Part 2 of 3: Corinne to Tremonton via ATK and The Transcontinental Railroad

[Frulk_imp]

This is Part 2 of 3. Just before you arrive in Corinne, Utah you come across this sign.



Corinne is the last gas station for a while. Knowing this I have two 32oz MSR Gas bottles in the bags. .54 of a gallon was what the receipt said I put in them total as the manufacturer recommends not filling them to the limit. Gas is relatively high in this one horse town (Not of course when compared to what we were paying in the recent past). Gas can be bought for about 10-15 cents cheaper in more developed areas.



Mim's is the last place for a cold one for miles in these parts. The inside is one part dive bar, one part greasy spoon, and no parts franchise. You won't find Land Rover's covered with 26.2, Dirty Mudder, and so forth stickers sitting out front. This place isn't for the Park City/Aspen crowd. PBR (Poor Bikers Refreshment) is top shelf stuff for this establishment. The service is friendly and the food hits the spot.



Once west of Corinne you're basically riding on the old prehistoric Lake Bonneville lake bed and can open the CB up to all she can do (with or without that rev limiter). I cruised along at 60 mph and took in the horizon to horizon views. this view is to the southeast of the road I'm traveling on and shows the first ever public waterfowl management (hunting) area in the US (dedicated in the 1930's)



This pic shows the road junction where you can turn left and follow the road along the old Transcontinental Rail Road grade over the hill and on to the Golden Spike memorial several miles away (site of the meeting of the east and west crews working to complete the Transcontinental Railroad). In the middle of the this pic just to the right and above the second bent is 'The Cut'.



Here in the pic you see a notch looking back east where I came from. Just on the other side of 'The Cut' was a large chasm and it constituted one of the most difficult sections of the entire railroad east of the Sierra Nevadas for the workers to complete. Originally a 400 foot long wooden trestle bridge spanned it as it was the quickest way to complete it. I think only 4 trains crossed it before men filled in the entire span with wheel barrows. The plaque said 500 men working for two solid months from sun up to sun down is what it took to complete it.



I decided not to head to the Golden Spike Memorial site because I've been there and was more interested in finding a road my buddy had told me about. I headed back down the grade and made a left at the junction and came up to the ATK Headquarters and rocket display. ATK builds all of our orbital missile motors to include intercontinental nuclear platforms and the Space Shuttle Boosters.

The long 'booster' rocket in the pic is used on the space shuttle. Two of those plus the shuttles motors provide the thrust to get it into orbit. The shorter of the two upright missiles is what the Navy carries on subs, the taller is in the USAF inventory. The pic shows a scale that just doesn't reflect the sheer size of these beasts.



Heading north takes you past one of the many industrial complex areas that ATK uses for research. Again, as above pictures do not do it justice. This is a VAST area with innumerable buildings of all shapes and sizes covering thousands if not tens of thousands of acres.



Once you come around the northwest corner of the Thiokol Complex and begin to head east you come across this sign.



As I was contemplating the sign I saw the headlights of 3 bikes coming down the road at me. A Honda Fury, Harley and another road bike passed me. I thought to myself that if a Fury can make it how bad can it be so I took off. Turned out to be a beautiful little stretch of road with twisties and scenic to boot. The narrow canyon had snow on both sides so temps dropped quickly in those parts.



After a few miles heading due east I came to this scenic point overlooking the town of Tremonton, Utah with the Wasatch Mountains in the background



Once in Tremonton I again stopped at the local War Memorial and took a couple of photos. One Tremonton family in particular knows about the high price of freedom all too well.







This is a good place to end for this segment. I'll post the final pictures tomorrow in Part 3