I've never been here myself. Have only been as far west as the Salt Lake Marina on the south of the lake. Today, we're heading to the NV border.
Its a pretty barren drive --- there are mountains to break of the views but for the most part is all salt flats (~100 miles of salt flats). Some of them have water on them and others are dry. There are also 2 salt factories (one is Morton --- not sure who owns the other). We're trying to figure out where the water is coming from -- are the salt plants flooding the land (that takes a lot of water). (I look it up when I got home --- the water is just groundwater that in the summer evaporates but now since its fall, the evaporation rate is dropping allowing the groundwater to collect on the flats - lots of groundwater down there.)
About 1/2 way to the Bonneville Flats there this strange tree-like sculpture on the north side of the highway. We're in the middle of military property so maybe its some govt device -- but looks like a tree with large balls as leaves. Very strange -- I found out later that is just a piece of artwork (in the middle of no where).
Finally get to a rest stop (which the internet says is the best place to view the flats --- even have a hose to wash off your shoes if you walk on the flats).
The flats were dry and very white -- would've been shinier if the sun was out but it was an overcast day. I went down to the edge --- for a look.
The speed races are done about 7 miles to the north (at least that what the info board says).
We get back on the hwy heading west -- might as well stop at Wendover and the air museum there as we're only a few miles away. But we see an exit to the flats and we take it to see where it goes. Well it goes right down the middle of the flats and if it weren't for 2 people pull-off to the side, I probably would've drove right off the road and onto the flats because I just wasn't expecting the road to end.
Now we're in the middle of the flats, surrounded by white -- very cool. But there was water out here in spots which made the experience even better.
When we were done, we headed for the air museum which is an old air force base where Tibbets practiced for the atom bomb drop on Hiroshima. The museum is on a portion of the old AF base. There's an old hangar, barracks building, air tower and a few other buildings. You can't go in them because they need to be restored. There's a cargo plane outside which we can walk thru --- it also needs to be restored (but the birds seem happy in there). But it was neat to see inside and see where the pilots sat.
The old runways are still in use as the small Wendover airport (light aircraft only). There still some bunkers on the other side of the runways. Inside the one building is a small museum with memorabilia from the airforce base, replicas of the atomic bomb and a newspaper of the Japanese surrendering the war. All interesting stuff.
Dad and Uncle leave tomorrow, hope they had a good time --- I have a great time showing them around.
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