Moving–this time for real

Had a couple of visitors my last night at Stewarts Point. I don’t recall hearing any coyotes in the area, but this guy got blown through on a windy morning, encroaching on Hailey’s hunting territory.

I heard voices about 0400 and in the morning saw this 2WD pickup stuck up to it’s axle in the loose gravel.  The neighbour was coerced into helping with the tow, and I lent my tow strap to the operation to get rid of a small group of stoned and/or drunk idiots.  At least they didn’t bang on my door (at 0400), or otherwise disturb me.

And then we were on the road, after saying ‘so long’ to Nina & Paul who had the ‘beast’ parked just down the shoreline from me.

After a short back track on I-15 we headed over to Hwy 93 to begin the long trek northward for real.  Plans to stop again at the Pahranagat NWR were shelved when we arrived there around lunch time, so we just kept the wheels turning, turning left again onto the Extraterrestrial highway leading past ‘Area 51’.  A couple of alien craft disguised as dust devils tried to abduct us, but we managed to escape.

After re-fueling at Tonopah (and changing into jeans, with socks and a jacket, brrrr), we continued the northward trek, eventually pulling in to a lakeside rec area at Walker Lake.  This is just north of Hawthorne, which is surrounded by thousands of bunkers all over the desert … interesting!

(Check it out on Google Earth)

Walker Lake has the appearance of a half-empty reservoir, quite common in the southwest after years of drought, but it is actually the remains of a vast inland sea.  The water level is constantly going down, and they have posted signs where the water level was all the way from around 1880 to present.

Obviously, it is a challenge maintaining and extending boat launches here, much the same as at Lake Mead.

Ms Hailey heading home for some breakfast after a morning walk.

From there it was north again to join Interstate 80 towards Reno where fuel was added again to avoid having to pay California prices on the next leg of the journey.  Nice to see Nevada had a nice free dump station at the rest area along the way.

Temps were not that much above freezing along the way, and it was somewhat cloudy, but it was nice to get into some areas of pine trees, lakes, melted snow (!) and even some green grass!

We made it across the Oregon line before needing to fuel up again, and pulled over along the shore of Lake Albert for the night.