Great Lakes Road Trip Day 1 Part 2; San Francisco to Detroit

Eventually after sitting at the airport in San Francisco for a good solid three and half hours I did get underway towards Detroit.

At first I thought the flight path was going to head directly over CA 108 via Sonora Pass given that I could see the city of Sonora below in the Sierra Foothills. Sonora is the location of CA 108 and CA 49:

Instead the flight path basically took a direct shot east via Yosemite National Park and the Tioga Pass Road:

Before exiting California Nevada the flight took a pass over Mono Lake which is traversed on three sides by; US 395, CA 167, and CA 120:

My flight path followed US 6 through the state of Nevada which meant passing some notable features like the White Mountain Range just over the state line and the Crescent Dunes Solar Energy Project near Tonopah:

Entering Utah the flight path followed mostly I-70 which allowed decent views of three National Parks starting with Capitol Reef and the Water Pocket Ford:

The Canyonlands via the Green River:

Along with Arches with US 191 seen traversing the Moab Fault:

Unfortunately there was heavy cloud cover over the Rockies and in particular the Front Range which prevented much from being seen that was noteworthy. Really there wasn't much worth looking at out the window until downtown Chicago and Lake Michigan:

My destination was at Metro Airport in the old terminal building which has had a surprisingly nice remodel since I've visited last. I saw the traffic was bad on I-96 and I-275 so I decided to try US 23 to Brighton instead. US 23 was actually undergoing heavy construction due to a lane expansion project from Ann Arbor to I-96. The US 23 freeway was way busier than I remember it but it has probably been at least 2001 since I've used it to go through Ann Arbor.

Comments

Nick said…

To clarify, you didn't fly into a remodeled terminal in Detroit; it was the new North Terminal that was built in 2008 (assuming you flew on a non-Delta flight). The old terminals (Smith, Berry, and Davey) are no longer used for passengers. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Detroit_Metropolitan_Airport#North_Terminal

9:03 AM

Deer Isle Bridge in Maine

As graceful a bridge that I ever set my eyes upon, the Deer Isle Bridge (officially known as the Deer Isle-Sedgwick Bridge) surprisingly caught my eye as I was driving around coastal Maine one Saturday afternoon. About 35 miles south of Bangor, Maine , the Deer Isle Bridge connects the Blue Hill Peninsula of Downeast Maine with Little Deer Isle over the Eggemoggin Reach on ME 15 between the towns of Sedgwick and Deer Isle . It should be noted that Little Deer Isle is connected to Deer Isle by way of a boulder lined causeway, and there is a storied regatta that takes place on the Eggemoggin Reach each summer. But the Deer Isle Bridge holds many stories, not just for the vacationers who spend part of their summer on Deer Isle or in nearby Stonington , but for the residents throughout the years and the folks who have had a hand bringing this vital link to life. The Deer Isle Bridge was designed by David Steinman and built by the Phoenix Bridge Company of Phoenixville,

Former US Route 99 through Athlone and the last Wheeler Ridge-Sacramento corridor expressway

Athlone was a siding of the Southern Pacific Railroad located in Merced County on the alignment of what was US Route 99 between the cities of Chowchilla and Merced. The Athlone corridor of US Route 99 was one of the first in San Joaquin Valley to fully upgraded to four lane expressway standards. The Athlone expressway corridor was inherited by California State Route 99 when US Route 99 was truncated to Ashland, Oregon during June 1965. The four-lane expressway through Athlone was the last segment of what had been US Route 99 in the Wheeler Ridge-Sacramento corridor to be bypassed by a freeway. The Athlone expressway corridor was bypassed by the modern California State Route 99 freeway in 2016. Despite being put on a road diet and narrowed what was the Athlone expressway corridor still displays evidence of being part of US Route 99. Above the blog cover photo displays the Athlone expressway corridor of US Route 99 south of Merced as depicted in the July 1939 California Highways &

California State Route 38

California State Route 38 is a fifty-nine-mile State Highway located entirety in San Bernardino County and a component of the Rim of the World Highway. California State Route 38 begins at California State Route 18 at Bear Valley Dam of the San Bernardino Mountains and follows an easterly course on the north shore of Big Bear Lake. California State Route 38 briefly multiplexes California State Route 18 near Baldwin Lake and branches east towards the 8,443-foot-high Onyx Summit. From Onyx Summit the routing of California State Route 38 reverses course following a largely westward path through the San Bernardino Mountains towards a terminus at Interstate 10 in Redlands. Pictured as the blog cover is California State Route 38 at Onyx Summit the day it opened to traffic on August 12th, 1961. Part 1; the history of California State Route 38 California State Route 38 (CA 38) is generally considered to be the back way through the San Bernardino Mountains to Big Bear Lake of Bear Valley

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