We are heading back to finish our self-guided tour of Lassen Volcanic National Park, which last time was interrupted by darkness. Today we get an earlier start. It's only 78 degrees.
There were 855 lightening strikes last night at Hat Creek, where we were supposed to have stayed. I don't know how they count the lightening strikes.
I break down and spend the money on a new digital battery for my Canon G2 camera. Now all I need is a lens hood for both the Canon and the Fuji to prevent sun wash-out. At least I won't run out of power just when I come to the best photo-op of the day any more.
Bob has decided to experiment with a longer mustache and no beard. He has shaved most of his beard off, and left only the movie-star scruffy stuff. I finally get to see his chin after all these years. He is also letting his hair grow long. I'm excited. By the time we get home, if he doesn't chicken out, it should be great.
We climb the Cinder Cone, two steps forward, one step back. It is literally a mountain of volcanic ash. My walking stick helps, like a third leg to anchor me, but I'm very slow. Bob lopes ahead. The view of the lava blobs and painted dunes is spectacular from the top. On the way back at dusk, we are the only ones in the woods. It is absolutely silent save for the swish-swish of our feet in the ashes.
I fantasize about what we would do if we encountered a bear. We would make a lot of noise by popping our water bottles and I will beat him off with my walking stick. HA! Take that!
The road back is unfolding before us, reflections appearing one by one as though they are being unrolled from a huge reel. They are so golden and bounce our bright lights back so well we feel we are on an airport runway and we are the plane.
On the road back we see the flames from several small fires in the pitch black, and the road is very smoky.
When I was thirteen and babysitting my three sibs while my parents went out to dinner, the house on the hill just above us caught fire. I was afraid the fire would jump the woods between us and set our house on fire.
A year later when I was at Camp Ramah in Wisconsin, the building that held the library with many sacred books caught fire. We campers had a double bucket brigade shuttling water from the lake in one direction and bringing the books out of the library in the other direction. We did this for at least a half hour until the fire department from Eagle River could come put the fire out. Ever since then, fires have freaked me out.
Friday, August 7, 2009
Thursday, August 6, 2009
Day 48 - Thursday, 8/6/09 - SETTLED
We are going to find Whiskeytown. It is the first cloudy day we have had so far. 73 degrees. No drama, just clouds leaking droplets.
The woman at the gas station says "Just get on 299 and follow the signs to Eureka. If you miss it, you shouldn't be driving". We miss it.
But we do find Whiskeytown Falls. It is on Mill Creek. The hike is 1.7 miles. It is 63 degrees at 1000 feet. We decide to challenge ourselves.
There is a family coming back with a 6-year old girl in bare feet. We figure if she can do it, so can we. They call her "Iron Feet". Little do we know that most of the hike is at extreme grades. There is no sign rating the degree of difficulty as we had on our UT and NV hikes.
Corinne has been having problems with her Canon PowerShot G2 camera, an oldie but goodie, not holding a charge very well. She has gotten by with charging it every night. After all that effort, we get to Whiskeytown Falls and the camera is dead!
The Falls tumbles down over huge boulders. It is about 300 feet tall, with two main drops, stopping in two pools. It is beautiful and certainly worth the hike. There is one giant tree trunk that has fallen diagonally across it and is worn smooth by the water. We watch a young guy with his dog balance their way across the log. Whoa!
Turns out all that's left of the old Whiskeytown is the cemetery, where the bodies were exhumed and moved.
Crystal Falls is aptly named. The water is perfectly clear. The walk is very quiet, save for a quail, digging a nest for her babies. We hear another bird call echoing in the Ponderosa Pines. We feel as though we have the woods to ourselves.
Today would have been my Mother's birthday, were she still alive (God rest her soul). She passed away 6 years ago. But perhaps she is still watching over me, which is why when I accidentally slam my pinkie finger in the car door, there is a National Park Visitor's Center 300 feet away. They have ice cold water bottles in their refrigerator which I use to keep the swelling down.
