I always get a bit edgy before embarking on a new adventure and for this our latest trip it’s no different; I am anxious to get the Hell out of town while at the same time reluctant to leave all that is familiar and comfortable. That’s normal, right? I’m pretty sure that’s normal. For sure it’s normal. And it’s a big trip too, being on the road for somewhere around 5,000 km over 10 to 12 days. But… the uncertainty is part of the fun, isn’t it? I think it is, for sure it is. “Go ahead,” I say, “embrace the unknown, this will be good for you,” and, “everything will be fine.” I know it will be fine because why wouldn’t it be fine, it’s always fine, but I’m still nervous… and then I go anyway. To Nevada!
Which is a 3-day drive away. Of course we could get there quicker but that’s not really the point now, is it? The journey actually IS the destination, so for this trip the plan was to avoid the Interstate system where possible and visit the scenic highways and byways of an older, and maybe forgotten America. Yes, in a way I was searching for that prototypical Norman Rockwell scene and no, I never did find it. Oh well, eh?
But why Nevada? Well, the simple answer is that we needed the sticker. There is a magnetic map of the United States on our fridge, and there’s a sticker for each state that you place on the map after driving through it. After our previous trips there was only one state in the West that we never drove through – Nevada. I know, twice we drove right around it so yeah, we wanted that sticker.
On the second night of our trip we overnighted in Arco, Nevada, population 995 and known as the Atomic City, because in 1955 it was the first town on Earth to be lit entirely by nuclear power. I’ll be honest here, not much has happened to this town since.
Okay, so like I was actually afraid I might get shot while taking this picture, but I couldn’t resist. What more do you need to say, right? Rockwell would not have painted this!
Anyway, Arco wasn’t the only tired town we visited on this trip. Nevada is full of these old mining towns that are still kicking, but barely. McGill, Pioche, Goldfields, Austin – living ghost towns where if you look a little closer and let your imagination run a stretch, traces of colour and glory just might be detectable behind those boarded up, main street store fronts and grand houses with wraparound verandas now falling in on themselves. Once upon a time these towns were alive and full of hope and real people worked in the boarded-up buildings and sipped lemonade in hand-made rocking chairs on those wraparound verandas. They went to church on Sundays and probably had picnics afterwards, living life the best way they knew how, just like you and me. And to be fair, some of them still are, and I try to keep that in mind when driving through. I like these old towns; they speak to me, but sometimes what they say makes me sad.
Craters Of The Moon National Monument, Idaho. That’s sage brush growing in a lava field. No dogs allowed on any of the trails, so we drove the loop and took turns going out for little jaunts along the designated paths. Those mountains in the distance poking out of the bald-ass flatlands? Dormant volcanoes! Yeah, I thought that was pretty cool too!
Bonneville Salt Flats International Speedway – Wendover, Utah. Sounds impressive, doesn’t it? This is where you come to set World Speed Records, but if you haven’t been, I’ll let you in on a secret – there’s nothing out there. You drive 4 miles off I-80 until the pavement comes to an end, and that’s it. You want to keep going? Sure, drop off the pavement and onto the Flats and seriously, you can drive as fast as you want and as far as you want – the Flats seem to go on forever – but only if you have a suitable vehicle. I was driving a 25-foot RV, which is most definitely NOT suitable, so I stayed on the black top. Just about everybody else with a car or truck though gave it a whirl, and why not?
Lake Mead at sunset. To get into Lake Mead National Recreation Area you pay $25, and that’s good for 7 days. Then, the RV park we booked into charges another $70 per night. Ours was an unobstructed lakeview site and the view was quite spectacular, except… the lake was approximately ¾ of a mile away with absolutely no walkable access. Yeah, Right On eh? And the free WIFI advertised? For ONE device only! Oh, and did I mention that it was ONE HUNDRED AND FUCKING FIVE DEGREES FARENHEIT? Seriously, who cares about the view when you are sitting in a blacked-out RV with the A/C cranked, with no WIFI to watch the Dodgers even. I had a jug of Diesel Exhaust Fluid (DEF) still in its box and stored underneath in one of the compartments – it exploded from the heat! Ever smell DEF? Mmmmm, yeah this was not a pleasant experience.
We did actually get out of the RV at dusk to sit in our lawn chairs and sip iced sweet teas while taking in the vistas because seriously, the Mojave at sunset really is spectacular. It was still however infernally hot, like 95F hot, so we were deep into the neck sweats when out of nowhere came a visit from the aliens – yeah, for reals, man! Listen, Nevada is a well-known epicenter of UFO activity; North of Vegas you have the Extraterrestrial Highway and as well, the notorious Area 51 isn’t all that far from where we were, so it’s not that improbable to have an alien encounter. Anyway, as I was saying, just before dark an old visor bearing, whiskey voice, wearing too short shorts and a tank top with her belly hanging out (didn’t need to see that) showed up in a golf cart to lead a truck and trailer into the slot next to us. The beings that stepped out of the pickup were very tall broom sticks wearing clothes two sizes too small, tiny glasses and long, mop top hair. First things first, they all lined up outside the trailer for darts and drinks, before lighting up an enormous fire right between the truck and trailer. Come on now, who in their right mind lights a fire when it’s 95F? I guess these aliens are impervious to heat. Oddly enough, they spoke in what sounded like Russian.
