Goose Meadows NF Campground, Truckee, CA, to High Desert RV Park, Winnemucka, NV:  Left this morning at a little after 9:00.  Mike started out driving.  Back down the long hill into Reno and I80 followed the Truckee River until it turned north where it empties into Pyramid Lake.  We’re now in high desert with mountains all around us.  Not much vegetation—just some sagebrush and scrub.  The mountains are devoid of any vegetation.  Stopped at Lovelock, NV, for lunch and then I took over driving.  Stopped at a Flying J for fuel and got here about 1:30 and set up.  Catching up on my blog and then will let cable TV wash over us.

Emerald Bay, Lake Tahoe

Thu, 8/25/11:
Goose Meadows NF Campground, Truckee, CA:  After 10 days of “roughing it” we leave tomorrow to head home.  It wasn’t exactly roughing it, but we had no hook-ups.  Our solar panels keep the batteries fully charged, and we have our shower, etc.  But in order to fill our water tank we have to fill two six-gallon plastic jugs from the water faucet here at the campground and then transfer them to our tank.  And to do that Mike had fashioned a pump with two hoses (one sucking the water out and the other flowing into the tank) which makes that part of it much easier. But once we fill them Mike still has to lift them into the truck.  6 gallons of water is very heavy. We headed to the Laundromat and grocery store, came back and put everything away and then started getting ready to leave tomorrow morning.   Played Aggravation again.  I won again.  Yes! 

View of Reno from way up in the mountains on the way to Virginia City.

Virginia City

Wed, 8/24/11:
Goose Meadows NF Campground, Truckee, CA:  Drove over to Virginia City this morning.  I drove for a change to give Mike a break.  Back on Rt. 80 again and down the big hill 30 miles or so through the Truckee River canyon or valley to Reno and then south on 395 and then northeast on 341. Reno is a lot bigger than we thought.  Going south on I395 is where Reno is expanding.  When we got on 341 and started up over the mountains we saw warning signs of wild horses in the area.  Never saw any however.  We went up, up, up over the sagebrush-covered mountains and then down into the historic Virginia City.  Looks pretty much like it did back in the 1800s.  Gold was discovered first, but it’s mostly noted for the silver mines.  Still have wooden sidewalks.  A guy named Samuel Clements worked in one of the mines here. It was said that he was the worst miner ever.  He wrote a book about his experiences, “Roughing It”, which I bought at the local book store.  Should be a good read. He ended up on the editorial staff of the Territorial Enterprise, however, writing for the first time under the name of Mark Twain.  We took a train ride up to Gold Hill and back.  Then walked around Virginia City for a while and took a little tour.  Had lunch at the Sawdust Corners Rest. We also discovered that a guy by the name of George Hearst, father of William Randolph Hearst, made a fortune as a broker here in Virginia City. Who knew?  Drove back down through the mountains, back through Reno, and then back to Truckee and our site.  Another beautiful day.  Mid-80s up in Virginia City, 96 in Reno.  Probably low 80s back at Goose Meadows on the Truckee River.  

Denizens of Virginia City

School (kindergarten through 12th grade) built in 1875, complete with flush toilets 

Newspaper where Mark Twain first wrote under this pseudonym

Tue, 8/23/11:
Goose Meadows NF Campground, Truckee, CA:  Up early this morning—for us anyway.  Crawled out at 7:00 a.m. because I booked us on an 80-foot yacht, the Sierra Rose.  Had to drive over to the western shore and needed to be there by 10:00.  We left before 9:00 and just made it.  We shoved off at 10:30.  This was the most pleasurable day.  There were only 16 people on board and a crew of 3.  And instead of stripping this boat down and putting in all kinds of chairs to fit more people, the boat was in its original, luxurious state.  A beautiful salon, an afterdeck with lounging chairs, and the bow had a divan, chaise, and a table with chairs. There were three staterooms—a master suite with two baths, and two others with twin beds and its own bath.  Most of us were on the upper deck outside.  And they let people smoke up there.  Mike was very happy.  We sat with a couple of girls from Chicago who were smokers and had a great time.  Had several drinks from the bar onboard  and they served a great lunch of beef and chicken kabobs, rice pilaf, Caesar salad, fresh fruit, and brownies.  We were on the lake for 4 hours.  We saw a bunch of historic boats go by—mostly woodies, and the captain gave us a great history of some of the homes and establishments on this beautiful lake. One of the homes was the Fleur du Lac—the home that was used in Godfather II.  We also cruised into beautiful Emerald Bay.  A perfect day on this beautiful lake.  Back to our site and relaxed the rest of the day.

