Five Eastern Sierra Passes.....

 7:04 am - Saturday - April 25th - TWW - 41° F, humidity 50%, cloud cover 52%, wind 6 mph out of the west by southwest.....partly cloudy skies today with a forecast high of 65° F here at the Honey Lake Rest Area off US-395.  We find ourselves less than 2 hours from LPG&RVR.  On this date in 2018 TLE and I were in St. Louis, MO.....

Left to right: Moi, TLE, Kay and Creig (pronounced Craig)

.....having dinner at 4 Hands Brewing Company with TLE's brother, Creig, and his wife Kay.  You've only met TLE's sisters before, but she also had two brothers....Creig and Read.  The view this morning....

....sunrise over Honey Lake in the background.

We always have a time in mind for when we want to begin our driving day, and on Friday it was to be on the road between 8 am and 9 am.  It was a chilly morning in Bishop necessitating the use of our block heater (heats the coolant in the block of the engine) to heat up the big Detroit Diesel 6v92 for the first time in half a year.  The switch for the block heater is in the bedroom right above the head of the bed, so I usually, around 4, or 5 am on departure day, lean over and flip the switch so by the time we leave a few hours later the 6v92 will turn over and fire immediately.  Having access to 30 amps on each leg of our 50 amp system allows us to run our 2 electric heaters, the block heater, and our electric kettle at the same time....they each draw around 10 amps.

I had already disconnected from the water source Friday evening, so all I had to do after finishing my daily missive was to shutdown Starlink, and then unplug from shore power.  I fired up the big Detroit Diesel 6v92 around 8 am, and we were on the road by 8:10 am heading northward on US-395.

Our initial goal for the day was the Walmart in Indian Hills, NV (just south of Carson City) where we would do some shopping at the Walmart and Trader Joe's, which is in the same parking lot.  If you have followed our blog for any period of time you know that between Bishop, CA and Indian Hills, NV there are 5 summits we must climb, and descend.  The first is Sherwin Grade which begins about 15 miles north of Bishop.  It is around 8-9 miles long, and involves a continuous 6% grade topping out at 7,000 feet above sea level.  The second, just past Mammoth Mountain Ski Area is Dead Man's Summit (8,047'), then the grand daddy of all summits/passes on US-395....Conway Summit which at 8,143' above seal level is the highest point of the entire length of US-395 from the Mexican Border to the Canadian Border.  Then there is Devil's Gate Summit just north of Bridgeport reaching 7,519' feet above sea level.  The last pass, just past Topaz Lake, NV is Simee Dimeh sitting at a mere 5,978' where you begin a slow, long descent into the Carson Valley.  From Bishop to Indian Hills it is about 150 miles, but due to all of the summits, and climbing and descending them in mostly 2nd gear at 32 mph, it takes almost 4 hours, but the views are amazing....

Leaving Bishop

Beginning the climb up Sherwin Grade

At the top of Sherwin Grade near Tom's Place

Crowley Lake

Beginning the Conway Summit climb

Mono Lake

Mono Lake and Lee Vining in the distance

Conway Summit

.....it was basically rinse, wash, repeat for a little less than 4 hours.  I set the cruise control and just hung on to the wheel.

We reached the Walmart in Indian Hills around 11:55 am.  Our Jello plan was to shop, and then spend the afternoon and night in the Walmart parking lot (it used to be legal to do so until this year), but we were met with 'NO OVERNIGHT PARKING' signs, so that changed our plans immediately.  We usually stay at the Tahoe/Douglas Elks Lodge in Gardnerville, but spending just one night does not overcome the difficulty in backing into their RV sites, so on the spot we made a new plan.  We would spend a little over an hour there shopping, and for me taking a nap, before continuing on another 2 hours to the Honey Lake Rest Area in Janesville, CA where we have overnighted numerous times over the past 4+ years, then arrive at LGPG&RVR Saturday morning.  It's about 88 miles from Honey Lake to the golf course....

The Walmart parking lot

.....by 1:15 pm we were back on US-395 northbound through Carson City and Reno.  Road construction has been ongoing on US-395 through Reno, and north to the California border over 10 years, and it is still not complete, but it is close....maybe in 6 months when we head south again it will be FINALLY done.

