Tuesday 21st March – Salt Lake City and Hill AFB

You’d have thought that being parked in the middle of nowhere with no security around would make sleeping difficult? Not for me!  I had a solid night of sleep.  Must be the complete darkness and silence that makes sleeping in the desert easy.

Today was planned by Simon so, guess what? We were heading towards Salt Lake City and Hill Air Force Base (yes, ANOTHER one).  I did the first stint of driving.  It was very gusty and, being in the middle of the desert, there were times when dust and/or tumbleweeds were causing issues with visibility.

Driving through a dust-cloud

But it cleared up as we approached Salt Lake City

A good website tip for anyone thinking about driving around the US – Gasbuddy.com (right). As you can see from this colourful image of the Western States, there is a vast difference between the prices in different States.  For example, we will not be filling up today, but will wait until we get into Wyoming tomorrow where the price for gas is estimated to be as low as $2.17 a gallon.  These prices are reported by people using the gas stations so they should be up-to-date.  Now you can see why California gas prices were so painful!

Besides, the background scenery was great!

Having briefly stopped for lunch we made it to Hill AFB to the North of Salt Lake City for about 230pm.  It was still very breezy but bright so we went to look at the planes on show outside first, in case the forecast rain and thunder storms showed up. Despite me thinking ‘not another AFB’ to some degree, I still found it interesting and I seem to be getting the identity of more of the aircraft correct when Simon tests me!  Here’s a few different planes for you that we haven’t shown you before!

A Northrop 'Snark' - an intercontinental weapon from the 1950s

F16 Fighting falcon - the mainstay of the US Airforce until recently replaced by the F35

F15A Eagle - this plane has never been shot down in combat

Trinity bomb replica - having visited the Trinity site in New Mexico earlier in this trip it was interesting to see this full size replica of 'the gadget' that was built for a BBC film 'Oppenheimer' in 1980

B17 Flying fortress (I only added this image because of the cartoon image of Hitler in a coffin)

The museum shut at 430pm and it was only about an hour to an RV site that Simon had reserved for us.  On this journey, we passed the 16000 miles mark!  Because of the time constraints we are really pushing the mileage this week to get across to Mount Rushmore.  The fuel budget has to be blown if we are going to achieve the 48 states.

Despite Holiday Hills RV park in Coalville, Utah being a Good Sam Park, we were disappointed to find that the water on our campsite doesn’t work, despite the $29 price tag for the night. But we are tucked in between some scenic hillsides and only 30 minutes from the Wyoming border for tomorrow so that more progress can be made.