I drive through it a few times a year, living in Denver but have family in Minnesota/Wisconsin. As crazy as it sounds, at least you have small towns and corn fields along I-80. There are some areas in Colorado (stretches of I-76, US-287 between Hugo and Kit Carson) where there’s just… Nothing. Like, you’d be surprised at how much more empty a corn field can be, and it totally does weird you out how far you are from a simple gas station, let alone a familiar McDonald’s (neither of those towns have that; I believe you’d have to go from Limon to Lamar to get from one McDonald’s to the next on that road, which is almost 2 hours)
I lived in Utah for 6 years and loved driving through the empty parts of Utah and Colorado. Even Nevada sort of a little bit. I found it a far more stark, imposing, beautiful emptiness. Like “I could literally die if I broke down here…that’s so cool.” I remember one time driving out from SLC to Dinosaur, CO for the dispensary, and that stretch was just stunning. At one point, I had two dust devils spinning off to my right, and a rainstorm way off to my left over these lush, Shire-esque rolling green hills. I miss the west already.
I drive through it a few times a year, living in Denver but have family in Minnesota/Wisconsin. As crazy as it sounds, at least you have small towns and corn fields along I-80. There are some areas in Colorado (stretches of I-76, US-287 between Hugo and Kit Carson) where there’s just… Nothing. Like, you’d be surprised at how much more empty a corn field can be, and it totally does weird you out how far you are from a simple gas station, let alone a familiar McDonald’s (neither of those towns have that; I believe you’d have to go from Limon to Lamar to get from one McDonald’s to the next on that road, which is almost 2 hours)
I lived in Utah for 6 years and loved driving through the empty parts of Utah and Colorado. Even Nevada sort of a little bit. I found it a far more stark, imposing, beautiful emptiness. Like “I could literally die if I broke down here…that’s so cool.” I remember one time driving out from SLC to Dinosaur, CO for the dispensary, and that stretch was just stunning. At one point, I had two dust devils spinning off to my right, and a rainstorm way off to my left over these lush, Shire-esque rolling green hills. I miss the west already.
Empty Colorado isn’t really flat though. It has rolling hills. Nebraska and Kansas are like Minecraft superflat worlds.
Eastern Colorado might as well be west Kansas. Both areas I mentioned are in eastern Colorado.