2009 Trip to the Bonneville Salt Flats

Being an avid Austin Healey enthusiast, when Tim learned that two Austin Healeys were going to run on the Bonneville Salt Flats in an attempt to repeat Donald Healey's record setting speed runs of 1954, he said "We're going !".

We left Dallas on 9/02/09 and headed for Castle Rock, CO (map 3 below), to see and visit with friends, Dave & Kathy Helwick, who were working at a RV park there.

From there, we drove up to Longmont, CO (4), to see and spend time with Dan and Sheryl Martin. Tim and Dan have known each other since they were freshmen in high school in 1954.

From there, we drove north to Cheyenne, WY (5), before turning west and traveling to Salt Lake City (6) and Bonneville.

While at the Salt Flats, we stayed in an RV park in West Wendover, NV (7).

Leaving Wendover, we drove south to Ely, NV (8), then east to Moab, UT (10). While in the Moab area, we visited Arches National Park. We then drove south to Mesa Verde NP(12).

Leaving Mesa Verde, we drove south to Gallup, NM (14), then east to Amarillo (15) again before heading home to Dallas (16).

The 3 week trip covered some ground that we have already visited, but since we now tow a Miata, we spent more time in several locations and went to many places that we had not experienced before.


The Big Texan restaurant in Amarillo offers a 72 oz. steak FREE
IF you can eat the whole dinner within an hour.

Sherry & Tim (right) visiting Dave & Kathy Helwick in Castle Rock, CO.



THIS is actually the Castle Rock in Castle Rock, CO.



Sherry entering the Boettcher Mansion.



The grave of "Buffalo Bill" Cody.



The view of Golden, Colorado, from Buffalo Bill's gravesite.

The big white roofed building in the center is the Coors Beer plant.

We toured the Coors Plant in Golden, CO.

Some of the copper brewing kettles inside the Coors plant.

Through the years, Coors has been served in these types of cans.

Sherry & Tim at Coors.

On the way driving up Pike's Peak in our Miata, we met a
wonderful couple on their way down in their Austin Healey.

WE MADE IT ! 14,110 Feet !
When we were here two years ago, the top of the mountain was closed due
to a snowstorm the night before. We got lightly snowed-on this time too.

Here is one of the cog railway trains that runs almost straight up the side of Pikes Peak.

Here is a close-up of the cog rails on which the train runs.

Sherry at the Red Rock Amphitheater.


The Red Rock seating. This is a BIG place !



Showing the slanted red rocks that formed Red Rock.

A scale model of Red Rock showing how big it really is.


Tim & Sherry (right) also visited with Sheryl & Dan Martin.
Dan is a high school friend of Tim's.

Ft. Bridger.


Sherry is showing how a great many of the pioneers who moved west traveled,
walking and pulling a cart containing all of their belongings.

Beautiful scenery

Our RV looks lost among the big rigs.

The Mormon Temple in Salt Lake City.

The Mormon Tabernacle.

We visited The Mormon Tabernacle Choir during
their regular Sunday morning TV broadcast.

This statue is to commemorate the pioneers who came to settle the West.


One of the historic places in Wendover, UT, is the WWII Airport and Flight Training Center.
Sherry's father was stationed here in 1944 and his squadron was one of those moved
out when Paul Tibbets and his Enola Gay flight crews moved in to begin practice for
his historic A-Bomb drop on Japan.

We walked some of the same streets that Sherry's father and Paul Tibbets walked 65 years ago.

The preserved Operations Center and control tower at the airfield.

This diarama shows how the airfield looked during WWII. Few of the original buildings are left.
The pictures of the Austin Healeys (below) were taken in front of the BIG hangar.

The primary reason for the trip was to watch THESE two
Austin Healeys make speed runs ON the Bonneville Salt Flats.

Click HERE to see the Bonneville part of the trip

 

 

You have been returned to the Moran's Bonneville trip

Staying in West Wendover, NV, allowed us to put the 44th state (Nevada) on our RV map.

Some roads just seem to go on F..O..R..E..V..E..R..

What a MAGNIFICANT piece of rock !

We got rained on and as the rain stopped, the
sun came out and treated us with THIS rainbow.

Strange green rocks. I wonder what they are......

The Visitor Center at Arches National Park.

Another MASSIVE rock ediface.

This and the following structures are all in Arches NP.

I always wonder WHY these rocks are left standing and what
happened to all the "stuff" that used to be around them.

Mother Nature must have FUN making these "Balanced Rocks" to mystify us.

THIS is all that's holding that big rock up. That white rock layer must be really sticky stuff.


Here are some more.

The many different striations in THIS and the following structure were caused
by overlapping layers of blowing sand in an ancient, now petrified, sand dune.

Melleniums later, water moved in and covered the sand dune and layed down
many hotizontal layers of sediment, much of which has eroded away.

There are 5 arches in this picture alone (2 left, 3 right).

This is a blow-up of the arch formation on the right above.

This and the following arches are all in Arches NP.


People are dwarfed in this arch.

Someday... THIS hollow will become an arch.

This anomoly was about 6" in diameter and in the ground. I wonder what caused it.

This slowly flowing river carved this HUGE canyon.

This ancient dry river bed runs through Mesa Verde National Park.

This is like the picture that we all saw in our 3rd grade History book
Ancestral Pueblo people lived here almost 1,000 years ago.

Sherry is exploring the Ancestral Pueblo ruins.

We had to climb 7 of these ladders to get out of the valley.

These footsteps up the rock face were carved over 900 years ago.

There are also dwellings on the other side of the canyon.

This formation is obviously hard volcanic rock left over from a lava vent.
The rest of the mountain has eroded from around it.

That's All Folks... We hope you enjoyed our trip