I’ve driven the salt flats a few too many times.
I’ll definitely try dropping down to Hwy 50. I’ve taken 50 from Sacramento to Southern Lake Take but never further East.
I wasn't confident that I could tow a travel trailer across central NV, so I didn't take US50 between Reno and Ely. But I drove US50 all the way from Ely east to Kansas City. Lots of pretty country, and at a more leisurely pace than the interstates. You can hit Great Basin NP (near Ely), Arches NP, Black Canyon of the Gunnison NP, Ouray CO is not far south from this route and would be worth a detour, Monarch Pass, and then...a whole lot of plains. We stopped in Dodge City Kansas (the original "Wild West" town) one night. The Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve near Emporia KS is kind of a cool place to stretch your legs and see what the prairie used to look like before the farms. You could also hit the Gateway Arch NP in St. Louis on the way back to Nashville.I’ve driven the salt flats a few too many times.
Thanks!
Maybe Hwy 50 might be the way to come back to Nashville. Thanks!
Flipping your trip was a good call re: Beartooth Highway. We've had a lot of spring snow out here and it opened up late. There would have been a very good chance it was still closed when you were headed west. Love it when a plan comes together - sounds like a great trip!Well... I got back from my trip out West. I ended up flipping it around and bustin' butt to get out there and took my time coming back. Although, I really could have used a few extra days coming back to Nashville... I missed A LOT!
The route: (Times and distances taken from Google Maps)
My favorite parts:
- West Bound:
- Day 1: Nashville -> Lincoln, NE (12 hrs, 748 miles)
- Day 2: Lincoln, NE -> Rock Springs, WY (10 hrs, 697 miles)
- Day 3: Rock Springs, WY -> Truckee, CA (11 hrs, 730 miles)
- East Bound:
- Day 1: Truckee, CA -> West Yellowstone, MT (11 hrs, 749 miles)
- Day 2: West Yellowstone -> Cooke City, MT (All day cruising through the park)
- Yellowstone National Park
- Day 3: Cooke City, MT -> Custer, SD (10+ hrs, 469 miles)
- Bear Tooth Highway
- Little Bighorn Battlefield National Park
- Day 4: Custer, SD -> Hamburg, IA (12+ hours, 662+ miles)
- Custer State Park
- Iron Mt. Road (Hwy 16A)
- Bad Lands National Park
- Rerouted off of the interstate A LOT because of flooding.
- Day 5: Hamburg, IA -> Nashville (12+ hrs, 690+ miles)
- Rerouted off of the interstate A LOT because of flooding.
Disappointments:
- Yellowstone (of course... it's an incredible place.)
- Bear Tooth Highway... absolutely AMAZING!
I was talking to a friend who told me that if I liked Beartooth Highway, then I *must* drive the "Million Dollar Highway" in Colorado. But all of the "web pundits" say that Beartooth is better. Guess I'll have to see for myself!- Little Bighorn Battlefield (I just found it interesting how HUGE the battlefield was!)
- Badlands National Park... I just pictured all the old westerns I used to watch as a kid.
- Custer State Park... I honestly expected more wildlife (4 bison, 3 prong horned sheep and a few white-tailed deer), but maybe I was spoiled by seeing Yellowstone first.
- Iron Mountain Road... it's a pretty road, with a couple of cool photo ops of Mt. Rushmore through a tunnel...but not for the motion-sick prone. I was fine, but I am glad my daughter wasn't with me... she would have been miserable! It would be a REALLY nice motorcycle ride on a cool autumn day:
In Total: (This is from my truck trip computer)
But this was the funniest... I stopped at Beartooth Summit (approx 11,000 ft), so the "This trip" display was all downhill:
- 99hrs 37min Driving Time
- 5,527.5 total miles
- 292.0 Electric Miles
- 18.1 MPG (Keep in mind... Nebraska, Wyoming, Montana and South Dakota all have 80 MPH speed limits on the interstate... not great for mileage.)
87+ MPG for a ride lasting almost an hour!
If you've made it this far... you deserve a gift! So, for you older folks like myself (62+ years old)... do yourself a favor... go get a Senior LIFETIME Pass to the US National Parks! With fees, it comes out to about $100... but it's worth it! You just need one per vehicle.
https://www.nps.gov/planyourvisit/senior-pass-changes.htm
Anyway.... THANKS to everyone for all your great suggestions! I wish that I had time to go to all the places y'all recommended, but I'll be heading back next year so I'll try to hit some of what I missed if I take the same route.
I wish I could take credit for thoughtfully switching it... but I had just returned from Egypt with COVID and just needed a little extra time to recover. ?
I played around with several different trip-planning sites and found that Furkot (www.furkot.com) was the least bad. You can set up your trip parameters (i.e. start/end times for your driving day, how many hours or miles to drive each day, how long to add to the time for any stops, etc.). Then you just put in all the things you want to see, places you want to go and it will compute the route and suggestions on where to stop for the night. Each day can be tweaked however you want. It would be nice if you could send the entire route, stops and all, to Apple Maps or Google Maps, but you can't. If viewing your plan on a mobile platform, it will allow you to pick the next destination and it will send that to Apple/Google maps... that's helpful. It knew about all of the places within Yellowstone that I wanted to see.
Good gouge.