Once we escaped the road construction the drive became fun again as we crossed back into California just north of Border Town, NV.  The drive to Honey Lake was without incident and took almost exactly 2 hours....

Starlink deployed

Doesn't she look pretty!

....we found a nice pull site near the back of the Rest Area, parked, leveled, and settled in for a nice afternoon/evening.

Thanks for stopping by!

A laid back day.....

 6:52 am - Friday - April 24th - Bishop, CA - 37° F, humidity 28%, cloud cover 70%, wind 3 mph out of the northwest.....very cloudy today with a forecast high here in Bishop of 71° F.  On this date in 2025 TLE and I were in Walker, CA....

TLE and I split the Walker Burger

.....having a world famous Walker Burger....best cheese burger in the Eastern Sierra!  The view this morning.....

.....look at the fresh mowed grass!

Thursday was a laid back day at the Tri County Fairgrounds in Bishop, CA.  After finishing my latest blog post entry, and eating another of those wonderful Apple Fritters from Eric Schat's Bakery I headed outdoors to clean the exterior all of our windows, plus windshield.  It's been a while since I cleaned all of them at the same time, and it was long overdo.  While I was thus engaged the lawnmower guy came out to mow the grass where we are, so I needed to move our water hose, and a few other things so he could do his job, then returned to cleaning windows.

Other than that I spent part of the morning puttering around in the trailer, and then reading, and napping.  Around 3 pm we got dressed and took a walk over to Whiskey Creek for a late afternoon lunch.  It's about a mile walk each way.  It took just under 20 minutes to walk there, and we were pretty much the only people there (dinner service begins at 4 pm), so we chose the alfresco option for dining....

Not a bad view from the alfresco terrace

I'll take a 22 ouncer Blue Moon, thank you!

Bacon wrapped shrimp for our appetizer

Fish tacos for moi, and the 'Sunshine Salad' with salmon for TLE

.....we ordered their bacon wrapped shrimp for an appetizer, then fish tacos for moi, and their Sunshine Salad with salmon for TLE.  To chase the food I ordered a 22 oncer Blue Moon.  The food, as always was amazing.   As it neared 4 pm customers began to arrive for dinner service, but up until then we had the place to ourselves.

We took a leisurely walk home knowing that Friday we would be hauling anchor once again to continue our northward trek back to LPG&RVR.  We had planned on arriving there Sunday morning, but rain is in the forecast for Sunday, so we're speeding up our itinerary to arrive there Saturday morning.  Normally we would stay two nights in Minden, NV then continue our trip north, but we do not want to arrive in the rain like we did last April.

Thanks for stopping by!

Traditions....

 7;35 am - Thursday - April 23rd - Bishop, CA - 39° F, humidity 23%, cloud cover 9%, wind 6 mph out of the north by northwest....crystal clear, blue, sunny skies today with a forecast high of 70° F.  On this date in 2017 TLE and I were having our customary/annual first dinner at Lake Tahoe Pizza Company.....

....right across the street from Tahoe Valley Campground where we worked for 4 summers.  The best Anchovy Pizza ever!

Speaking of traditions, TLE and I have this tradition when in Bishop, CA to walk over to Eric Schat's Bakery on Main Street for pastries and coffees our first morning.  We pass through Bishop twice a year now....when we're going south and when we're going north...usually in October and April of each year.  As I have written more than once over the years, US-395 is our 'mother road'.  We have driven it from Hesperia, CA all the way to I-90 in Washington State more than once.  Our favorite section of this US Highway is the 147 miles stretch from Bishop, CA to Carson City, NV.  In years past when we worked at Tahoe Valley Campground we always drove US-395 to Tahoe.  It is not a fast way to get to Lake Tahoe, but it is the most beautiful way to get to Lake Tahoe.  On this day we began our walk over to Eric Schat's Bakery around 11 am.  It's about a 10 minute walk at the most.  Typically it is standing room only, but on this day it was very uncrowded....

....usually you have to wait for a table.  TLE changed things up a tad Wednesday by getting a scoop of Lemon Gelato to go with her House Brew coffee, but I stayed with my long time favorite....Apple Fritter....

