dkdm

Aaron,
I sent you a PM a few days ago. We're leaving St Louis on the 5th and we may be on I-80 or south of you on I-70.

If you get a chance, shoot me a text with your number. We have not decided on our route just yet.

What day will you be going through Lincoln NE?

If we don't catch you we'll see you in UT.

Cheers,
Dave

dkdm

Darwin,
Your saying avoid 6 (Denver to Grand Junction)

Tim,
Your saying that's the better way.

So I guess that means you get to see more as your crawling through construction....

I grew up in Salt Lake but its been many years since I've been back.

jerome951

I just passed Aaron and his wife (well, actually they passed me) early this morning on their way out of DC.

Unfortuantely I hadn't read this thread until now but couldn't mistake his car for anyone else's. His thread also explains why anyone would have a big grin on his face at 6am on a Tuesday....

Safe travels...

Darwantae951

Sorry, I meant 6 Between Spanish Fork and Price in UT, off of 191. Great drive, but right now the road is all torn up.

JohnKoaWood

No.. Thats his meds kicking in..

And yes i'm jelly...

Tim-C.

Better is, like beauty, in the eye of the beholder. I'm not sure if the priority is seeing one of the most beautiful areas of the country on the drive out, or getting to Parade more quickly.

If it were me, I'd take the drive through Colorado and roll the dice on construction on Rt 6. If the OP is coming from DC, a little stop and go will probably feel natural.

Also, while in SLC, check out Astro Burger or Crown Burger--great hamburgers with Pastrami on top. Probably not exactly healthy, but boy are they good.

Darwantae951

Do you mean Apollo Burger?

Tim-C.

Yeah, Apollo too. There are a bunch of different ones all apparently owned by different Greek families. Any will do, IMO. Do you have a favorite? I've just never seen a pastrami burger anywhere else, and it's a damn shame.

For further reading:
City Weekly article on SLC burger joints
http://www.cityweekly.net/utah/artic...g-burgers.html

Carl's Junior references Crown burger as inspiration for their pastrami burger
http://phx.corporate-ir.net/phoenix....5065&highlight

dkdm

Cool,
I'll have to try a Crown Burger, looks like their first store is not far (8 blocks) from my first job and they opened up just a few years before.

I let Aaron know we're taking I70 and spending Friday night in Grand Junction before rolling in for our volunteer shift Saturday afternoon.

I also let him know since we'll be about 8 hours behind him let us know if he is in a bind we can move north to I80 for support.

Since this is his tread, I'll go back to watching......

Cheers

Crackership

How are you getting from Moab down to I-40? You going to cut through the corner of CO or head down through AZ? I've done that trip a few times and I think the best drive is to cut across CO on 491 over to 160 to Durango and then take 550 south through the Aztec/Farmington/Bloomfield area and follow it down to Bernallio. From there you can take I25 south to where it meets I40 in Albuquerque, or, if you have time, you can cut up I25 for about 45mins to Santa Fe. There's some neat stuff to see there. If you do wind up passing through Santa Fe, there's an amazing restaurant on the corner of St. Francis Dr and Cerillos Rd. called Maria's. I can't go to Santa Fe without eating there at least once.

Just as an FYI though, if you do take the route I suggest, make sure to fill up the tanks, get some food and make sure you're good to go in Farmington (I don't know if Aztec or Bloomfield even have a gas station), cause there is absolutely zero civilization between there and Bernallio on SR550 and that's a good 150+ miles.

Anyway, hope you guys have an awesome trip! Take lots of pics!

ausgeflippt951

Subscribed home boy. Btw love what the camera did to your wheels!

GOBOGIE

I was on I 80 during that storm coming out of Toledo... pretty bad even for us midwesterners. Take tons of pictures. I've done a similar road trip and that was my mistake... not enough pictures.

Keep us posted. What's your daily planner look like on the way back? You will be about 15 mins from my house (South Bend, IN exit)... maybe I could take the cover off the turbo and come and see you.

