falling off like Scrabble tiles or puzzle pieces. Quite sad, but not unexpected. The rest of the grave markers were old and interesting, but then it was time to move on.
Heading down the hill (a $1,000 fine and a year in jail if you throw something off the hillside here) I stopped to photo a dead tree. It might have been here when Doc Holliday was alive, who knows.
After that, we didn't do much stopping because we were all anxious to get to our campsite in Utah. As we drove off the freeway and onto the highway toward Dead Horse Point State Park, we were awed enough to stop and get a few pictures.
We set up our camp just as the sun was setting. This is one of my favorite photos of the entire trip (from a personal perspective, not as a "best photo" one). And this was my favorite stop along the way -- from a scenic perspective, not a comfort or visiting family, in case *someone* reading this gets offended. Looking at this photo makes me long to go back.
After we set up we got some more sunset photos. It was so comfortable here! At home, when the sun goes down you pretty much drag the sweatshirts out, but here it remained warm and I was comfy in my shorts and tank top all night.
I felt like I belonged here.
