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Yesterday was a long day, not helped by the fact that we had not realised that our detination was in a different time zone. In fact we were travelling through Utah blissfully unaware that we were an hour out. We are now 7 hours behind UK time, called Mountain time. California & Nevada were Pacific time.
We drove for some time yesterday, following Susie's directions & thought we must be in Utah by now even though we had not seen any signs to confirm this. Imagine our surprise when we saw that we were now entering Arizona! We had still been in Nevada all along. We just cut through the North-Eastern corner of Arizona & then were in Utah. At first the scenery was arid rocks, rust coloured due to the iron content & very similar to Arizona & Nevada. Gradually the landscape changed & became lush farmland, with many cattle grazing. Most of the time we were on Interstate 15 (I15) & this was a high speed 4 lane highway (two in each direction). The speed limit was 80 mph most of the time although sometimes it would drop to 75 or 70, rather confusing. In California & Nevada, when the limit was say 70 mph, ttrucks & trailers were limited to 55. Not in Utah, they were doing 80 or so as well as everyone else. It seems that pretty well everyone here drives at the limit, whatever that is. Some people, quite a lot in fact, were towing big boats, all doing 80, but they seemed to have very stable trailers & big pick-up trucks to pull them. We did see many more Police in Utah than we have seen elsewhere.
Whilst the farmland looked very green & productive, all around were high mountains & as we travelled further North we could see snow on the peaks. Winter has really been hanging on here. Most of the time we were travelling on relatively flat land in the middle of a valley with the high mountains to either side, although miles away. We have seen so many of these huge landscapes in the last few days that they are now becoming old hat. At times, though, the Interstate was cut through the mountains with very impressive engineering. Generally thee roads here are in very good condition, ecpecially so given the severe winter weather.
Eventually we arrived at our overnight destination, Evanston in Wyoming. Here we were able to confirm our suspicion that the time had changed as Susie had been giving us an arrival time that was an hour out. Obviously she knows the time zones too. It was too late to update the blog last night so two day's worth here now.
Mileage yesterday 478. Total (this car) 1531. Total 2062.
Today we moved further North & are now at Driggs, a small town in Idaho. Susie took us on small country roads, still in very good condition & quite wide over seemingly flat land. Quite soon we moved back into Utah & then into Wyoming again. Then we moved into Idaho & back into Wyoming, eventually setling in Idaho. We did gradually climb to over 7,000 feet though we never felt we were really climbing.
Leaving Evanston was a good example of the poor side of the US, with people living in mobile homes, trailers & in some cases what can only be described as shacks. Many of them were surrounded with junk, it seems that when something stops working they just keave it where it is, so old cars etc were an eyesore. There seemed to be no planning or "Zoning laws" so people just put there accomodation anywhere they choose. It did look a real mess. Other towns we passed through did have signs to say they had Zoning laws & were much tidier.
Further North we were in real farming country & we actually saw two real cowboys, as well as Pronghorn Antelope. Also much in evidence were the huge watering machines, although judging by the amount of water we saw lying in fields they won't be needing them anytime soon. I'm intrigued by these machines, some are on large wheels & rotate around a fixed point at one end. Others have what look like very heavy duty oversize bicycle wheels every 20 feet or so & look like they move in a straight line.
We stopped for lunch at a Burger King & a couple of (American) Indians came in too, very distinctive features. We were trying to imagine what the country would have been like when only they were here, before the huge fields were enclosed with barbed wire & it was just prairie with bison (buffalo) grazing.
Tomorrow we are moving into Yellowstone & staying for two nights.
Mileage today 213. Total (this car) 1745. Total 2276.
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