June 12, 2005
South Lake Tahoe, CA to Wendover, UT
| We were up and out at 7:15 a.m. local time. Arrived in Reno and stopped at the oldest restaurant in town (or so they advertise) at 9:30 local time. Beautiful ride here, rather cool, but a great view. Reno is a little like Las Vegas, Nevada, with wedding chapels and casinos everywhere, but things are more spread out. The drive through Nevada was very scenic and beautiful. We drove through a butterfly hatching for a 20 or 30 mile stretch. While it was beautiful, the constant streaks of yellows and reds that painted the windshield and helmets and everything else got annoying. It's hard to see, but if you look closely, you can see that bike is getting pretty messy. |  |
| Along Route 50 near the Fallon Naval Air Station, there were long stretches of flat light colored sand maybe ten or twenty miles long that sloped slightly toward the road. There were a lot of black stones infrequently scattered across the ground. All along the sand slope were words and names people had spelled out with the black stones; mostly so-n-so loves so-n-so and even a few naughty words. The words went on and on almost endlessly along both sides of the road. Obviously, lots and lots of folks have taken advantage of the natural billboard over the years. | We had never been through Nevada before and assumed it would be pretty flat desert, but there were a good number of mountain ranges and valleys between them. They were not huge mountains, but it was pretty far from being a flat desert landscape. We rode over a good number of passes which kept the ride interesting. We arrived in Wendover, Utah at 5:30 local time. Found the Mantego Bay Casino a good spot for supper. Crab legs and sirloin. They had a pretty good band playing there and we listen to them for a couple hours while watching some TV. (There's about six television sets in this room; all with a different program on!). |
Odometer at End of Day: 19716 Miles Traveled: 531 Places visited:
Toiyabe National Forest |
7452 ft. Carroll Summit |
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