The woman at the gas station says "Just get on 299 and follow the signs to Eureka. If you miss it, you shouldn't be driving". We miss it.
But we do find Whiskeytown Falls. It is on Mill Creek. The hike is 1.7 miles. It is 63 degrees at 1000 feet. We decide to challenge ourselves.
There is a family coming back with a 6-year old girl in bare feet. We figure if she can do it, so can we. They call her "Iron Feet". Little do we know that most of the hike is at extreme grades. There is no sign rating the degree of difficulty as we had on our UT and NV hikes.
Corinne has been having problems with her Canon PowerShot G2 camera, an oldie but goodie, not holding a charge very well. She has gotten by with charging it every night. After all that effort, we get to Whiskeytown Falls and the camera is dead!
The Falls tumbles down over huge boulders. It is about 300 feet tall, with two main drops, stopping in two pools. It is beautiful and certainly worth the hike. There is one giant tree trunk that has fallen diagonally across it and is worn smooth by the water. We watch a young guy with his dog balance their way across the log. Whoa!
Turns out all that's left of the old Whiskeytown is the cemetery, where the bodies were exhumed and moved.
Crystal Falls is aptly named. The water is perfectly clear. The walk is very quiet, save for a quail, digging a nest for her babies. We hear another bird call echoing in the Ponderosa Pines. We feel as though we have the woods to ourselves.
Today would have been my Mother's birthday, were she still alive (God rest her soul). She passed away 6 years ago. But perhaps she is still watching over me, which is why when I accidentally slam my pinkie finger in the car door, there is a National Park Visitor's Center 300 feet away. They have ice cold water bottles in their refrigerator which I use to keep the swelling down.
Wednesday, August 5, 2009
Day 47 - Wednesday, 8/5/09 - SETTLED
There are big-time forest fires here in the mountains, which is both exciting and frightening. Our nostrils sting from the smoke. We plan to hike in Lassen Volcanic National Park, where a volcano erupted in 1915 and 1922, leaving huge truck-sized boulders and a crater with boiling sulfur pots.
The rest areas along Hwy. 44 are well hidden in the Ponderosa Pine Woods. They is evidence that they cut down as few trees as possible for construction.
We see a phenomenon we have seen before, where on an interpretive trail there are paved extensions. We start to call them "Future Benches", as though the Park Service is waiting for someone to make a donation for a bench and put their name on a plaque. Or maybe a new interpretive sign will be placed there when they have more funding.
The trail in Lassen Volcanic National Park is spectacular, with truck-sized black kacite boulders left by the volcano as the lava cooled. There are red and grey kacite boulders left by an eruption thousands of years ago. There are rocks on the left side and pine trees clinging to the cliffs on the
right.
The signpost says 30 minutes for a 1/2 mile hike to Bumpass Hell, the sulfur pots and boiling springs left by the volcanoes. They are amazing, despite the pungent odor. But the signs lie - it takes us an hour to get in and 30 minutes to get out.
We get a late start, so we walk out of there at moonrise. Thank God the rocks on our path are white. It's a little freaky. I see moon shadows for the first time in my life. So awe-inspiring, a true religious experience! Who was it who wrote that song "Moon Shadow"? Van Morrison? I can only remember the first words: "Moon shadow, moon shadow".
Temperature drops from 92 when we depart our campground in the afternoon to 41 at night at 8500 ft. Dressed in shorts and tank-tops, we aren't exactly prepared for the cold, and end up putting on everything we can find in the car. I have 2 sweaters, an old airline blanket for a skirt, and my yellow rain slicker. Bob has a windbreaker and a green rain poncho. We are warm enough, with the effort of hiking.
There is a family who comes in just as we are leaving Bumpass Hell, the sulfur pools. Once again I have trusted that the Universe will provide - they have lights with them!
