The Micro Mini Road Trip

“Don't follow your dreams; chase them.” ~Richard Dumb.

Doesn't sound so dumb to me. We took a mini road trip. Actually after a 43,000 mile road trip, anything less than ten thousand would be a mini trip. So we took a micro mini trip. Since we're living in central Utah, we decided to check the place out. First we drove to the Brian Head Summit. Soon I must find out how this town got named Brian Head. Is that the stupidest name or what? BH is a mixed bag, with wonderful vistas, lush green trees and beautiful mountains. However, fifteen years ago, central Utah suffered a drought and afterward the bark beetle did it's damage, killing hundreds of thousands of trees. The forest service, (who supposedly manage the forests) did nothing, neither trying to thwart the little buggers, nor let loggers reap the harvest from the dead timber. Now the trees continue to stand ugly and dead, a wonderful fire hazard.

But let's give it up for Brian Head, asthey are building a lake, complete with fishing, ice fishing, skating and non motorized boats. Awesome!

The summit sits at 11,300', pretty darned high and overlooks everything around it. Cedar Breaks with it's red cliffs sits tho the South. We can see the ski runs, now idle, directly below us. The Wasatch Mountains loom to the North. And shrieking cold wind buffets from every direction.

We headed to Panguitch, a nice little town in farm country. QG was disappointed as the quilt shop that used to exist, doesn't. The Great Recession strikes down another small business.

North again and we're actually following our route on our first day of the '50 States' tour. Pretty cool, and lots of good memories. The climate is high desert, with rocky mountains (not THE Rocky Mountains) looming to the East. Soon we followed a river, complete with white water rafters. Didn't look like a lot of white water to me, but fun nonetheless. We hit I-70 and headed West and this brought back memories too, of when we bought Libby in November and hit snow right about here. I still wake up screaming about that. Okay, maybe not. We rolled into Beaver and if you'd like to live in a small town with cows in your back yard, Beaver is the place. It didn't do anything for Quilter Girl and me either. Seemed like a mixed bag of nice and well kept homes interspersed with- um, others. However, the diner served great food with pleasant service. We fired up and headed back South on 15 toward Brian Head. QG said, “Looks pretty windy still.” “Yeah, I suppose it does,” I replied from the driver's seat of our little Colorado pickup. QG wanted no part of the wind, so even though the temps were in the low 80s, we rode in air conditioned comfort.

Poor Libby.