Ugh oh in Utah

Our two nights in Wyoming were pretty uneventful except for the really pretty views from the Sweet Water Event Center in Rock Springs, WY.

This place takes no reservations, yet always has had space for us. It’s quite reasonably priced, too. 

We set out for Utah on Saturday morning, expecting to arrive in Logan around 2:00 pm. It was less than four hours away and the weather was beautiful.

We stopped for a brief break around noon and saw across the road there was a family of five pulled over with the hood of their truck up. The truck had overheated, and Bob brought over a small cooler with water from our sink to fill their radiator so they could be on their way. We then continued on and came to a few miles of twists and turns in the road along with steep declines. By the time we got to the bottom we could smell burning rubber. Ugh oh. There was a nice spot to pull off so we stopped and got out to see what was wrong. This was when Bob realized he should have used the engine brake; the brake pads were now smoking. There was a small campground about six miles ahead so, after waiting a while for the brakes to cool down, we continued along and stopped to see if the campground had room for us for the night. Fortunately they did, so after I made a quick call to the campground in Logan to say we would be delayed until tomorrow, we settled in. We were right on Bear Lake in Garden City, Utah, one of the prettiest spots you could imagine, with a lovely view of the lake. I’ve actually had this place on my list of places to visit so it really worked out.

We walked down to the beach and saw this odd-looking tractor towing a flat-bottomed boat out of the water. Water levels are so low that the tractor could just drive out and hitch up the boat!

Bear Lake is currently about 19 miles long and 7 miles wide, and has gotten smaller with lingering drought conditions. At its deepest spot it is over 200 feet deep, but not where we were! 

The next morning we set out again for Logan which was now only 47 miles away. The ride through deep canyons was beautiful and the engine brake was engaged so there were no problems.

Not a relaxing ride, though, after the day before. But we made it! We’ll be in Logan, UT until Wednesday morning and I’m looking forward to visiting some interesting shops.