May 9th - May 23rd

It has been a long time since I did this.  Part of the reason is that my computer crashed and I had to rebuild it from the start.  That took about 4 solid days and it still isn't 100%.  I also have been avoiding updating this as it is getting harder and harder to write this... oh well.

After Reno, we traveled to Vegas but it took us 4 days as we only drove a few hours each day... it was exhausting!  Once we were in Vegas, Arda spent a week with her sister (Yvonne) and 2 friends (Dorri and Nel) while I stayed in Boulder City at a the Canyon Ridge RV Park.  It was a good thing I didn't have plans as it allowed me a chance to get my computer fixed.  I also took the time to clean-up my tack and one saddle... still one to go!  This took almost all day.

On the Monday (the 17th) I picked up the "Golden Girls" and took them to Lake Mead for lunch and a cruise.  It was a good break for them from the dark gambling halls.  After our cruise, we went back to the trailer where I fixed hamburgers, salad, and other stuff for dinner... actually I can't take all the credit as Arda did a lot of the work.  Here are a few pictures of Lake Mead.

We left Boulder City early (at least for us) on Thursday the 20th and headed to Cowboy Tom's in Chaska MN.  We drove about 500 miles each day.  The first night we stopped at Wally Mart in Rocking Springs, WY.  The 2nd night was spent in Merdo, SD at the Triple H Truck Stop.  We arrived at Cowboy's about 4:00 PM on the 22nd.

We are here for a week with Bob & Betty King so will update this in a week or so...

Take care and keep your loops open.

April 31st – May 8th

Well as far as the Californios and Reno are concerned, they are both winners.  Reno has done an excellent job of making the downtown a pleasant place to be… aside from the casinos that is.  They have a well maintained bike/walking path that follows the Truckee River through the center of town.  There are many places (benches and parks) to sit and/or picnic along the 20-mile path.  There are a number of rapids where kayakers spend their lunchtime doing tricks and there is even a race course.  The weather was a little cool and we had a severe windstorm one night where the winds were over 100 mph.  Fortunately, the RV Park is in a valley so we were not impacted too bad.  In fact we had worse wind storms when we were in Arizona.

I also thoroughly enjoyed the Californios.  Most of the cowboys who competed could throw some large loops… 14' – 20' and still catch 200 lb calves.  It was fun to watch the youth competition.  There were 2 young boys (brothers) from Alanson MI who competed.  They were good and in fact Nathan one the over-all youth competition.  As for the rest of the Californios, it was a good opportunity to talk to a lot of people who have excellent knowledge and are willing to share it.  Of course there was lots of tack to purchase too - J.

Tuesday we moved on as we are now headed to Las Vegas (of course it will take us a week & and half to get 400 miles) where Arda will meet up with her sister (Yvonne) and a couple of friends (Dorri & Nel) where they will have a girls week… Vegas will never be the same!  We stayed the night at the Desert Rose RV Park in Fernley, which was only a couple of hours from Reno.

Wednesday we got up late and Arda had her coffee in bed because we were only travelling a short distance to Sun Valley RV in Mina, NV.  Nevada's geography is unusual in that one can drive for hours on very straight roads, lots of rocks, small and large, plus very little vegetation and then all of a sudden Walker Lake appears.  This was a huge lake with a lot of nice picnic areas so we stopped and had lunch.  We drove a few more miles down the road, where at the end of the lake was a Naval Undersea Warfare Center… in the middle of a desert?  I guess our "enemies" wouldn't think to look there – HA!  

We drove for another 2 hours and stopped for the "night" at the Space Station RV Park in Beatty NV.  Travelling this way is tough – I recommend it to anyone who enjoys travel.  Arda went to the casino (surprise) that was next door while I caught up on our bills because we had excellent internet service.
  
Friday we headed for Furnace Creek Oasis in Death Valley.  This was a beautiful drive.  At one point we had a 16 mile long descent at 8 degree.  The scenery was just beautiful.  At Furnace Creek Campground we unhooked the trailer and then went site seeing.  The landscape in Death Valley is a series of stark contrasts from flat land, to salt flats, to rocks, and to mountains in all colors.  A number of side trips off the main road are dirt roads but they are in reasonable condition so we drove several of them.  We drove out to the "Devils Golf Course" which was just amazing.  This was part of a dry lake bed.  In fact all of Death Valley was submerged by Lake Manley, which dried up over 10,000 years ago.  It was 90 miles long, 12 miles wide, and up to 600 feet deep.  The land leading up to this area was very flat that transitioned into an area that was all broken up and full of salt.  We also went on to Badwater where there is water all year round and a very large salt flat.  The dry lakebed is about 280 feet below sea level while on the west side Telescope Peek rises over 11,000 feet.  This is the lowest and highest point in North America.  We went back to our trailer where we enjoyed a nice hamburger on the grill even though the temps had ranged from 81 – 102.  Fortunately, it was not humid so we were able to enjoy ourselves.  The whole area is very quiet and everywhere we went, as our good friend Charley Hendren used to say, we could "listen to the quiet".  It was exhilarating.

Saturday morning we decided to do some more sightseeing as there was one side-trip where the road was under repair on Friday.  We got up before breakfast, ate our cereal, and hit the road with our coffees in hand.  The road, Artist's Palette was open.  What gorgeous scenery!  There are blues, greens, various shades of browns, reds, tan, etc.  It is truly breathtaking to see nature's beauty.  It was well worth the trip.

After our sightseeing, we packed up the trailer and headed to Pahrump NV.  The Paiute Indians first lived in this area over 100 years ago where they discovered an abundance of water.  They named the valley Pahrump because Pah = water and rump = rocks.  There is an abundance of both here in the valley.  We are going to stay in the town of Pahrump at the Preferred RV Park, which is within walking distance of 2 casinos. 

There are a lot of pictures located at the following links… Death Valley.  Sorry for the large number of pictures but I couldn't decided which ones to exclude.

Keep your loops open until next time.