> US 50 has been described as the world's (maybe the nation's) loneliest highway.
> If it were me, I'd stick with the freeway...I'm not into ghost towns.
Its "loneliest road" reputation sells postcards and T-shirts a lot
better than it holds up under statistical or anecdotal scrutiny. I
wouldn't want to tackle it in an iffy car, and as of my last trip in
the mid-90s you could end up spending a Sunday or holiday night in some
little town because the last gas station for quite some miles was
closed, and like any Western road it could get exciting as a storm
front came through; but it isn't as though the last guy through there,
three days ago, is the reason the buzzards are circling in the next
valley. All in all you'll find it fairly typical of two-lane
blacktop in the rural bits of your own region.
If long stretches of lonesome are what you want, US 6 from Ely down to
'pah, or the north-south state highways that connect it to 50 and 80,
would serve a lot better. Hardly on the way from Salt Lake to Oregon,
of course!
Highway 50 has some mountains, too. Pick up John McPhee's _Basin and
Range_ for some local color, as well as, of course, the appropriate
bits of _Blue Highways_. You'll be doing more vertical travel than on
I-80, and that's a consideration under icing conditions or in active
snow.
Enjoy your trip,
--Joe
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