At any rate, the dogs and I woke up at 5:30am on the morning of our last day at Baker Creek and I decided that I would rather break camp and get breakfast on the road somewhere than fire up the stove to make coffee. An hour later we were rolling down and out of Great Basin National Park. The morning held promise and the scenery was gorgeous, as usual.
We got to Ely and I was reminded of my loathing for the town. Now, I don't know what might have initiated my overall distaste for Ely from childhood trips through Nevada, but the failure to find a diner where I could get a cup of coffee without having to wade through smoke and slot machines cemented it in the "I will never stop here again if I can help it" category as an adult. It could be that my short temper was due to the lack of caffeine, but it was only 7:30 in the morning and I usually don't turn into a raging wench on a caffeine jones until at least 9:30am. After leaving one spot where I watched a "waitress" who more closely resembled a "stand and talkress" I finally had to give in to McDonalds for my fix. Off we roared, west onto Highway 50.
Highway 50 has a reputation and even glorifies itself as the lonliest highway in America. Really? Is it any more lonely than 395 between Valley Falls and Wagontire? Or any of the number of highways elsewhere in Nevada, for that matter? I found it enjoyable to cruise along at 75 mph (bless you, Nevada speed laws) without the worry of traffic or police. Once the caffeine kicked in I was even feeling civil and gave these weary souls a honk and wave as I blew by. Some waved back, others not so much.
Early in the planning stages of this trip I had chosen Hickison Petroglyph area as a potential spot to camp, and even though it was only 10:30 or so in the morning when we got there, I was still willing to give it a look. The "no water" sign didn't scare me, as I was packing 15 gallons thanks to some pilfered spring water bottles from work and a nicer one from Grandad. We pulled in and surveyed the campground, found it to be a little scary in view of being the only person there besides a very friendly fellow who waved like a crazed man when I drove by, and decided to just look at the petroglyphs instead. I found a shady spot in the day use area to park, opened the door to the pickup, and within 60 seconds was swatting madly at my neck. I swear that a legion of no-seeums and mosquitos shrieked "BLOOD!" when I presented the dogs and myself as victims. With a frenzy of determination, I urged the dogs out into the sun and onto the interpretive path. The self-guided tour pamphlets were all gone from the trailhead, so I had no idea what I was looking at whenever we got to a post with a number on it facing a rock. There were a few petroglyphs, but nothing better than can be found east of Lakeview. I figure this is probably because of Hickison's proximity to a highway and the fact that it is marked on a nationally published map. Any old vandal can stop and scratch new graffiti on top of the archaic graffiti. Kinda sad, really, but here's what I had the patience to see and determine as the best of the bunch.
After Hickison, I really was in no mood to stop, so we breezed down through Austin and headed north to Battle Mountain in order to make a quick shot towards Winnemucca. The day was beautiful and even though the chances of finding a camping spot were decreasing exponentially with my mood and the hour of the day, I did at least appreciate some of the views.
Once we left Winnemucca it looked as though Lakeview was going to be the next "camping" spot for the night. I figured that if Mom and Dad weren't home that at least I could throw down the tent on the back lawn and fight mosquitos there as easily as anywhere else. However, once we made it to Sheldon National Wildlife Refuge, my mood had again lifted (this day was a rollercoaster of negativity followed by gazing happily out the window) and I decided to drive at least part way in to see if there was a place to camp. I didn't want to camp at Virgin Valley with the opal mining crowd, so we took a dirt road and headed for some primitive spots marked on the map. Gooch Springs sounded interesting, but turned out to be in a direction I didn't want to go, so we forged ahead. When I turned off the pickup to let the dogs run, it was absolutely gloriously silent up on top of Sheldon and once I again I thought that I could face setting up the tent. After marvelling at all of the obsidian nodules on Horse Heaven flat and watching a lone antelope run off, we made for Catnip Reservoir.
As soon as I saw the place I wanted to stop. That lasted until I realized someone else was camped there. Since I doubt that they would have appreciated visitors, I decided to just follow some dirt roads back to the highway and head for home. I'm not sad that I took a long detour through Sheldon. It was a fantastic drive and I was recharged by the time we hit the pavement once more. But some day I'm going back to Catnip.
The desert was blooming its heart out up on the high flats. This is just one of the many pictures of flowers that I took.
Though the antelope I saw on the refuge were very far off and moving fast, these deer weren't too worried about the pickup.
This is my favorite picture of the dogs from the whole trip. By this point we had been on Sheldon for about three hours and I was hoping that the road we were on would not peter out, but I figured that the worst that could happen was that we'd have to backtrack. The dogs enjoyed the unfettered freedom to run for a while.
After a week on my own with no one else making decisions, I realized that I did, too, and that was enough. We made it to Lakeview a few hours later, visited with Mom and Dad, and rolled into Klamath before midnight. It had been a 17 hour day of driving, but it was worth it.
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