Day 34: Monumental

Heber City, Utah

Distance for the day: 294.8 km

Cumulative distance: 7,317.6 km

Top speed: 133 kph

Moving average: 82 kph

Temperature:  14.2 - 37.2

Spent the morning at Dinosaur Natuonal Monument, a fascinating trip back in time seeing dinosaur fossils embedded in the silty, ashen rock that holds the bones.

That is a big bone.

Here, Nan is getting acquainted with a 149 million year old bone.

This is the most complete Allosaurus skeleten found anywhere.

Pinch and zoom, if you can. This rock face was filled with bones.

Green River, which was almost Green Reservoir.

This building was constructed to protect the wall
of fossils and allow viewers to study them.

Stegasaurus disply outside the visitor's centre.

Fun haters. Spoiling a perfectly good photo op.

There is a "wall" of rock, long since turned perpendicular to what is our base ground. Fossils from the region date back to about 149 million years, 85 million years before the Extinction Event that eliminated dinosaurs from remaining the dominant animal species on Earth.  The wall is enclosed inside a building that was built around the fossil bed.

Ranger Molly explained to me that a river flowed through here but there is evidence (fossilized clam shells) that there were at least two periods of extreme drought. The dinosaurs would have gathered around the river to have access to water and plant life that would have remained until the droughts delivered their final verdicts.  The dinosaurs would have died near the reliver then subsequent floods had washed their carcasses and bones down river and collected in this spot. Millennia of ash from volcanoes in what is now California drifted and fell in the region, burying the bones. Many layers of rock reflect the multiple times the region has been home to an inland sea and drifting ash. Tectonic activity since then has folded the former sea floor to create rising rock formations, exposing the fossils.

We did a little moto tour through the park, at least where the road was paved, including one campground which surprised us to no end that it was not fully booked for a Friday. The geography, the geology was realy quite dramatic including several rocky areas that were a distinctive light green and to top it off, the road was swarming with LOCUSTS or at least, Mormon Grasshoppers. We saw them by the thousands walking on the road and alongside. Not sure what is so special about them that they felt they could take over... well, Utah but there seems to be some kind of connection: Mormon - Utah. "Mormon crickets are named after the role they played in the mid 19th century invasion of Mormon's settlers crops in the Salt Lake Valley of Utah." I had a difficult time avoiding them on the bike. I didn't want that bug splatter all over. Me. 

Mormon cricket.

In 1950, there was a plan to build a 168 metre dam on the Green River, which passes by the park, which would have flooded the region and the fossils would have been lost. Fortunately, the American public objected and the plan was scrapped. That was back when "united we stand" as seen all over US license plates, meant something.

After the park, the ride was pretty routine. We had discussed going north then west and

Vending machine where we had lunch. Teach those kids early!

The Vernal dinosaur collection.

south to Herber City but decided there was too much risk in getting to our destination close to the start of the Oilers game. Not unlike yesterday, we went through a pretty major storm cell. We could see thunder clouds building ahead of us and we talked about puttig on our rain gear before we got nailed. I was looking for a place to safely pull over but none was forthcoming, unless I was prepared to make a very tight turnaround on gravel. The wind had us buffeting around, with swirling winds blowing us left and right. My hands were getting tired hanging onto the handlebars. Then the rain started but to our amazement, we were pretty much through it in only 15 minutes.  The skies remained threatening all around us but we kind of shot throught the middle and it continued to rain on our left and right but we slipped through without getting too wet. Less so than yesterday in fact. 

Arrived in Herber City at 4:00 pm, in time to go pick up "some refreshments" before the game. 

We had the US feed on the TV in the motel and the Canadian feed on the tablet.

Oiler's deadline acquisition Adam Henrique scoring the GAME WINNING GOAL!

Hard to believe after three games of this series, we were all thinking that the Oilers just didn't have what it takes. Now, after the last three games, we are all thinking the Panthers just don't have what it takes. Game 7 Monday, winner takes all!

