Day 1-3 ~ On the Road Again!

On Tuesday August 28th we started another great adventure. It was the start of our newest VBLT (Very Big Long Trip). We left Sacramento with two other couples, Curt, Dawn, Foster and Marty. Our destination for the night was Hawthorne, NV, via Reno and Fernly, NV. We next traveled to Pahrump, NV, where we will join a tour group of 17 other RV's for a 33 day tour of the Southwestern National Parks beginning August 31st. We got off to a rocky start when our travel partners, Foster and Marty, had a fender bender within a few miles of their home. It is amazing to see the repairs that can be made by two determined men (Foster & Chig) with a screw gun, nuts, bolts and bungee cords. Amazingly they did not find a use for any duct tape.

We were an hour late meeting Curt & Dawn at the Gold Run roadside rest but were soon on the road. Our trip south from Fernley took us along the western border of Nevada, an area of travel new to us. The terrain was quite dry and barren although we passed through several green valleys growing various crops.

Just before reaching Hawthorne we passed by Walker Lake. It was suprising to see a large body of water in the desert landscape. It is a natural lake fed by the Walker River and it has no outlet. It is 5019 square miles in size. In the past 100 years the lake level has dropped 140 feet due to agricultural diversion from the river. The salinity level has also risen over the years killing off many species of fish. As a result the numbers of migrating loon have dropped significantly. Just south of the lake we arrived at our RV park destination. The town of Hawthorne has an Army Depot where large quanities of ammunition are stored. As we arrived we could see many storage buildings with more storage buildings as we continued south towards Pahrump. The second day of travel was not scenic. Some of the mountains were interesting colors and there were some large sand dunes but the road was narrow and straight and very boring. We passed many fireworks stores (legal in Nevada) and past Area 51. We drove for over 6 hours and the drivers were ready to call it a day when we arrived at the Lakeside RV Park for two nights.