Montana to Utah - Out of the Smoke & Manda-Mask Land Into the Heat & Societal Normalcy

After 2.5 months in Montana, I finally decided it was time to move on, and decided to head south to Utah, to a beautiful and remote area I had camped at in May. After spending all of Thursday packing up my campsite and running some last minute errands, on Friday I spent all day driving from Big Sky, Montana to a spot in the mountains of the Fish Lake National Forest in Central Utah outside the little towns of Richfield and Salina. It was a first for me since I embarked on the nomadic camping lifestyle a year ago, covering so much ground in one day and the longest day of driving I’ve had in many years - close to 600 miles in about 12 hours including stops.

After some breakfast and getting the car all packed up, we left the campsite I had called home for over a month at 10am, and I let Dakota run with the car down the gravel forest service road for a couple miles knowing it was the only exercise she’d be able to get all day. I was excited to have devised a new way to carry my skis on top of the car (pinned under my roof bag) so I didn’t have to have them inside the car, where they become a major pain in the butt.

Dakota wasn’t stoked about being cooped up in the car all day, but she behaved herself. I was personally hoping the smoky atmosphere would diminish the further south I got, but I didn’t have my hopes up, knowing how bad the west coast fires are right now...

It was quite interesting to see the rapidly changing scenery and wide variety of pandemic-perception climates from town to town. It seemed that no businesses in West Yellowstone were bothering to even attempt to enforce the Montana mask mandates, and the gas station I stopped at didn’t even have any type of required notice of the mandate on the door, and neither of the clerks were wearing masks, not even a bandana around their necks! What a change from Big Sky and Bozeman where the employees in nearly every store are wearing masks, no doubt by employer requirement...

Arriving in the beautiful town of Ashton, Idaho, the smoke was still awful, blocking the nice scenic views, but no notices of mask requirements, so it was the first time in months I didn’t feel like an outlaw for entering a store as a normal human daring to show my face. Apparently there are no mask mandates in Idaho, but strangely the ‘pandemic’ is just as nonexistent there as in Montana...

It was still smoky in northern Utah, but not as bad as Montana and Idaho, and began to dissipate slightly the further south we got, it seemed. Around Salt Lake City one could at least see the surrounding mountains, something the thick smoke further north had hindered.

There is apparently a county-wide mask mandate covering Salt Lake City and the surrounding area, but I noticed many people in noncompliance, and nobody was attempting to enforce it in their businesses as far as I could tell. I never got hassled for not wearing a mask, and never saw any other non compliant patrons getting hassled, so it would appear the Covid coolaid is wearing off all across the country.

No mask mandates and literally no one wearing masks anywhere south of Ogden, which really just seems like the southern edge of Salt Lake City. It just goes to show that the ‘pandemic’ is literally only in peoples’ minds at this point, and for those who unplug from the news and get back to normal life, everything is back to normal. What is glaringly obvious from traveling through areas with such different covid fear levels is that the only thing preventing society from a complete return to normal is peoples’ fear and hesitancy to embrace normal life, not some virus.

After making it through Salt Lake City, which is always like driving through a war zone with the heavy traffic, I let out a big sigh of relief as it had been a good two hours of jam-packed 7 lane interstate traffic... It didn’t help going through Salt Lake at rush hour, but it was the northbound traffic that was really bad by the looks of it, slowed to a standstill for miles, while the southbound traffic was just a matter of full roads without the total traffic jams. 14 total lanes of traffic is a lot of road, and a lot of traffic!

But then to my surprise, the smoky conditions began to rapidly clear up the further south we got! There was one small fire in the mountains just south of Ogden right off the highway, but it looked to be under control, and the amount of smoke it was generating must have been minuscule in comparison to the west coast fires.

It was nice to have clear views again, and a pretty sunset before nightfall.

Then it was a couple more hours driving in the dark before reaching our destination. Finally arrived at around 10pm, 12 hours after departing, and it felt really awesome to be out of the car for good and get some sleep!

Dakota was especially happy to get out of the car and stretch her legs before bed.

No smoke here that I can tell, and just as beautiful as I had remembered, though instead of snow-capped peaks, now everything is bursting with autumn colors.

It’s quite a bit warmer down here than Montana (which is still experiencing above average temps), but much milder up at 7,600-7,700 feet elevation in the Mountains where I’m at compared to the hot valley temperatures. Only getting up into the 80s in the daytime, rather than the 90s like down in the nearby valleys, but still got cool nights at least.

After unpacking and setting up my new camp all day Saturday, interspersed with a few short hikes with Dakota, it felt good to have a nice relaxing evening with a movie and a frozen pizza I was able to cook on my wood stove, and be able to get to bed at a decent hour.

The views remind me why I fell in love with this area, and the level of peace and quiet is hard to beat.

Had a nice evening walk right before sunset collecting some firewood from among the burned junipers from a wildfire of times past.

Then the sunset arrived, which was pretty.

There’s some cows in the area, and I heard coyotes last night, but no human neighbors within at least several miles.

No light pollution either, with the closest tiny town over 30 miles away, this darkness really illuminating the true extent of the starry skies. Last night there was briefly a tiny sliver moon, setting almost as soon as darkness fell.

I appreciated the amazing view out of the front of my tent this morning, having finally gotten a good night’s sleep with some free time to look forward to, after spending three long busy days of packing, driving, and unpacking...