Main salon

Aft of the main salon.

Way up on top.

Vikingsholm Castle--built in 1929--Emerald Bay, Lake Tahoe

The only island on the lake, owned by the owner of Vikingsholm Castle

A little tea house built on the island by the mistress of Vikingsholm Castle.  She took guests out there by boat.

Fleur du Lac--Mansion used in Godfather II

According to our Captain, this is a very rare sight on Lake Tahoe.  It's a 1930s era racing boat, built out of aircraft quality aluminum.  It's very fast.

Mon, 8/22/11:
Goose Meadows NF Campground, Truckee, CA:  Headed out this morning to go to Carson City and then Virginia City.  But I said, we’re so close to Mono Lake from Carson City, why don’t we just drive down there first.  So we did.  Went through Carson City, which sits in a big valley.  Looks really nice.  The place we went through that I loved the most was Gardnerville, about 40 miles south of Reno.  This little town is so neat—both literally and figuratively.  The sidewalks all look like they’ve been freshly swept; the grass along the main drive through town was green and meticulously cut.  The main street had huge hanging flowers all over that were beautifully maintained.  The white board fencing looks like it was just painted.  Just a really cute town with a lot of historic buildings nicely maintained as well.  Continued south along the eastern Sierras along bubbling, pristine streams and through narrow canyons.  A beautiful drive.  We finally got to Mono Lake which was really different.  The lake is very saline and there are these rock formations jutting out of the water.  There were a couple of dormant volcanoes around the lake as well.  After checking out Mono Lake we then decided we may as well go into the eastern entrance of Yosemite and up to Tioga Pass.  Which we did.  And except for the fact that the road was pretty scary in places, it was absolutely beautiful.  There were a myriad of crystal clear streams and water falls.  And one alpine lake after another.  It was indeed beautiful.  Had lunch at the historic Tioga Pass Lodge which was built in 1914.  There was a lodge and several cabins along another pristine little stream.  After a delicious lunch we started back and decided to stop at a ghost town we’d heard about—Bodie.  Only 13 miles off the main road (I395), but there was a 20-minute delay because of some road work and then the last 3 miles was a very rough dirt road.  But this ghost town was something.  In its heyday it boasted a population of 10,000.  The buildings left there were just a fraction of the original town.  It was a gold mining town of fairly ill repute.  It sits way back in sagebrush-covered hills.  I didn’t know sagebrush smelled so good.  While we were waiting for the road construction delay, I opened the window and was amazed at the wonderful fragrances wafting in.  And when we got up in the hills a ways you could see the beautiful eastern Sierras spread out before you.  Quite breathtaking.  Left Bodie at 6:00 and headed back.  Figured we had a three-hour drive ahead of us.  We made it back closer to 10:00.  Tired.  But the drive was worth it.  

Mono Lake with its unusual formations.

There are a couple of dormant volcanoes around the lake.

Alpine meadow--eastern Yosemite

Beautiful alpine lake--eastern Yosemite

Another beautiful alpine lake--eastern Yosemite.

Gas station--Bodie ghost town

One of the homes--Bodie ghost town

Store front--Bodie ghost town

One of the mines in Bodie

After the big "Comstock Load" was discovered in Virginia City, the rush was on in the area and gold was discovered in Bodie in 1859.  The town grew from 20 people to 10,000 in one year!  The town had a terrible reputation.  The last man to live there left in 1974.  Don't know how long he lived there all by himself.  Must have been creepy.  

Lake Tahoe

Sun, 8/21/11:
Goose Meadows NF Campground, Truckee, CA:  Got up late again and relaxed outside reading and enjoying the peace and quiet of this place.  Topped off the water tank.  Then we drove to Tahoe City and had lunch at the Gar Wood restaurant out on their deck overlooking beautiful Lake Tahoe.  A couple of people in swimming.  Water temp is 68 degrees!.  After lunch we drove to a little park by the dam.  They dammed up the outflow from the lake to the Truckee River some years ago in order to control water levels—both in the river and the lake.  Another amazing fact about Lake Tahoe—once water makes its way into the lake, it stays for a long time.  It is estimated that the water stays in Lake Tahoe 700 years!  By comparison, water stays in Lake Erie 2 years!  That means that some of the water going down the Truckee River was here when Marco Polo returned to Europe!  That is just amazing to me.  Had a camp fire tonight.  Played cards.  Then turned in.