Bob has been worried about how we will get out in the dark. I have been figuring that we will just hold on to the rocks on the mountain side of the path and use my camera and his cell phone for light. There are cliffs on the other side. I've never known him to be quite so anxious.
I find out later that he was worried about encountering big wildlife on the mountain, like cougars and bears. We see chipmunks, but that's all.
While I am having a wonderful time traveling, sometimes I feel so rootless, like there is a big hole in my soul. I know it is because I am missing all my connections back home. My friends are such a big part of my life. On the one hand I am always looking forward to our next adventure, and on the other hand I am counting down the weeks until I can return to my "real" life, my home, my own bed, my neighborhood, my kitty-cats, being closer to my adorable little grandson Nathan.
We laugh sometimes at our Garmin GPS, and call it "her", as in: "Let's see what she has to say". We haven't named her, though.
Sometimes her robotness is hilarious, as when she says: "Turn on Rt. 90 NO, or when she attaches consonants to the wrong ends of words, as in "Eas Tauto Doctor", (for East Auto Drive). But we can't live without her.
The temperature is crucial to our comfort. We are constantly checking the gauge in our car.
We skip dinner. Bob eats fruit, but Corinne craves junk food. At 11:00, nothing in town is open except McDonald's, so we break down and order a McFlurry and a Large Fries.
The rest areas along Hwy. 44 are well hidden in the Ponderosa Pine Woods. They is evidence that they cut down as few trees as possible for construction.
We see a phenomenon we have seen before, where on an interpretive trail there are paved extensions. We start to call them "Future Benches", as though the Park Service is waiting for someone to make a donation for a bench and put their name on a plaque. Or maybe a new interpretive sign will be placed there when they have more funding.
The trail in Lassen Volcanic National Park is spectacular, with truck-sized black kacite boulders left by the volcano as the lava cooled. There are red and grey kacite boulders left by an eruption thousands of years ago. There are rocks on the left side and pine trees clinging to the cliffs on the
right.
The signpost says 30 minutes for a 1/2 mile hike to Bumpass Hell, the sulfur pots and boiling springs left by the volcanoes. They are amazing, despite the pungent odor. But the signs lie - it takes us an hour to get in and 30 minutes to get out.
We get a late start, so we walk out of there at moonrise. Thank God the rocks on our path are white. It's a little freaky. I see moon shadows for the first time in my life. So awe-inspiring, a true religious experience! Who was it who wrote that song "Moon Shadow"? Van Morrison? I can only remember the first words: "Moon shadow, moon shadow".
Temperature drops from 92 when we depart our campground in the afternoon to 41 at night at 8500 ft. Dressed in shorts and tank-tops, we aren't exactly prepared for the cold, and end up putting on everything we can find in the car. I have 2 sweaters, an old airline blanket for a skirt, and my yellow rain slicker. Bob has a windbreaker and a green rain poncho. We are warm enough, with the effort of hiking.
There is a family who comes in just as we are leaving Bumpass Hell, the sulfur pools. Once again I have trusted that the Universe will provide - they have lights with them!
Bob has been worried about how we will get out in the dark. I have been figuring that we will just hold on to the rocks on the mountain side of the path and use my camera and his cell phone for light. There are cliffs on the other side. I've never known him to be quite so anxious.
I find out later that he was worried about encountering big wildlife on the mountain, like cougars and bears. We see chipmunks, but that's all.
While I am having a wonderful time traveling, sometimes I feel so rootless, like there is a big hole in my soul. I know it is because I am missing all my connections back home. My friends are such a big part of my life. On the one hand I am always looking forward to our next adventure, and on the other hand I am counting down the weeks until I can return to my "real" life, my home, my own bed, my neighborhood, my kitty-cats, being closer to my adorable little grandson Nathan.
We laugh sometimes at our Garmin GPS, and call it "her", as in: "Let's see what she has to say". We haven't named her, though.
