Day off

Today's the day I leave Steamboat, I have to say that I really like the flavour of the town after having only been there for a half a week. I did a one hour run, tried to make it to the Rabbit Ears peak, but couldn't find the right trail.

Looking at a map, I've decided to make my way from Craig to Rock Springs wia the less travelled route. I start on the 13/789 north, then head west on a road that doesn't have a number on my map, nor does it on the sign. There actuallly wasn't even a turn sign, it just had signs to various ranches and their distances once I was on it. Not a lot of traffic to say the least. I passed through the southern tip of the Jonah, and the middle of the Hiawatha gas fields. I took a bunch of pictures, passed through a desert flash flood storm, waded the Little Snake River, and basically just explored. I passed through Powder Wash and Hiawatha, which aren't towns, villages or even hamlets - they've made the map but are "camps", indicating they aren't permanent.

All in, it was about 200 miles, 120 of which were off road. I'm fairly certain that's the lowest population density area this side of Alaska. I saw one Slumberger truck, one Ensign truck and that was it. I don't think there were many repair shops catering to anything other than Dodge, Ford and Chevy trucks in the entire corner of the state. If I stayed any longer I would have had to buy a gun rack and spraypaint the Benz with desert camo, in the style of the locals. Beautiful scenery throughout, then drove up highway 430 to Rock Springs. There's a huge JR Simplot phosphates mine on the south end of town, and in general I couldn't really find anything appealing about the city. Judging by the size/quality/number of truck stops along the interstate there, it's a passing through point for many.

I make my way north along the 191, through numerous Wyoming towns. All the population signs show less than 200 people, hald don't make triple digits. Pinedale is the only one with a bit of critical mass, and seems like a really nice place. A ship shape looking car wash draws me in, to polish up my road trip mule before Bondurant and the beautiful road along the Hoback.

I make it into Jackson at about 9, and due to timing decide that I'll take part in the mountain bike race tomorrow. I sign out for the night in mountain biker ghetto style - sleeping in the car in the parking lot where race registration starts at 7:30 tomorrow. Let's hope the legs still have some juice left in them!