There are many questions I have posed to myself throughout this trip. Some of them are more like study questions you'd find on an impossible midterm. Take, for example, the one I chewed on yesterday while driving from Denver to Boise: What is different about Ohio and Oregon, aside from the fact that Ohio is new and Oregon is old? Does our main character like Ohio so well solely because it is different from Oregon? Watch her as she tries to explore Oregon with the same wide-eyed wonder she has explored Ohio.
I realized a few months ago that, magical though I believe Athens truly is, I had never looked upon Oregon with those same eyes, that same dedication to peering expectantly around every corner and rejoicing in what I found. I really hope that I can learn to do that in Oregon.
Perhaps it was the several days I've already spent on the road; perhaps it was the fact that I drove almost entirely on interstates; perhaps it was the fact that I was driving on roads I had driven before in states I had been to more than a handful of times. I don't know, and I hope it wasn't exclusively the latter, but I could feel my adventure-enthusiasm melting away as I drove west yesterday. I caught myself gaping less at sights equally spectacular to those I had stumbled upon in Kansas. I was focusing less on the journey than the destination.
Granted, I had set a high bar for myself yesterday - Denver to Boise is some 800-odd miles, and because of the extra day I'd spent in Denver, I was feeling extra itchy to get on the road and make up for so-called "lost time" (though I certainly wouldn't characterize it as such). Therefore, I spent less time dilly-dallying, soaking up roadside vistas, stopping in the middle of dusty back roads to snap a photo, etc.
I did partake in some beautiful vistas yesterday, though, and I pulled over a few times to snap pictures of snow-capped peaks rising through the endless sky, of red granite bluffs towering over the ribbon of highway (and seemingly little else; in Wyoming, Utah, and Idaho, it is uncommon to find more than one exit every ten miles).
I had my first taste of home, driving north out of Denver on I-25. I looked to my left, and something about that exact combination of elevation and browned grassland reminded me precisely of eastern Oregon. The moment passed, but it was the first time on this trip that I started to feel like I was getting closer to home, odd though it was that it was sparked by a memory of Oregon's high desert.
Where do the prairies end? Where does the West begin? I pondered this as I drove north, where often to my right I saw the endless grassland, sweeping all the way to Kansas and beyong. At the same time, to my left, snowy mountain peaks towered above me. Right then, the answer seemed clear: Interstate 25! As I made my way into Wyoming, however, and subsequently Utah and Idaho, I discovered that there is no clear dividing line. Rather, the west is composed of a jumbled, beautiful mix of sagebrush and snow, elevation and expanse. Perhaps that is the wild west?
The interstate is such a sterile driving experience, and determined though I was to make it from Denver to Boise in a day (easily done), I still lamented the end of my relationship with back roads. I did cut across a corner of Colorado, taking US-287 from Fort Collins to Laramie. The weather was agreeable, and it was absolutely stunning. I would come around a curve, and be greeted by rolling buttes that seemed like they would be soft to the touch. I saw enormous red granite peaks that came right up to the road. Everything was covered in the finest dust of snow imaginable.
After my hour on US-287, though, I picked up I-80 and never left the interstates since. Wyoming was windy, but sunny. It's almost always sunny at 7,000 feet. I continued to muse upon this question of where the west begins, and I still didn't quite draw any conclusions; I think that is a blog post in itself.
I-84 cuts across a little corner of Utah that is actually quite beautiful, though mostly unpopulated. You pass through Ogden, though, a city whose size I had forgotten. Anymore, though, I think my perception of a "big" city is a little skewed (Salina felt enormous to me, but don't get me started on how befuddling Denver was!). I only got out of my car once in Utah, and that was just to snap a picture or two from the side of the road. You slide right into Idaho from that, finding more farms and interminable fields stretching under mountain peaks.
So far, that is the most universal thing I have found: everywhere has farms. And cows, and hay.
I eased into Boise right as the Boise State football game began, and met up with drum corps friend Jeff at a bar downtown. The rest of my visit in Boise was comprised of a little bit of rest and a lot of visiting - hence my slowness to post. I'm still going to keep each day in a separate post, though.
Total Friday mileage: 855 miles. Total mileage: 2405 miles.
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