Everybody has a dream. Some dream of traveling to exotic places, others winning the lottery and still others of doing great things. Steve’s dream was to drive his Model A on the Lincoln Highway.
Being we live in Minnesota we couldn’t start in NYC and drive to San Francisco, so we had to decide do we go East or West first. We decided to go west first and east next year. On our way west we met up with the Lincoln Highway in Carroll, IA.
The first couple of days were the hardest. We struggled to find the markers for the highway and it wasn’t much fun until I saw sitting in the back seat the book, “The Lincoln Highway, The Great American Road Trip”. Steve had brought the book along, but I hadn’t looked at it before so I didn’t know it was a wealth of information. After that the trip improved greatly. Now we knew what to look for and where and the bonus was that at every stop there was a brief history about it.
Our first problem(s) occurred the second day in Kearny, NE. It had rained and at the motel there was a large puddle of water in the parking lot. Our room was at the end of the building and we parked as far away from the puddle as we could. After unpacking we decided to go out for dinner.
On the way back from the restaurant Steve noticed the car was steering hard and leaning to the side. Our front tire had gone flat. Steve replaced the innertube and we went to bed. The next morning Steve went out to pack up the car and found that during the night someone had taken their 4 wheeler and sprayed our car with mud. This was the only time our car was ever vandalized in the 20 years of owning it. Needless to say it was upsetting, but Steve found a car wash nearby and cleaned the mud off before we started the new day.
In Wyoming the roads were good and we saw interesting sights, but it was the wind that proved to be the challenge. It never stopped blowing with 40 mph gusts. We stopped earlier in the day than we normally would because of the stressfulness of trying to keep the car on the road. Steve had read that early in the morning the winds were less so the next day we left by 6am and it was much better.
The scenery now had changed from the flat grasslands of NE and WY to rock formations, rivers, hills and valleys. Our A was still chugging along with only a little trouble that cleaning the carburetor fixed.
The scenery was breathtaking as we entered Park City, UT. The first thing we saw was the ski jumps from the 2002 Olympics and they were impressive. Park City was almost a ghost town in the 60’s but since the Olympics it has become a huge tourist area. We were lucky to have found a hotel in the heart of the historic Park City. The streets were lined with cute boutiques, tourist shops and restaurants. Unfortunately, we didn’t have time to enjoy this town except to eat a buffalo burger in one of the many restaurants.
The next morning we decided to take a shortcut to Salt Lake City and drive the Guardsman Pass through the mountains. The ride was not for the faint of heart as we wound straight up the narrow mountain road going 12 mph with no guardrails!
In Salt Lake City two young missionary girls gave us a tour of the Mormon Tabernacle and a brief history of the Mormon church. The shape of the tabernacle was our biggest surprise. We were expecting a large church instead it was in the shape of a submarine! With this shape there was no need for microphones as the missionary girls demonstrated.
The next stop before we left the area was to drive to the Great Salt Lake. The lake is located on Antelope Island State Park. Not only can you bike, hike, swim and camp in this park, but you can see the free-ranging bison, deer, antelope, bighorn sheep and millions of birds. It was interesting, but not enough for me to want to camp there.
Leaving the Great Salt Lake we continued driving through the salt flats and saw the sign to the Bonneville Speedway, but didn’t stop. Soon we turned onto US Route 50 that has the nickname of “the Loneliest Road in America”. This stretch of highway is 287 miles long with very few towns on it. One of the towns we stopped at was Eureka, which boasts to be the “Friendliest Town on the Loneliest Road “.
Finally, we made it to Reno where our cousins lived . They were our tour guides for two days and took us to the Donner Reed Museum and Virginia City. The Donner Reed Museum was fascinating. We had our picture taken by the Donner Reed monument that is 20 feet high. That monument represents the height of the snow on their fatal journey.
The Cartwrights of the TV show Bonanza lived in Virginia City, NV and it always showed them in a large meadow riding into the Ponderosa Pines. Actually Virginia City is located on the side of a mountain; not a meadow leading into the Ponderosa Pines.
Virginia City is a typical Western tourist town except for one thing. Some of the residents dress in costume and walk around the town. They weren’t friendly, but they added a theatrical touch to the place.
After two days we said Good-bye to our cousins and headed to Union City, CA, where we stayed with friends. We had a lovely time and enjoyed our visit, but after 2 days we were anxious to reach San Francisco, our final destination on the Lincoln Highway.
We left early in the morning and as we got closer to San Francisco fog and a light mist descended on us. Finally, the fog blindness and misted windshield were too much. We were literally driving blind on a congested road and it was scary. Steve pulled over on the side of the road and cleaned the windshield with Rain-X. That helped and then the fog became lighter, too, so we continued on until we entered Lincoln Park, our final destination.
We found the final sign that said The Western Terminus of the Lincoln Highway behind a bus stop, where a bus was parked! After the bus moved Steve maneuvered the car as close as he could get for a picture.
We did it! We made it all the way from Wayzata, MN with relatively little car trouble to San Francisco, CA. Next year the adventure continues on the Lincoln Highway, only we’ll be traveling east.
Comments