Sometimes her robotness is hilarious, as when she says: "Turn on Rt. 90 NO, or when she attaches consonants to the wrong ends of words, as in "Eas Tauto Doctor", (for East Auto Drive). But we can't live without her.
The temperature is crucial to our comfort. We are constantly checking the gauge in our car.
We skip dinner. Bob eats fruit, but Corinne craves junk food. At 11:00, nothing in town is open except McDonald's, so we break down and order a McFlurry and a Large Fries.
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
Day 46 - Tuesday, 8/4/09 - ON THE ROAD
The campground in Hat Creek where we were going to spend a few nights is evacuated due to wildfires, so we are going to change our route a little bit.
We go through an RV Wash this morning to get the red dust and sand off. The Rovin' Art RV looks a lot better now. I can take pictures out of the windows while we are moving if I absolutely must.
At the California border, we are stopped for an Agricultural Inspection to check for gypsy moths. The inspector gets on one of those sliders that rolls on four wheels under the car and checks the chassis. We get away with none found, even though he had a light. We are happy; he is disappointed.
The terrain is getting more green and more meadow-like, with less desert flora and more high grass. The hillsides are coated with cedars. There are oodles of clear ponds and small lakes. The transition from desert to pine forest is instantaneous.
We see stacks of hay for sale. Some farmers are raising llamas.
Our stop in Susanville, CA for lunch is relaxing.
We drive past Hat Creek and are astounded by the drama of the fire we could have been caught in. There is thick black smoke on both sides of the road. The road is closed. The firefighters are in their yellow gear. There are helicopters and small planes overhead constantly. We can see the flames.
We go through an RV Wash this morning to get the red dust and sand off. The Rovin' Art RV looks a lot better now. I can take pictures out of the windows while we are moving if I absolutely must.
At the California border, we are stopped for an Agricultural Inspection to check for gypsy moths. The inspector gets on one of those sliders that rolls on four wheels under the car and checks the chassis. We get away with none found, even though he had a light. We are happy; he is disappointed.
The terrain is getting more green and more meadow-like, with less desert flora and more high grass. The hillsides are coated with cedars. There are oodles of clear ponds and small lakes. The transition from desert to pine forest is instantaneous.
We see stacks of hay for sale. Some farmers are raising llamas.
Our stop in Susanville, CA for lunch is relaxing.
We drive past Hat Creek and are astounded by the drama of the fire we could have been caught in. There is thick black smoke on both sides of the road. The road is closed. The firefighters are in their yellow gear. There are helicopters and small planes overhead constantly. We can see the flames.
Monday, August 3, 2009
Day 45 - Monday, 8/3/09, SETTLED
Out to breakfast. Corinne is craving French Toast. Bob has packed egg salad sandwiches for lunch. We plan to use one of our gift cards for Macaroni Grill for dinner in Reno.
We're not gamblers, so the fact that there are slot machines even in the grocery stores does not tempt us. The gigantic columns outside the Atlantic Casino are impressive.
The big thing out West is to identify your town by painting the first initial of the town on the hillside so passersby will recognize where they are.
For someone like me, with a fascination with hay bales, I've certainly gotten my fill here. There are walls of square hay bales, pyramids of hay bales. There are no silos, just stacked outside in humongous piles. Not even covered by tarps or plastic.
We visit Sand Mountain Recreation Area. The road is more than corrugated - more like a washboard. The sand was blown there 4,000 years from a lake that dried up, hundreds of miles away. Then the sand was trapped by the mountains and couldn't go any further.
This area was used by the Pony Express in 1860 - 1861. There are ruins from lava rock buildings that were used to shelter the Pony Express riders.
There are kangaroo rats and a giant jackrabbit with huge ears running among the lava rocks.
Above our heads Navy planes from a nearby base performed drills. They repeated touch-and-goes. We saw helicopters using their FLIRR, infra-red capacity.
I so hate to be hot that I would rather wear Keanes sandals and get hot sand in my toes than to be closed up in hiking boots.
