I figured besides wanting to make sure we were alive the next thing you’d want to know is, How is that near beer? We gave it an honest shot and both were disappointed. It’s not that it doesn’t work per say, but the feeling of intoxication and joy must be constantly tended to. Meaning if you are not actively drinking you are rapidly becoming sober. I don’t know about you but I drink to get drunk, near beer feels more life chasing the dragon. So when in Utah, plan ahead and hit the government distributors. Not to bash it completely, I could see drinking this.. Nevermind I can’t. I guess if you wanna pay about the same for less and don’t want to be that asshole parent at your kid’s baseball game this is what you should drink.
On to the day.  We did our best and failed to stay dry today. Early this morning we did about 13 miles of gravel roads. They were pretty innocent enough only a little mud here and there, and a few hair pins covered in loose rock. Nothing we can’t handle. We were treated to some really beautiful scenery, again I was reminded of Alaska by the size of the mountains and the way the clouds do their thing around them.
We rode through a few small towns after the gravel road into a place called Paradise Valley. Paradise is a bit of a stretch but it was a really nice area.
Then we hit the highway to make our way through Salt Lake City. Holy moly do they drive like shit. People passing us at highway speeds texting, their lane changes we sudden, and their overall speed was whatever they felt like. At one point I said to Kat,  “I’m uncomfortable”  he agreed. We’ve both seen how bad the bay area can be, but this was a different monster. In the bay area if there is a slight bend in the highway or something remotely interesting on the side of the road, you won’t know it till 30 minutes from now because they basically stop. Here it was the opposite, speed up in turns, hey is that an emergency vehicle?  Who cares! We were glad once that was over. Some advice to others, if your on a bike skip the city if you want to live. In a car, at least you’ll survive but I’d skip it anyway.
We saw the “great” salt lake. We tried to figure out what makes it Great and came up with nothing. From here on out will be the big salt lake.
As we left town the rain started. We were heading towards our first National scenic byway but the rain picked up and the road was out. We turned back and headed for highway, we’ve got a movie to make. The rain got worse but the drivers got better. Wet and more tired than I expected we made it to Nephi.