Nevada and Great Basin National Park
We left home on June 12, 2021, to have dinner with long–time friends, now former neighbors living in Lincoln, California. We spent the night nearby in Auburn.
The next day, Sunday, June 13th, we drove across the Sierra Nevada on I–80 to Fernley, Nevada and continued on US 50 to Ely, Nevada. We stopped at a roadside pony express display near Cold Springs to eat our lunch. This stretch of highway is known as the “Loneliest Road”, and traveled over several mountain passes, going past “Sand Mountain” Recreation Area and through the attractive mining town of Eureka.
Today’s drive was a total distance of about 420 miles. Along the way, we stopped at the prehistoric Hickison Petroglyphs, east of Austin and took a short walk to three sites plus a view of the mountains.
Ely has an attractive early 20th century courthouse for White Pine County. It is also the site of historic train that gives rides in summer, the Northern Nevada Railway, which is a national historic landmark.
We left Ely the next morning, June 14, 2021, and drove just over an hour to Great Basin National Park. Great Basin is an uncrowded gem of the park system and is known for its fall colors.
While there, we took a guided tour of Lehman Caves. The cave was discovered in 1888. Due to COVID there was only one tour called “Parachute Shield Tour” and it entered from the normal exit of the cave. We went as far as the Grand Palace. At one point, the guide turned off all the lights, which was very spooky. There is something of a friendly competition with another famous cave of the park system, Carlsbad, to which our guide compared this cave to several times. Apparently the Carlsbad Cavern does not have one of these Parachutes.
After a picnic lunch nearby, we took the Wheeler Peak Scenic Drive which climbs from 7,000 feet to almost 10,000 in elevation over 12 miles. Near the top, we got a beautiful view of Wheeler Peak, which at 13,036 is the second highest mountain in Nevada. There is a monument to Stephen Mather at the viewpoint.
We then carried on into Utah on US 50 via Delta through surprisingly lush dairy farming country and spent the night in the small town of Fillmore, a detour south of US 50.
We are worried about tomorrow since the weather forecast is for temperatures well over 100 degrees. It appears we will need to change our plans for several hikes since it is going to be dangerously hot.