EDIT: Just re-read your orginal post... looks like I missed the opportunity as your taking the southern route on the way back.

ramius665

UPDATE

The lodging we were staying in last night didn't have wi-fi and I was too tired to attempt to type out an update and include pictures on my phone.

So, to recap the last 2 days.

We departed early (0600) from South Bend, IN with the intent of stopping for the night outside of Omaha, NE. The humidity at 0545 was pretty shocking, guess some of that was left over from the storm the day before. Here's a pic of the cars (sorry it's cloudy, the lens kept fogging up):


And here is Minta, now much more rested than the day before:



But the dawn was beautiful:



We quickly entered Illinois and made great time skirting around Chicago. Luckily we didn't need to enlist the aid of any fellow Rennlisters (Thanks for the offer OmniGLH!!). Traffic was light and we got tons of waves, thumbs up and stares. I don't know what it is about the new-ish Chevy Impala/Malibu but man, folks from Illinois seem to love those things. We did run into a spot of trouble outside of Joilet though. We were cruising along doing the speed limit when we quickly noticed that traffic was at a total stop. We managed to slow down without any difficulty and the traffic behind us didn't do anything jerk-ish like rear-end one of the cars. After a quick hop off of the highway and a chat with a Illinois State Police officer, we got back onto I-80 and saw that the delay at least had the good grace to light itself on fire as an apology:



The rest of Illinois was flat, smooth and pretty unremarkable.

We entered Iowa for the last leg of our drive for the day. Th mission was to get across Iowa, enter Omaha, NE and drive about 7 miles south to Offutt Air Force Base. Iowa has all kinds of crazy things that I had never seen before. A chain of convenience stores called Kum & Go:



Apparently, the World's Largest Truck Stop:





And, for the best photo:

(Wait, we didn't get a chance to take the picture of a crop duster flying ~50' AGL over the 951 because someone [ModdedEverything951S] had to call and talk to Minta about cats)

Minta and I were both pretty surprised at how hilly Iowa was. For some reason we were under the impression that Iowa is flat and full of corn. Totally wrong on both counts. Just as the heat was getting close to unbearable, we finally arrived in Omaha and Offutt AFB.

Base Lodging was nice, for $40/night it was much nicer than an equally priced Motel 6. We lucked out and the Commissary was open even though it was a federal holiday and dinner consisted of deli sandwiches. We were just too tired to try and get anything else.

Waking up early again for a 0600 departure we were greeted by some great photo opportunities:







And then we found out that we were totally wrong about Iowa, but not about Nebraska. I think we drove 285 miles with about 80 feet total change in elevation. And I'm pretty sure that Nebraska grows enough corn to feed the entire planet. But gas was the most expensive in Nebraska than anywhere else on the trip, $4.09/gal for 91 Octane!!!!! We did get to see the "breadbasket" of America and saw our first fellow Porsche owners headed to Parade:



We also saw a massive arch across I-80:



Once we passed the split with I-76 toward Denver, it seemed like the rest of Nebraska was at an incline! On a side note, the cruise control in the 951 randomly started working, after hours of diagnosis and testing prior to departing with no success. As we continued west, we noticed that besides a change in the terrain, there was also a change in the people. The best way I can describe both together is that there were a few places that easily could have doubled as a scene from Mad Max II. I kept waiting to get passed by a black Ford Falcon XB or asked at a fuel stop "Who Rules Bartertown??"





We felt like a million bucks when we finally arrived in Wyoming. There's just something about making it a couple of hundred miles to the border of a state that just gives you a feeling of accomplishment. In the 50 or so miles of Wyoming, we had a few interesting photo opportunities:







And we were really surprised by the wildlife all over the base once we finally arrived:

Richgreenster

Lets do Crown burger on Monday. It is only 3 min from the car show.

I love love love to eat there but my wife gets mad at me when I do. It has turned into boys night out for me and my kids when my wife is away.

ramius665

Deal!