I'll leave it to you to guess whether I stopped or not. Okay, so Day 1 featured about fifty different kinds of landscapes, and since I drove lass than 250 miles, that's saying something. I left Lodi at 7 and made my way out of the San Joaquin valley up into the Sierra foothills to Placerville. Now I have mentioned Placerville before, when I made a Hangtown Fry at my house last year. When Mom and I went to Placerville ("Hangtown") a few years ago, we were foiled in our search for one. But not this time! I ended up at Chuck's ("American and Chinese Food! Serving Hangtown Fry since 1964!" -- mmm hmmm, FIVE STAR CRAZY), which was a vintage diner without a trace of irony. I have almost a chemical allergy to fake nostalgia, so I was very excited when I walked in and it was all original and clean clean. I ordered the Hangtown Fry and hash browns and ten minutes later, voila, I was eating it. Criminally good, but I would have said that even if it had turned out awful because I've been thinking about having it for so many years. I chatted with Gwen the waitress (SHE STARETED IT so SHUT. UP.) a bit and then I drove away, my belly full of eggs, bacon and oysters.
An hour later, I crested Echo Pass and holy moly, there was Lake Tahoe in all it's obscene beauty. Saturday at Lake Tahoe was a bit of a mistake; there were fifty million people there. I hiked a little bit at Emerald Bay, but there really were just too many people for me to enjoy it, so I scenic drove more than I had planned. Then back around the south end of the lake and up the east side, where I stopped at Logan Shoals and had Deep Thoughts while I stared at the lake. Let me just say: the Sierras do not suck in the scenic department.
Then like ten feet later...the crazy-looking Nevada side of the Sierras. It looks like the moon! If I had come across America in 1840 in a freaking covered wagon, I would have started sobbing immediately upon setting eyes on the Sierras and turned around and wagon wheeled it back to Boston, or wherever the hell I was from. That side was seriously foreboding looking. Oh and within twenty minutes of driving, the temperature went from 78 to 105. And now I am in Fallon, where it looks like a dust storm is moving through. They don't put that on the brochure, you know. But now I am fixated on getting a tumbleweed. I can just put it in the corner of the living room, next to all those dust bunnies. Anyway, here's a picture of a threatening thundercloud, Nevada-style.
5 comments:
Watch out for that UFO!
If my damn house ever sells, I'm moving to Fallon. Temporarily, until I can afford a place in Carson City, so I'm crazy jealous that you're there right now.
No, move to Austin...it's prettier and more extreme. But I didn't see a grocery store (and I walked all the streets!), so, hmmm. There were three historic churches, though, all with pipe organs that went "around the horn." Seriously, every piece of propaganda said that; only the Episcopal one still works.
Fallon was a good way-station, but it was a strip of stuff with a Wal-Mart and that was all.
Yes, but I have a friend who's currently stationed there who is willing to a) rent me his house at a reasonable rate when he transfers to God-Forsaken Lemoore in January and b) bring my dogs.
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