We bolted early the next morning to avoid any unwanted abduction scenarios (one can never be too careful about these things) for the old gold mining town of Beatty, Gateway to Death Valley. Max wasn’t all that thrilled about stopping here but I said, “seriously, how bad can it be? This town has wild burros.” They do too, like approximately 800 of them, all descendants of the original donkeys that were brought in to work the mines in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries. And they are everywhere. Like I said, “how bad can it be?” Well… Right, so we pulled into the office at the RV park and the sign on the door said, “push the button to ring for service,” which Max did, summoning out of the shadows what one might call the living embodiment of the creature otherwise known as ‘Red Neck.’ This little dude in a scrunched-up cowboy hat, wearing a white ‘wife beater’ was adorned in all sorts of chains; chains for keys, a chain for his wallet, and other chains for whatever, and oh yeah, knives! Oh boy eh? So like I counted at least 4 strapped to his body; this ‘Honky Tonk’ was equipped with a lot of sharp steel there kids! He seemed friendly enough though, living in his holiday trailer right out of the 50’s, massive piles of junk stacked high as the sky, and he even had a ferocious chihuahua tied up on a long chain outside. Of course I’m thinking to myself, “Oh my God, you can’t even make this shit up.” It was awesome, and the park had good WIFI (many of the parks we stayed at advertise free WIFI and then when you come they give you a password before saying, “the WIFI doesn’t usually work – like seriously, what the fuck?), allowing me to read The Sunday Times even though it was still Saturday (8-hour time difference to London – I know, I’m a nerd). Yup, about 11 pm the ambulance showed up, not really sure what that was about but all of us denizens of the trailer park milled about for a bit and shrugged our shoulders before going back inside, the crisis seemingly having sorted itself out without any outside assistance.
But… Beatty, Nevada population 880, has The Death Valley Nut and Candy Company, which is the biggest candy store I’ve ever seen. Seriously, it’s one of the largest candy stores in America, and it’s in Beatty, Nevada. Population 880. Little slice of Heaven this place is, and as I walked the isles rocking out to Bruce Springsteen’s ‘Glory Days’, I almost ran over an older lady who thankfully was only amused by my boyish but clumsy enthusiasm.
Nevada itself is well, rather empty. We drove a section of Highway dubbed ‘The Loneliest Road in America’ and it wasn’t all that different from a few other highways we traversed. On one section of highway between West Wendover and Ely, we encountered two snakes and an antelope but no other vehicles for well over an hour. When we finally crossed paths with other humans, they were in a motor home, and the driver and I waved to each other.
The scenery however is quite spectacular, regardless of where you find yourself within the state, but be prepared because there is WIND, like absolutely everywhere (that includes Southern Idaho as well). There are times when you are cruising along and you can feel the wind start to really push the RV, and you struggle to hold it steady, then… just as your heart is jumping out of your chest, it feels like an invisible hand reaches down and literally shakes the shit out of you, for maybe a second or two. That’s when Mart goes absolutely nuclear, “holy #$&^$%^&*&%#!!!! Did you feel that? $#$%%^&%&&*&^** bastard!!!” Yeah, like the Donald Duck freak out, except I’m driving. This would happen 4 or 5 times a day. Just South of Jackpot, Nevada the wind hammered us so hard the Electronic Stabilizer Program in the RV faulted out and would only re-set when we got into the relative quiet of a fuel station. I might have gone slightly ballistic that time as well.
So yeah… Welcome to RV life eh? Hey, we got through it fine enough, just like we knew we probably sorta would lol! And we’ve now put on well over 20,000 km all over the Western US and Canada which I think kinda makes us genuine RV’ers, right? Damn straight it does, just a bit younger compared to most of the ‘hard cores’ we seem to come across. No really! The very serious and full timers all look to be about 10 years older than us and even though I ‘throw smack’ at the Boomers all the time, it probably wouldn’t be a bad idea to actually engage in a conversation with one of them once in a while. Max does because she is actually sociable, and she always comes back with interesting tidbits. I am antisocial and very rarely talk to anyone, but I think maybe in the future I should try and change that, so you know – SAY YES – TALK TO SOMEBODY ALREADY? – because when it’s all said and done, it’s actually the people who provide the interesting and colourful parts of a trip, right? Mind blowing shit I know, but we humans are all weirdos and funny as fuck, especially when we don’t mean to be. I need to see more of these weirdos, and less wind, like way, way, way less wind.
Peace out my brothers and sisters!