We’ve embarked on another journey to points yet unknown. After spending the night with family near Umapine, Oregon, we headed straight down the all too familiar I-84 towards Salt Lake City. Or so we thought, we planned to camp at Antelope Island on the lake, but a late start from Curt’s brother’s ranch left us with darkness descending 200 miles short of our destination. We chose the Three Island Crossing State Park, a locale made famous by the Oregon Trail. We both wondered why the Oregonians chose to cross here, when they would have to repeat the same feat a hundred miles up the river. The next day, more of I-84, and the most desolate and boring stretch of interstate (Burley, Idaho to Ogden, Utah). . . Curt chose to listen to BBC’s coverage of the F1 Brazilian Grand Prix, I immediately went to the ipod and headphones. There was some good news though, I was able to stave off Curt’s desire to visit the Golden Spike Monument once again. I know that one of these times I will give in, but not this one.
We quickly discover faulty equipment. The new “5 day” beverage cooler has a faulty seal. We make a beeline for the Salt Lake REI. Glad we’re members since we don’t have a receipt. They look up our purchases for the year, and apparently, we never paid for the cooler in the first place. Sales clerk error. She used the cooler to pack our purchases and never scanned it. So, we finally purchased our cooler, and last minute supplies and hustled to Goblin Valley State Park, UT before sunset.
Fortunately, there were a few sites available. We carefully reviewed the ‘reserved dates’ marked on the posts and selected the best spot from the ones remaining. We set the tent, unloaded our bins, and started to build a fire. Just after dusk, a pickup pulled up in the spot next to us. The gentleman explained that he had reserved the spot we were in earlier that day – he PAID for it. He and Curt had an unfriendly exchange about putting the reserved tag on the post – but the long and the short of it was that we had to move to another site. Campers can appreciate what a pain this is! Later, we realized that they were not even going to occupy the site. He spent the $16 fee twice to buy some extra space. The arrogance of the $32 guy was not sitting well with us. I began to imagine the perfect passive aggressive retaliation. I wish I could let it go…
The next day, the $32 guy’s lady came over with a Green River melon as a peace offering. I will attempt to let it go. We certainly enjoyed the melon for breakfast the next day. However, first we had to endure a tough night.
The winds began REALLY gusting. We woke – with everyone else in the tent area – to double check everything in the huge winds. Curt lost his balance in the dark and wind, and grabbed for the tent pole. Unfortunately, it snapped. The tent was flapping wildly in the gusting winds. I announced, “I’m leaving the tent”, Curt responded, “Where are you going to go?” I chose the front seat of the car, while Curt remained in the loud and collapsing tent. With the nearest real town about 150 miles away, Curt spent his night trying to figure out how to fix the tent, meanwhile, I slept like a lady in the middle seat of a transatlantic red eye to Turkey. And we haven’t even started our vacation yet.
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