Dang Hot!

When we made the reservation here in Baker, I started thinking about all the weird places we have stayed as a traveling duo.  The Portland airport Ramada certainly comes to mind as the hotel I'm most glad I survived. I slept in my clothes and showered in my shoes. Gross. But just as a weird place in general, there were several in Italy that might fit the bill, namely the room in Venice. It was so small that the door hit the queen sized bed, and you had to crawl across it to get to the other side. That, and I woke up with 27 mosquito bites on my face from the canal! I thought this "End of the Trail-er" would join this dubious list, but is has turned out to be quite delightful. It is a portion of a trailer (other part is storage) situated nearly on the grounds of Great Basin National Park. We awoke to this amazing view this morning. 

Isn't it beautiful? We poured some iced coffee and took our scones outside for breakfast. Where it was already 99 degrees!! Planning for an in-the-car day, we packed our water bottles and headed for the scenic drive in Great Basin. 

The Great Basin is an area of watersheds that covers nearly all of Nevada, and parts of Oregon, Idaho, Utah, California, and Wyoming. It basically covers areas where water in any form (snow melt, precipitation etc.) does not make its way to the Pacific or Gulf of Mexico. It drains to lakes, evaporates, or drains to ground water.  And that's about as best as I can explain it! This area gets 10 inches of rain annually. ANNUALLY!! Isn't that so hard to understand? Living on the coast, in an area that can get up to 100 inches of rain, it is hard to fathom a place with so little water. 

The scenic drive took us through old mining districts, stands of aspen, and up to about 10,000 feet. 

After viewing the park in fits and spurts, we were HOT. Real hot. We packed our cooler, and set out (in the air conditioned vehicle) for the Osceola mining district. It's another back road story, only this time we knew that we were on the right road! Gold mining began here in 1872, and during its heyday, there were around 1,500 people living in Osceola. Mining dried up around 1900, and the town was almost completely lost to fire in 1940.

Our last find, leaving the canyon, was the Osceola cemetery. 

Later, after we returned home and were trying to get our body temperatures back to normal, I did some digging on the group of "Marriott" graves. Most of them were children, but there were three adults. The Marriotts (of the hotel group) are from Utah, and ranched in the mountains in Utah and Nevada. I dug up some family trees, and would love to find a connection between the folks in this cemetery and the Marriott hotel family.  My efforts have been slightly hampered by the popularity of the name John.... ;)

Um, IT'S HOT HERE!!!  We have those awesome cool towels to help with the temperature, and I found relief wearing mine turban style. A girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do!

Tomorrow we are up early to beat the heat and hopefully conquer the altitude to see the bristlecone pines. 

💟

Cherry Creek Adventure

Today we drove out of Idaho, headed for Nevada. We had our first stop penciled in about six hours down the road, so when we saw the sign for an "Interstate Oasis" we pulled right off for an unplanned photo op. This oasis was Shoshone Falls which is part of Twin Falls on the Snake River. I've never been to Niagra Falls, but this looked similar to the pictures I've seen. It's about 1,000 feet wide (thank you Wikipedia) in a horsheshoe shape and consists of several indivual falls. As imagined, it was beautiful.

https://youtu.be/v6sLj9zubmk

Please enjoy this short video as it took 400% longer to upload than shoot. ;) (Full disclosure, I did not do the math on that %, though I seriously considered it. 😆)

In case you tuned in for a geology lesson, which always seems to be part of the T&L adventure, let me tell you that Shoshone Falls was sculpted by a six week flood of Lake Bonneville around 15,000 years ago.  The water moved around 70mph as it formed the canyon. 

There was a delightful little picnic area, and we had a cooler full of deliciousness, so it seemed like the perfect lunch plan! But, IT WAS HOT!! This is the best picture we got of the two of us, the one with the least amount of sweat and wincing. Consequently, we ate lunch in our car, under the solar shield, with the AC on high. 😂

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After this began a long stretch of road towards what ended up being the adventure of the day. 

We were about 15 miles (so says Siri) from the turn off for Cherry Creek ghost town, when a huge "Cherry Creek" sign popped up on the right. We careened off the road, on to a gravel road, and headed toward adventure. I had read that the road to Cherry Creek was not great, but passable. The continuing road to Egan Canyon was the road that may require 4WD. So when the road turned washboard, I wasn't surprised. In fact, it's not a road trip if you're not on an unmarked washboard road, right? 😉

It may have been around the 2nd or 3rd mountain where the passenger grew tired of the journey. I could tell her interest in the adventure was waning, and the worry about getting back to the freeway growing, but I could still see the freeway (you know, in the distance), and so we adventured on. 

After about 30 or 40 minutes (?), we finally saw structures glinting from the sun. There was more there than I had thought there would be. And very difficult to establish what might be actual homes, and what might be abandoned. But there were clear ghost structures, including an old one room school house.  

Out of Cherry Creek we saw the actual road we should have turned on -- paved and 55 mph. Where's the fun in that? 😉 On the way back to the freeway, I, the driver, insisted on one more stop to inspect an abandoned railroad checkpoint and several abandoned railcars. This "road" definitely could have used 4WD, and I was rewarded for my adventuresome spirit with no turn around spot.  😆 I think my Jeep was reveling in the moment, but I was glad for to see the main road coming closer and closer in the back up camera!

 Also today we saw an enormous red snake slither across the freeway. It turned out to be an animated, rogue pool noodle.  😆 I wonder what tomorrow will bring? 

Drive, drive, drive

I’m trying to put my finger on what exactly happened today and all I’m coming up with is driving. And being hot. ;) It was 103 in Pendleton, where we were very happy to be in an air conditioned Jeep rather than a covered wagon. ;)  We ate the first of many meals in the safety of our car, and made it to Idaho during daylight hours. Tomorrow we push on to Baker, looking for ghost towns on the way. We anticipate having actual adventures to report soon. ;)

Thelma & Louise Ride Again!

Like most of America, T&L mourned the loss of our spring break trip. We know that everyone had plans that were canceled, trips delayed, and vacations put on hold, so we tried not to take the break in our travel streak too personally, but...WE DID!! One of us has been home since March, and the other working long hours, so we needed a getaway. But where to go that is safe and responsible?  If you guessed the middle of nowhere, you are correct!!

On our travels, we always wonder if we are visiting places we will see again.   When safe to do so, we will be back to Cornwall, Hawaii, and Zion, among others. There are also places we drive or fly away from thinking that this is it: there are so many places in the world, our journeys will probably never bring us this way again. It is one of these roads we are heading back out on tomorrow.  Back in 2014, we flew into Reno, drove across Nevada, and flew out of Las Vegas. It was one of the weirdest trips we've ever been on.  One of our stops was Great Basin National Park, where they have bristlecone pines, but the snow level was too far down for us to see them. But it's like 100 degrees now, so that snow is long gone! We are heading to a "city" with a population of approximately 70, and 11 COVID cases in the entire county. We're going to be really hot, see some really old trees, and have an epic adventure. ;)  T&L are driving, not flying, which is our favorite way to travel.

Embarrassing hat? ✅

Play list? In the works -- gladly taking suggestions 
Cooler of food for 7 days? ✅
More sunscreen than seems reasonable? ✅
All the bottled water we could carry from Costco? ✅
Bags packed? 😂

We think we will have Wifi at our spot, so we hope, as always, that you'll journey along with us!

💟 T&L