is hidden inside a tunnel !! the most significant event of the travel day, crossing the watershed from the Pacific to the Atlantic, was marked by a little green sign (similar to the one that says 4896 on Old Dominion) in the middle of a long dark tunnel on I 70 at 11,200 feet (so high the van betrayed its VW roots, and started to not have enough power to get up the hill without dropping down a few gears...). The 500 odd mile drive east on I 70 from Fort Cove to Denver is really fun. The scenery varies from the flattopped sand and rock hills of the Utah desert (one goes past the Arches national park) to the green flat bottomed valleys of the Colorado river, to the 10,000 foot high slopes of Aspen and Breckenridge. The road is challenging. It runs alongside the Colorado river for 200 miles or more. You get to love that river, especially towards the end when there are people rafting and kayaking on it. We should do it. It is NOT terrifying (as it is in the grand canyon) and would be great fun. I also discovered another sport we should engage in -- ATV camping and exploring in Fishlake National Forest (UT). Great for those of us unable to carry heavy packs any more.
Had a great italian lunch in Grand Junction (CO) at the bar of the Olive Garden restaurant talking to a russian petroleum engineer assigned to colorado from his native Siberia. We had a nice discussion of South Ossetia and the russian invasion, and Chechnya and the killing of the woman reporter, and Mevdeyev vs Putin and I even remembered the name of the crazy young president of Georgia -- Shalikashvili... the guy had his eyes wide open... thank you, the "economist".
But 500 miles is too much for one day... and I will have to do it again tomorrow -- across the flat lands. Salina, Kansas here we come (there is a balneario called Salinas outside Montevideo on the way to Punta -- I can pretend I am headed there).
Ah, the new car has a CD player with a 6 CD cassette deck, which I loaded and made work. I drove to music, but tonight I bought myself some books -- so tomorrow I will start with the first installment of Moby Dick -- lets see how far I get.
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