Day 17: Green River, WY - Lincoln, NE

When I got up it was crystal clear outside, but after breaking my fast, re-organising The Luggage and generally getting my act together, outside had turned the colour of an old sock.  Whether it was fog, low cloud or the Exhalations of the Earth made no difference to the outcome - it merely made everything cold and difficult to see.  But I did have a quick look at Expedition Island, which is now a rather nice park:

Expedition Island. Tarmac car park probably not there in John Wesley Powell's era.

And photographed a couple of bridges for CrinklyLion.  Here's one.  Of them.

Trona Bridge, connecting Expedition Island and the south side of the Green River

Whatever the cause of the prevailing atmospheric conditions, it proved possible to climb above it as I-80 rose above the 2,000 metre mark, and for a while it was glorious and sunny.  Over the Continental Divide near Table Rock, west of Rawlins.  To the east of here, rivers end up in the Atlantic in one form or another; to the west they're supposed to flow into the Pacific, but most of them wander off into the Great Basin and are never heard of again.

Much of southern Wyoming looks like this:

Wyoming.  Monday.

There are sage grouse in this picture, but they are not very big and are uncommonly well camouflaged.  I could hear them going bok-bok-bok-bok, but that's all.  This particular bit of Wyoming doesn't have snow fences to prevent the prevailing south-westerlies from burying I-80 on a regular basis, but most of it does.  After Laramie it's back over the highest point on I-80.

Ironically it was after this that the trouble started, in the form of further low cloud.  As the road drops from more than 2,600 metres at the top to about 330 here in Lincoln, clearly we weren't going to be in the clouds very long.  Resentfully, they repaid the weary traveller with rain of a Several of different intensities.  Temperatures ranged from 7 degrees while climbing through the Exhalations of the Earth early in the day to a massive 17 degrees on arriving in Lincoln.  In the rain.  Top-down motoring was not even contemplated chiz.

Tomorrow will see the first Unknown Territories of the return leg of the trip, as from here I'll soon be vectored south down I-29, parallel to the Fairly Mighty Missouri and into Parts Beyond.  Looks like the route passes around Kansas City but given the trouble I had finding the place last year, another visit to Stull isn't on the cards.

Additional:  I thought my lapdancer's keyboard had gone as wobbly as Primal 2 on a windy day so rebooted it while I went for a smoke.  It was in a state of unbootedness when I returned so I tried again.  It got about halfway through and then died.  I finally found that it wasn't getting any mains power.  Given the run-time with the current state of the flattery (crap), it was hardly surprising.  Plug into a different wall socket; appropriate blinkenlights blink, in a lighted manner.  The Automatic Diary lives on!  Also thanks to Bram and Annette for the e-mail.  It's always nice to discover that there's more than just the handful of followers who read this Bobbins.