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These are the only pictures I have at the moment. Pictures of the trip were few and unfortunately were lost enroute. Here is what happened.
As I prepared myself for the trip from SLC to "the Floating Sandbar" as some of us call it, one of the things I knew I wanted to have along was a digital camera. I have one in a cell phone but no way to download them in any meaningful way (read not at all). I also have a camera built into a PDA which I use regularly. The picture quality is better than a phone but not as good as a cheap REAL camera. I thought I might purchase one in SLC before I took off, and that was my plan, but time ran out and money was running short (read, I forgot).
I decided the PDA would have to do. I took a few pictures before leaving, the usual stuff, you know what I mean. I also took some shots of some very scenic vistas early on my route as I threaded my way up into and over the mountains of the Wasatch range along Utah 6. Well, as tuned in to weather as I am, a former sailor living on the Gulf coast and having just experienced the worst hurricane in 100 years, I believe I must have been distracted by the magnitude of the experience I was about to have. I knew I might encounter cool weather but everything I saw indicated fair weather, little or no rain and certainly no COLD fronts until I was well south of the area. Again, I was wrong. I seem to be wrong on a regular basis, just to stay in practice I guess. Anyway, a COLD front moved through SLC the night before departure. I had not brought any cold weather clothing other than insulated coveralls and the thermal liner for my jacket, no gloves, no long sleeved shirt or thermal anything else.
As I proceeded over those magnificent mountains, toward where the front then was, I began to notice a very definite drop in air temps. OK, time to don the coveralls. Actually, I put on the leather chaps I acquired with the bike and they were adequate for that first day's ride. The second day was completely unimaginable. Please remember, all this works into the original story. Leaving Monticello, Utah, it was nippy but not real cold. By tis time I was expecting cooler riding conditions so I used the coveralls and all was fine, for a while. Then I started getting chilled again. The thin leather work gloves I was using were not up to the task of the wind chill factors I was enduring and even though I had my cuffs cinched down tightly, a certain amount of cold air was traversing up my coat sleeve. I spyed a motorcycle shop as I passed through a small town and immediately turned around. There I purchased a long sleeved, turtle necked shirt and a pair of insulated riding gloves, the only ones they had (cost about $75 for just the gloves). I must admit the gloves worked fine for keeping out the cold but they are an abomination for ease of use. I never timed myself putting them on or taking them off but I feel in my heart it surely took a full five minutes each way, each hand. needless to say, taking pictures with my particular camera was then and there a thing of the past, at least along the route. Overnight stops could still be managed, I thought. Caught up in the excitement of finally making real progress, I neglected to notice the charge level of the PDA. I also mistakenly thought any pictures taken were automatically saved on the memory card I had installed just for pictures. When the charge falls too low, the device shuts down and WILL NOT turn on until fully recharged, and when it is recharged, guess what, you have to run a complete set-up all over again. That was the end of the picture taking, and of the pictures I had already accumulated. Gone, never to be recovered. Anyone care to go back there with me to retrieve those pictures?
Live and learn,
Ron