Since I have no sense of direction, nor am I a one-trial learner of place, I rely on Bob to be my guide. While I spent a year working on the wedding, he spent a year working out the skeleton of our trip. Now we have the freedom to take it day by day, stopping at interesting architectural, geological or historical markers along the way, and even staying longer in one place overnight if we need to.
I should come back from our trip looking 10 years younger. Every day in the desert is like having microdermabrasion treatments to your skin. When we come home from a day of hiking, our skin is full of salt and sand.
I like to think I'll keep off the 5 pounds I've lost, too. Besides the constant activity, rock-climbing, sand-walking, trudging uphill at high altitudes, there is the fact that since I'm not watching TV at night, I'm not so tempted to snack.
Dicky-Du and his Zydeco Krewe come from LA to Reno to perform at a small club. He's the son of Roy Carrier. The audience is small but appreciative. We are grateful we can do some zydeco after 6 weeks away from our favorite kind of dancing.
One of Dicky-Du's roadies wears a L'il Anne and the Hot Cayenne t-shirt. L'il Anne is a local zydeco performer who is one of our favorites. We feel right at home.
We're not gamblers, so the fact that there are slot machines even in the grocery stores does not tempt us. The gigantic columns outside the Atlantic Casino are impressive.
The big thing out West is to identify your town by painting the first initial of the town on the hillside so passersby will recognize where they are.
For someone like me, with a fascination with hay bales, I've certainly gotten my fill here. There are walls of square hay bales, pyramids of hay bales. There are no silos, just stacked outside in humongous piles. Not even covered by tarps or plastic.
We visit Sand Mountain Recreation Area. The road is more than corrugated - more like a washboard. The sand was blown there 4,000 years from a lake that dried up, hundreds of miles away. Then the sand was trapped by the mountains and couldn't go any further.
This area was used by the Pony Express in 1860 - 1861. There are ruins from lava rock buildings that were used to shelter the Pony Express riders.
There are kangaroo rats and a giant jackrabbit with huge ears running among the lava rocks.
Above our heads Navy planes from a nearby base performed drills. They repeated touch-and-goes. We saw helicopters using their FLIRR, infra-red capacity.
I so hate to be hot that I would rather wear Keanes sandals and get hot sand in my toes than to be closed up in hiking boots.
Since I have no sense of direction, nor am I a one-trial learner of place, I rely on Bob to be my guide. While I spent a year working on the wedding, he spent a year working out the skeleton of our trip. Now we have the freedom to take it day by day, stopping at interesting architectural, geological or historical markers along the way, and even staying longer in one place overnight if we need to.
I should come back from our trip looking 10 years younger. Every day in the desert is like having microdermabrasion treatments to your skin. When we come home from a day of hiking, our skin is full of salt and sand.
I like to think I'll keep off the 5 pounds I've lost, too. Besides the constant activity, rock-climbing, sand-walking, trudging uphill at high altitudes, there is the fact that since I'm not watching TV at night, I'm not so tempted to snack.
Dicky-Du and his Zydeco Krewe come from LA to Reno to perform at a small club. He's the son of Roy Carrier. The audience is small but appreciative. We are grateful we can do some zydeco after 6 weeks away from our favorite kind of dancing.
One of Dicky-Du's roadies wears a L'il Anne and the Hot Cayenne t-shirt. L'il Anne is a local zydeco performer who is one of our favorites. We feel right at home.
Sunday, August 2, 2009
Day 44- Sunday 8/2/09 - SETTLED
Our tenant Rob, who is renting our house for a month while we're away, tells us to go visit the Amazon.com warehouse, which is very secretive. We are curious. We try to find it according to the directions on the internet. The name on the building we find is Quebecor Retail Division.
There is a funny sign along the way at the Pawn Shop: Clearance Sale. That just strikes me as odd.
