Andrea and I just got back from a long (3200 mile) road trip to Denver where we hung out with Andrea’s family and had a really good Thanksgiving dinner. We decided to take a long route to Denver to see some parts of the country we hadn’t seen. We started by cutting up to Lake Tahoe via US 50 across the Sierras. This is a great drive. There was no snow in Tahoe. The only snow we saw was a dusting on the high peaks. South Tahoe and Incline Village were virtual ghost towns. We stopped along the way to take a hike and check out the lake.

After leaving Tahoe, we drove up to Reno, then across to Winnemucca and up US 95 to Jordan Valley, OR where we spent the night in the Sahara Motel there. It was pretty cold when we got there and a really cold crisp morning when we woke up. The hotel is a 50s style hotel complete with a 50s style coffee maker and furniture. It was nice and clean though and the man who ran the place was really nice.

The next stop was Boise. We were there on a Sunday so there wasn’t much going on, but we walked around downtown and went to Ann Morrison Park and let Dusty run around and watch the geese.

The night we stayed in Boise, Dusty got bored and we didn’t really have any toys for him. I threw him an empty Pepsi bottle but he didn’t really act like he cared about it. Then 5 minutes later, he picked it up, brought it up on the bed and started gnawing on it. Crazy dog….

Next stop was Utah. We headed down I-84 then cut up into the mountains north of Salt Lake City. We stopped along the Great Salt Lake just as the sun was going down. It was beautiful.

We drove through the mountains, had dinner in Park City, then drove on to spend the night in Heber City which is only about 20 miles down US 40 from Park City. It’s a really nice town with the tall Wasatch peaks sticking up behind it.

We cruised across northern Utah towards the Colorado border. We crossed a couple passes and eventually got into the more desert part of Utah. We stopped at Dinosaur National Monument for a break. We went to the quarry and saw bones sticking out of the rock. I’d been there when I was a kid and I don’t think it’s really changed since. We also took a hike up a wash and drove down to the Green River. The river there is still full of silt, as rivers should be and it was really cool to see the river flowing before it hit the dams.

We got to Steamboat, CO that night and stayed with our friend Mike Martin there. He’s got a sweet place on the slopes. Wednesday was opening day at Steamboat and lift tickets were only $15 so we threw our stuff together in the morning for a few hours of skiing before continuing onto Denver.

After skiing we headed for Denver. We stopped at Rabbit Ears Pass to throw the ball for Dusty. It was really cold. Dusty kept falling through the crust layer which wasn’t making him very happy. I fell through the crust layer too which didn’t make me very happy.

We got to Andrea’s Aunt and Uncle’s (Bonnie and Nino) house near Denver Wednesday night just as everyone was sitting down to have pizza for dinner. The next day we headed back to Bonnie and Nino’s house for Thanksgiving festivities. Everyone hung out, had fun and ate lots of food. A good Thanksgiving. The Broncos even won, making all the Denverites very happy.

The next day, we went to the Butterfly Pavilion in Westminster. Andrea, Donna and I also went up to Boulder to walk around the Pearl Street mall and check out the scene. CU was playing Nebraska that day, so the traffic was kind of crazy.

Friday night we had a cowboy dinner at Trail Dust near Bonnie and Nino’s house. There’s a big slide that the kids had fun on and a dance floor with live music. A good end to our stay in Denver.

Saturday morning, we woke up early and were on the road out of Denver by 6:15. We drove straight through on I-70 and I-15 and got back to Santa Barbara around 1 am. The drive would have been 2 hours shorter but we hit really bad traffic between Las Vegas and Barstow. I hate I-15.

We only stopped a couple times in the Reef areas of Utah to take some pictures.

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