Day 33: There's a storm coming

Naples, Utah

Distance for the day: 335.3 km

Cumulative distance: 7,022.8 km

Top speed: 138 kph

Moving average: 90 kph

Temperature:  17.2 - 38.0

I would love to tell you that these first three pictures were from this morning, when we got up to catch the morning sun. I would also like to tell you that Nan and I won the $15 million 50/50 draw from the last Oilers home game. Both woud be equally accurate.

They are from last night, taken with my phone, so they were overlooked for yesterday's post, so we thought they could make the cut for today.

This is the Colorado River from the distillery where we had dinner last night, the place that served us a package salad for dinner, with plastic cutlery that came in a cellophane wrapper, with an individual salt and pepper envelope. Kind of like we had tonight but not as good as we ate in our hotel room tonight.

The view from the Homestead, the cute little motel
where we stayed in Palisade last night.

So, the truth of the matter is that I had to finish last night's blog post this morning because I just couldn't stay awake any longer. Plus, I didn't really want to get up early anyways. By the time we were up and getting ready, all the other guests of the 8 room Homestead had cleared out. I guess that tells you something. We were loaded and on the way by about 10:15 and because we often find ourselves 15 minutes from departure wondering where the heck we are going, we rode into Palisade to have a look around and waste some time. We were slab riding this morning so it was pretty hard to be confused about what route we were taking. Especially as our first destination of the day was Rifle. Despite asking where we had lunch and looking online for an answer, I was unable to learn the origin of the name Rifle for the town. However, it may have been reasonable to name any town in the mid west after a weapon, since everybody here is either packing or somebody before them was. The area was the scene of several bloody battles between the Ute First Nations and the US Cavalry after the US government renaged on the agreement to grant Ute tribes their own land in a treaty. We passed near but not through the town of Meeker, named for the Indian Agent attempting to convert the local tribes to Christianity. You can probably guess who that turned out. I can't imagine it was too much better in Canada. We at least said we're sorry.

We had breakfast in a Rifle restaurant called
"Good Ol' Home Cooked Food". The food wasn't too
memorable but the decorations were. This was
in the "non-smoking" section.

We had numerous pleasant views along the White River after we had eaten. Not quite as dramatic as some of which we had seen but beutiful nonetheless

It did get a little more dramatic later in the day as we encountered some nasty weather. When we came out from lunch, it was still 28 degrees so we weren't overly concerned with a little bit of moisture. Being let in by our mesh gear. But as we rode along, the winds picked up and the temperature went down.  And the rain fell.  We still weren't overly stressed as in the far distance, we could still see what looked like storm clouds dissipating but it wasn't really clear how far it was to that distance. Nan asked me twice, "should we put on our rain gear? Isn't that why you re-sealed the seems?" Nah. 

Ewwwww.

Oh oh.

We saw this cool type of formation a few times, where it looked like boulders were stuck together and then shifting tectonics uprooted them into "fences".

The actual sight where Meeker met his demise.

That is a small portion of where it was raining. 
A much larger portion of it was on us. That is when
the temperature dropped down to 17.

Some business combinations make little sense to
me. Pickles and ice cream. Odd combination.

The rain did stop and for a few minutes, we were pretty wet. Mesh gear is not too good for keeping the rain out. It didn't matter much. Pretty soon it was 38 degrees and we were wishing for rain. 

We rode through the town of Dinosaur, Colorado, not far from Dinosaur National Monument. Dinosaur I am sure is a shadow of its former self. They have a "Brontosauraus Avenue", named after a burger on the Flintstones and numerous statuettes of dinosaurs around the town but not much else. It looks a little like most of Dinosaur has packed and moved on to some place with living creatures

I think they may have in fact, moved to Vernal, pretty close to where we are spending the night. Vernal thinks that they are the capital of the dinosaur world as absolutely every business has a small statue of a dinosaur out front. Dinosaur National Monument is actually closer to Dinosaur than to Vernal so I am not sure how Dinosaur got stiffed.

After the rain today, the bike was filthy, so I had to give her a shower.