After much searching, I finally find a cowboy hat for my grandson Nathan. Garage Sale signs along the road have led us off into the desert to little back road with small houses and trailers. The hat is red, paper-based, and costs 50c!
On our visit to Virginia City, where many of the shopkeepers are dressed in authentic miners' outfits, or like cowboys or prostitutes, we are interested in the old gold and silver mines. There are lots of curio shops and saloons, in restored Victorian buildings. 10,000 buildings were destroyed by fire in 1876. The merchandise ranges from very expensive antiques to Made-in-China "chotchkes". There are slot machines everywhere.
Smoking is still allowed in many places out West and it seems that even where it is not allowed, the enforcement is not great. Today we are in a saloon in Virginia City called Bucket of Blood and the Comstock Cowboys are playing some really great music.
We are dancing away and all of a sudden these three people behind us light up, despite the No Smoking signs. Noone from the Saloon says anything, and these are tough-looking motorcycle folk. We are not about to cause a scene, so we just leave.
I have never seen so many motorcycles as I have out West, nor so many people with tattoos. Two women on a motorcycle wink at us. Are they winking at Bob, or at me?!
I see my first cheek-piercing today, too. OW!
Down the street at Bob's BBQ we are attracted by the smells, but the meal proves to be the worst we've had so far - hard pulled pork, stale and dry cornbread, tasteless coleslaw and the worst old and flat crumbly bun we've ever seen.
Bob is still looking for the perfect buttery yellow buckskin fringed jacket. He saw one years ago in Montana on our way back from Alaska, and passed it up because of the expense, but he's been kicking himself ever since.
Utah is the Beehive State, but we saw no beehives in two weeks of traveling across the entire state. Yet here we are in Nevada, and so far we have seen two farms with hundreds of beehives. We ask why and are told that the name "Beehive State" for Utah comes from the Mormon ethic of working "like busy little bees".
Our RV park has standards - only vehicles of certain brands and certain model years are admitted. Ours is one of the smallest and oldest. There is a really old RV here that appears to have a young working family living in it with 3 kids, ages about 2, 5 and 13. Maybe the Mom is a traveling nurse?
The 5 year old spends the entire hour while we are making dinner seeing how far she can throw her little plastic chair across the empty RV site next to theirs. She stomps after it, angry that she can't better her last effort, only to try again and again. A strong wind from an upcoming storm helps her cause.
There is a funny sign along the way at the Pawn Shop: Clearance Sale. That just strikes me as odd.
After much searching, I finally find a cowboy hat for my grandson Nathan. Garage Sale signs along the road have led us off into the desert to little back road with small houses and trailers. The hat is red, paper-based, and costs 50c!
On our visit to Virginia City, where many of the shopkeepers are dressed in authentic miners' outfits, or like cowboys or prostitutes, we are interested in the old gold and silver mines. There are lots of curio shops and saloons, in restored Victorian buildings. 10,000 buildings were destroyed by fire in 1876. The merchandise ranges from very expensive antiques to Made-in-China "chotchkes". There are slot machines everywhere.
Smoking is still allowed in many places out West and it seems that even where it is not allowed, the enforcement is not great. Today we are in a saloon in Virginia City called Bucket of Blood and the Comstock Cowboys are playing some really great music.
We are dancing away and all of a sudden these three people behind us light up, despite the No Smoking signs. Noone from the Saloon says anything, and these are tough-looking motorcycle folk. We are not about to cause a scene, so we just leave.
I have never seen so many motorcycles as I have out West, nor so many people with tattoos. Two women on a motorcycle wink at us. Are they winking at Bob, or at me?!
I see my first cheek-piercing today, too. OW!
Down the street at Bob's BBQ we are attracted by the smells, but the meal proves to be the worst we've had so far - hard pulled pork, stale and dry cornbread, tasteless coleslaw and the worst old and flat crumbly bun we've ever seen.
