October 2013 Government Shutdown

It’s been in my mind to devote October to a road trip for quite some time, and now it seems that it is finally gonna happen. I postponed it for a few days to stay home for the first Warriors preseason games. It seemed important that I have some kind of mental image of what this year’s team will look like to carry with me for the month. I’m glad I did that.

I waited two more days because the condo folks wanted me to be home when the roofers came. Fat lot of difference that made, they just stomped around on the roof for a few hours and left. They totally could’ve done that without me! That happened today, Tuesday, so tomorrow I’m leaving.

I also used this time to finish the exhausting process of identifying the correct Medicare Supplement plan and signing up for it. By the time I return home it will be November and I will be on Medicare – woo!

Wednesday (Oct 9)

I am finally getting this packing and leaving streamlined to a pretty smooth process. I was all packed, kitchen cleaned, freshly showered and shaved and ready to go by 1-ish. Time enough to go to the Northwest Library and cycle my books so I will have a full six weeks to get them back (three weeks plus one online renewal). Then very tasty mid-afternoon breakfast at Big Ed’s, and I point myself east on I-80, on the road at last!

Because I never actually get going until early afternoon, I like the first day to be a short driving day. Therefore I will be overnighting in Winnemucca rather than going all the way to Elko.

I got there 6-ish, and drove straight up the hill to Water Canyon, the gate to which was S H U T due to the government shutdown. F– the dumbass tea party republicans and whatever stupid process they are going through to come to terms with a black president andthe modern age.

Anyway, I had planned for this and had made sure I had a backup option – the Winnemucca Walmart does allow sleeping in the parking lot. So …

bad news: instead of a beautiful quiet canyon among the aspens, I am under the security lights with delivery trucks idling near me  all night,

good news: I have a place to sleep in Winnemucca tonight!

Thursday

The shabby camper hogging the best spot in the corner of the lot appeared abandoned last night, but I find out very early in the morning that it is not. There is a (forever unseen) older couple outside, waking me from a deep sleep because they are ten feet away,crabbing at each other in loud voices. Eventually they stop and I get a little more sleep. When I did get up, it turns out that in addition to two crabby people, at least four cats live in that little trailer – two peeking out of the sleeping pad over the cab, and two sunning on the dashboard.

Turns out there are two nice breakfast places in Winnemucca! I went to get Griddle last time, good food, bad wifi. Yelp told me about another – Third Street Bistro(?) that I liked even better – good food AND good wifi.

The drive to Elko was uneventful. Miles of one lane traffic for construction, but I was in no hurry. Straight to Elton’s house were I find him and Jesse and I re-meet his dad. After extended text negotiations with Cassie, we are to meet her and Matt for drinks at the DLC. Elton and I head there early, collect sister Cindy, meet C and M, we drink and have fun. Cassie wants to try out the new Basque place so we do. It was a really fun night. I don’t have social nights out on the town like that much anymore.

Friday

The de Leons are such good hosts. Cindy says they’ll have breakfast whenever I get up, so I get right up! She makes excellent eggs. I think I upped my onion dicing game watching her prepare the veggies for the eggs. Her mom made a really tasty and healthy banana blueberry smoothie. Since he’s he guy I guess, Jessie did the meat – in this case bacon :). I said goodbye to all and headed off to Cowboy Joe’s, where the wifi from the Stray Dog next door is always excellent. I didn’t really need more coffee, but I did need the wifi.

With a little assist from Jessie, I had an epiphany about this trip. The trip I had planned was heavy on federally administered lands (Great Basin National Park, many National Forest campgrounds), so it was going to be a problem. Jesse turned me on to the idea of just going straight up the Mountain Highway, the road right down the hill from Elton’s house! As soon as he suggested it I had a “duh” moment, like it was the right answer all along.

I wasn’t real clear on what goes on in southern Idaho, but I know it was mostly state parks and private campgrounds, so it seemed like a better place to wait out the shutdown. And I’ve never been there! Turned out to be a perfect idea.

I finally left Cowboy Joe’s about 3-ish, because I my plan was to stop at Wild Horse Reservoir only eighty miles away.

The reservoir was pretty and pleasant today, but kind of boring so I press on. Right after the dam, the Owynhee River plunges into a steep and narrow canyioon that twists and turns for the next twenty miles or so. There is a really delightful National Forest campground towards the north end – closed of course. I wish to file that on away for the future.

I enter the Mountain Time Zone and thus lost an hour at the Idaho border. It is getting dark sooner than I would like, so I pick up the speed a little bit to press on to Bruneau Dunes State Park. It’s Friday night and despite the fact that there was nobody on the roads, the campground is very crowded, I feel lucky to have gotten a spot!

They have an observatory here, with the final astronomy talk of the season tonight!! So most of these folks are Astronomy geeks of some sort – Boy Scouts getting their astronomy merit badge, Boise State nerds on a field trip, that sort of thing. All very wholesome and uplifting – really! The waxing half moon and little big of hazy cloud cover made it not great for stargazing, but we did try. And I was able to do my favorite thing of moonlight hiking about 3/4 of a mile across the fields to and from the observatory!

Saturday

Boy did I sleep a long time! Like 12 hours, I think! I turned over and checked the time, expecting ti to be 9 or 10, and it was after noon! and check-out is 1PM. One hour of that was the time change, but still … I had to get my ass in gear, so I packed up and left the campground. I explored the park a little – see what the observatory looks like in the daytime, check out the odd little lakes at the bottom of the dunes – cool place! The dunes are apparently stationary, not the usual shifting dunes, so they felt more like hills of sand rather than dunes – if that makes any sense.

Then one of those pre-caffeination morning drives that are always a little off the mark. I drove right past the remarkable Thousand Falls area – water just gushing out of the side of a cliff into the Snake River for hundreds of yards. On a full stomach I woulda been all over that! I passed a coupe of places where I otherwise would have stopped, but yesterdays Yelp research showed a place with good food and wifi at Hagerman, so that is what I’m aiming for. Glad I did! The wifi eventually worked, my pleasant waitress was simply gorgeous, my locally grown, pan-fried trout filllets were excellent, and she gave me great advice, namely to goto Miracle Hot Springs next.

Since this is Saturday (and all the national campgrounds are closed!), the Springs was a little too busy. I am happy that I got the last camping spot! The strangest thing that happened was the hundreds of flies that swarmed into the as soon as I pulled in and opened the sliding door.

Hot pools were very, very nice. Temperature was perfect, in fact, everything except the plague of flies was just about perfect!