We drove from Lower Burrell, Pennsylvania to Salt Lake City, Utah over three days, Sept. 15-17, 2022. Over those three days, we drove 1,915 miles through eight states!
Pennsylvania
Ohio
Indiana
Illinois
Iowa
Nebraska
Wyoming
Utah
Whew! It was wonderful seeing the country – but we drove the entire 1,915 miles over three days – and most of these miles were on I-80! Not to mention, in one day we drove more than 900 miles!
Once we left Pennsylvania we stopped in Columbus, Ohio to see a co-worker of Jay’s for lunch. Great convos. Great lunch. Great time. Thanks for making time to meet with us, Ozzy!
We continued on from Ohio for a few more hours before pulling over for the night in Bloomington, Illinois.
This first day we covered Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana and Illinois.
We were up early for day two of driving. The scenery was beautiful and we crossed the Mississippi River (although briefly). We continued on and made great headway. We stopped at the World’s largest truck stop off of I-80; it was agreeably the largest truck stop we had ever seen. It was crazy busy!
We passed so many open fields, cows, horses and CORN!
We stopped for gas and quick road snacks at a Sinclair Oil Gas Station! I have never seen a Sinclair gas station but I love their dinosaur mascot – super cute. They are missing a marketing opportunity by not selling little squishy dinosaurs or other toys with their logo/mascot.
Also on I-80, we hit the monster of all hail storms! It was bad enough that the hail even chipped one small spot on the hood on Jay’s truck! It was insane. I was sure the hail was going to crack the windshield, but thankfully it didn’t. The lightning that accompanied the storm was something like we had never seen. Then, once the storm cleared, a beautiful rainbow appeared. It was something right out of a novel. Beautiful.
We safely pulled into Cheyenne, Wyoming for the evening. And wouldn’t you know it, due to a football game all of the hotels in the area were sold out! Luckily, we found one on the outskirts of town near a military air base. The hotel was great and we were thankful to get some much needed rest. On day two we completed, Iowa, Nebraska, Wyoming.
On day three, we continued driving through Wyoming. We stopped at Sinclair, Wyoming, to get Sinclair gas at the Stinker Gas Station. It was a unique opportunity and made us both giggle.
We both felt that Wyoming was the most beautiful landscape that we had ever seen. Vast fields of green, small lush rolling hills, tons of wildlife – if it wasn’t so far in the mid-west we both felt like we could live in Cheyenne or a surrounding town.
We checked in to our hotel in Salt Lake City and we will check out Sept. 23.
Life with Mary and Jay 