Bob is still looking for the perfect buttery yellow buckskin fringed jacket. He saw one years ago in Montana on our way back from Alaska, and passed it up because of the expense, but he's been kicking himself ever since.
Utah is the Beehive State, but we saw no beehives in two weeks of traveling across the entire state. Yet here we are in Nevada, and so far we have seen two farms with hundreds of beehives. We ask why and are told that the name "Beehive State" for Utah comes from the Mormon ethic of working "like busy little bees".
Our RV park has standards - only vehicles of certain brands and certain model years are admitted. Ours is one of the smallest and oldest. There is a really old RV here that appears to have a young working family living in it with 3 kids, ages about 2, 5 and 13. Maybe the Mom is a traveling nurse?
The 5 year old spends the entire hour while we are making dinner seeing how far she can throw her little plastic chair across the empty RV site next to theirs. She stomps after it, angry that she can't better her last effort, only to try again and again. A strong wind from an upcoming storm helps her cause.
Saturday, August 1, 2009
Day 43 - Saturday, 8/1/09 - SETTLED
There is a big event happening at the local park - Hot August Nights. One part of it is an antique car show. We enjoy walking around sharing memories about the old cars we see.
Nearby is The Chocolate Nugget Candy Factory. On the lawn there are several antique farm implements, and a statue of The Old Prospector as big as the building. His hands were larger than his head.
Bob is musing: "I wonder if when they got drunk and they had ridden their horse to the saloon, they could just let the horse take them home. But then, the next day they'd have to tell their friends: 'I was arrested for RWI last night (riding while intoxicated)'. This is why Bob's son Jim is a stand-up comedian.
On the way home, we pass Steamboat Springs, a hot springs that has been in operation as a health facility since 1859. Back then they were on the railroad. Now they are on the Historical Register as a Day Spa. The water comes out hotter than 200 degrees. The owners have to cool off the baths. When we walk in, the proprietor says "Are you here for a soak?"
We see hundreds of houses built on the Geiger Grade on the way to Virginia City. It is quite steep. All have huge glass windows for the view, most with dirt roads and many with antique cars in their driveways. These are spectacular homes.
When we pass a bicyclist riding up this 6 degree grade at 6000 feet elevation, Bob comments: "He must be training for next year's Tour de France."
ROADKILL: Straw hat
In the evening we try ballroom dancing at Never Enough Ballroom Dance Studio in Reno. It appears that everyone else but us has taken lessons from this studio, so they all have very similar dance styles. It is a bit intimidating. We do manage a waltz, an East Coast swing, the foxtrot and a two-step.
Nearby is The Chocolate Nugget Candy Factory. On the lawn there are several antique farm implements, and a statue of The Old Prospector as big as the building. His hands were larger than his head.
Bob is musing: "I wonder if when they got drunk and they had ridden their horse to the saloon, they could just let the horse take them home. But then, the next day they'd have to tell their friends: 'I was arrested for RWI last night (riding while intoxicated)'. This is why Bob's son Jim is a stand-up comedian.
On the way home, we pass Steamboat Springs, a hot springs that has been in operation as a health facility since 1859. Back then they were on the railroad. Now they are on the Historical Register as a Day Spa. The water comes out hotter than 200 degrees. The owners have to cool off the baths. When we walk in, the proprietor says "Are you here for a soak?"
We see hundreds of houses built on the Geiger Grade on the way to Virginia City. It is quite steep. All have huge glass windows for the view, most with dirt roads and many with antique cars in their driveways. These are spectacular homes.
When we pass a bicyclist riding up this 6 degree grade at 6000 feet elevation, Bob comments: "He must be training for next year's Tour de France."
ROADKILL: Straw hat
In the evening we try ballroom dancing at Never Enough Ballroom Dance Studio in Reno. It appears that everyone else but us has taken lessons from this studio, so they all have very similar dance styles. It is a bit intimidating. We do manage a waltz, an East Coast swing, the foxtrot and a two-step.
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