Riding Around Utah

GPS Tracking via APRS worked Great Today
We parked at my sister Neena's home not far from Ogden on Thursday night after a long day wobbling with the wind in the RV coming across Windyoming.  After a short visit with her and Bill, we decided to ride the bikes over to my brother Bruce's house since it is only a few miles away in Syracuse.  There is a nice rail-to-trail path that supposedly goes all the way down to Provo, so we rode a few blocks to the west, not far from the Great Salt Lake, and picked up the trail southwards.  It turned out to be a VERY nice trail, with at least one exception:  When encountering many city streets, cyclists must dismount and wrestle their rides over CURBS on both sides of the street.  Then, you're back on the beautiful rail-trail for maybe a few blocks and then ANOTHER curbed non-crossing.  Obviously a committee - designed pathway:  Provide a nice path for cyclists and walkers, but of COURSE automobiles must have the priority and go their way unfettered by cyclists.  After about 4 miles, the path didn't seem to be taking us due south - it was veering ever so slightly toward the east.  So we turned onto city streets, got on 1000 West, which is the way we go when we drive, and rode the last 3 miles to our destination.  Most of these Utah streets are WIDE with wide shoulders, and much of our street riding was marked with a bike lane, and the drivers were tolerant and courteous.  Occasionally a street narrows when outside one of the many suburb-city limits but, again, the drivers were good to us and didn't mash or sideswipe us.  We encountered a couple drivers who pulled out of side streets in front of us as though we were invisible but that's no change from anywhere we've ridden, especially including home in NM.
After about an hour's visit, we enquired where the famed bike path was that was supposed to be closer to their house, and were directed to a nearby Jensen Park, where a bike trail goes through and around it.  There was no pathway going directly north so we rode the one going northwest, hoping it would get us to another path that would take us to Sunset instead of the Great Salt Lake, around whose periphery we were riding.  A daddy-daughter couple on bikes showed a fork in the path that would take us "Straight to Sunset".  As we rode, however,  we found ourselves quite a bit west of our intended direction, and my old Garmin 350 doesn't compute the Utah street addresses like "350 W 3200 S", nor does it even SHOW the city of Sunset.  There's a Smith's Food King about a block away from our desired destination so I made the Garmin find the store, which Garmin insists is in Layton instead of Sunset.  Regardless, it now guided us back towards the correct direction.  We enjoyed the ride, though much of it on city streets, and even though the outbound ride to Syracuse was 6 miles and the misguided return trip was 12 miles.  It was lovely weather and a great day to be exploring unfamiliar bikeways.  We'd love to explore the north / south trail that supposedly goes almost a hundred miles, but not if we have to jump curbs every few city blocks.  The old railway certainly didn't have to jump curbs to get through, but of course trains have the right-of-way and can't be expected to stop abruptly every so often - unlike what is expected of cyclists.
Stats from the GPS: Total Miles: 18.26
Overall average speed            Moving Avg               Max Speed
  4.5 MPH                                7 MPH                       20.8 MPH
Total Trip time                       Moving Time             Stopped Time
  4 hours 2 mins                     2 hours 35 mins         1 hour 27 minutes