Lake Tahoe

Sat, 8/20/11:
Goose Meadows NF Campground, Truckee, CA:  Putzed around all morning.  Got talking with the couple next to us who came in last night. They live in a little town south of Reno.  I was telling her how dry my hands have been since we got here.  She said, well it is the desert.  Here in Lake Tahoe, I said?  With all the water around us?  And pine trees?  Doesn’t matter, she said.  It’s still the desert.  In fact, on average one million four hundred thousand tons of water evaporate from Lake Tahoe every 24 hours!  That’s amazing.  Where does it go?  We sure haven’t had any rain here.  It is a conundrum.  After lunch we drove to Reno.  Only 30 miles east on Rt. 80.  This section of Rt. 80 was pristine.  The section before the Truckee exit was all chewed up.  Chains are mandatory here in the winter.  I guess they do a number on the highways.  Reno is much smaller than Las Vegas, but seemingly more livable.  We parked in the Circus-Circus Casino garage and walked around a little.  Went into the Silver Legacy Casino because we were intrigued by the huge dome that was part of the building.  Turns out the dome housed a life-size replica of a silver mine shaft.  Pretty amazing.  Gambled a little.  For a change I won.  Went to the bar and had a drink to celebrate and played some video poker.  Looks like gamblers’ anonymous is in our future.  Had a great prime rib dinner at one of the restaurants in the Silver Legacy Casino and then drove back to our site.

Mine structure inside the Silver Legacy Casino.

Lake Tahoe

Fri, 8/19/11:
Goose Meadows NF Campground, Truckee, CA:  Drove all the way around Lake Tahoe today.  It’s 75 miles around.  The lake is 22 miles long and 12 miles wide.  It never freezes in the winter because of its depth.  The water is constantly in motion—the warmer water at the top sinking and the cooler water at the bottom rising.  The water is very clear.  You can supposedly see the bottom in 80 feet of water.  But it’s cold—39 degrees in the depths and 68 at the surface.  However, we saw some brave people in there    Some of the gated homes around the lake are amazing.  We made several stops to enjoy the views.  The southwestern side of the lake is much more rugged and still in its natural state.  Must be National Forest or State Park lands.  South Lake Tahoe in Nevada is probably the most developed town on the lake.  Several casinos and hotels.  Tahoe City near us is probably the second largest town.  The other towns that dot the shores are pretty small.  

Pictures don't do justice to the water colors and clarity.  They are amazing!

Lake Tahoe

Thu, 8/18/11:
Goose Meadows NF Campground, Truckee, CA:  Colder in here this morning than yesterday morning—41 degrees!  It was so hard to get out from under the covers!  After our morning ablutions and filling the fresh water tank, we drove down to Squaw Valley which was the site of the 1960 winter Olympics.  It’s just 8 miles down Rt. 89 between Truckee and Lake Tahoe.  Parked and walked around the village a little and had lunch at the Blue Coyote overlooking one of the ski runs.  After lunch we drove east on 80 to Donner Memorial State Park and visited the museum there.  Part of the Donner party spent the winter on the eastern end of Donner Lake and the other on a stream several miles away.  Of the 90 people in the party, 48 perished and 42 survived.  How these people made it through the Sierras is beyond me. In some of the rocky and boulder-strewn areas they actually had to unload their wagons, dismantle them, and then haul them up over the cliff or boulder with ropes and then reassemble them and reload them.  Amazing resilience of these early pioneers. We drove up over the pass and then back down to the lake.  Donner Lake is nowhere near as big as Tahoe, but it’s just as pretty without all the congestion.  Back to our peaceful, quiet site and enjoyed the rest of the afternoon.  85 today once the sun made it over the mountains.  Once the sun dips behind the mountains though it cools down quickly.

Squaw Valley

Showshoe Thompson

Snowshoe Thompson, a native of Norway, carried the mail on his back for 90 miles over the 7500 ft. mountain passes through blizzards with winds of up to 80 miles per hour and drifts up to 50 feet high.  He did this 2 to 4 times a month from 1856 to 1876 no matter what the weather.  He did this on his homemade 10-ft. long 25 pound skies from Placerville, CA, to Genoa, NV.  He also carried a six-foot long pole he used like a tightrope walker for balance and he pack could weigh up to 100 pounds.  What a guy!

Picture of me in front of the Donner Memorial.  The snow level at that time (1846) was 22 ft.--the top of the stonework on this memorial.

Pretty Donner Lake

Bridge just before the pass.  This is the kind of terrain the immigrants had to deal with.