Two more apple fritters in the bag for Thursday and Friday

....on our walk home we stopped off at Reagan's Sporting Goods to check out their 50% off sale, but did not find anything without which we could not live.  We were back home by 12:30 pm.  As we walked down the entrance road to the fairgrounds I noticed there was snow on the White Mountains too from the recent storm.....

.....around 2 pm I headed outside to wash, for the first time in 6 months, the Newell.  I wanted to wash her before we left TWW, but the 7 mile drive out to US-66 is very dusty, and felt like I would be wasting my time. Being here in Bishop for 3 days was the perfect opportunity to put a smile back on her 'face'.....

.....TLE took a couple of pictures of me near the end of my work.  For the first time in 6 months she looks beautiful....

....in all it took me around an hour to wash off 6 months of dirt and grime, but I got her done without feeling exhausted....lol.

Around 4 pm TLE and I walked over to 'Upper Crust Pizza' on Main Street down near the Smart and Final Iris grocery store.  TLE didn't partake in pizza on this day, but chose an appetizer of Chicken Wings with a side salad.  I ordered their standard pizza (sauce and cheese) adding anchovies, black olives, onions, mushrooms, and pepperoni.  As happens to me from time to time I neglected to memorialize our dinner, but it was great!  This is our second time dining at this pizza place.  They make a mean thin crust pizza.

We were home by 6 pm after a quick stop at Smart and Final Iris to pick up some milk, and cheese.  For the next hour+ I napped off my food coma....I ate half of that medium pizza....lol.  For evening entertainment we watched another episode of 'Survivor Season 50', and were in bed by 10 pm.

Thanks for stopping by!

The story I almost forgot to tell....

 7:56 am - Wednesday - April 22nd - Bishop, CA - 36° F, humidity 27%, cloud cover 17%, wind 6 mph out of the north by northwest.....mostly sunny today with a forecast high of 66° F.  On this date in 2025 TLE and I were overnighting at Fort Amargosa.....

....on our way north to Likely Place Golf & RV Resort for our 4th season.  We were just there yesterday!  The view this morning....

.....lots of snow on the Eastern Sierra this morning.  They got 8-9 inches at Mammoth Mountain Ski Resort....a lot for late April.

Before I begin today's post about Tuesday I feel compelled to relate a story from the day before we departed TWW.  As of Saturday morning (April 18th) I had been missing a 10 foot extension cord for about a week which I use to power our Toro blower.  It was a minor thing, but I don't like losing stuff....does anyone?  Next I found I was missing a large Phillips head screw driver.  I remembered using it recently, but could not remember where.  I figured I'd come across it before we left TWW, but again, I HATE losing stuff.  The final 'nail' in the coffin, so to speak, was I misplaced a hammer I was using that very morning to pull the spikes out of the ground which affixed the numerous artificial turf pieces on the 'lido deck' to the ground.  I was trying to retrace my steps that morning, but could not find that hammer.  I have several hammers, so it's not a big deal, except I really HATE losing stuff.  Now the number of missing items had reached 3, and I was beginning to question my ability to function as a mature adult male....my memory seemed to be betraying me.  I told TLE about the missing stuff, so she could be on the lookout for any of those 3 things.

We had been talking about moving the two wheel chocks we have screwed into the trailer floor to show us where to stop when inserting the VW.  We used to have a bike rack on the back of the Beetle, but removed it last winter, and left it in the garage at TWW.  Without the bike rack we felt we could move the VW back 18-24".  We did some initial measurements of the VW, and then repositioned the two chalks.  Now it was the day before our departure, and we wanted to see how much more room would be available at the front of the trailer, so I suggested we walk over to the VW to measure from the middle of front tire to the very front of the car, and then mark the floor, so we knew how much room, for sure, that we had to begin stowing things in front.  We walked over the Beetle to do just that, and what do you know?  I found the Phillips head screw driver sitting on the top of the license plate.....doh!  Well, good, one of three things found.  We then walked over to the garage to get something, and as we were exiting I saw the missing extension cord hanging on the handle bars of one of our bicycles....cool....2 things found.  As we walked back to the trailer I, pointing at the roof top solar panels, telling TLE we needed to stow them first thing in the morning.  As I glanced over at the roof top solar panels I saw the missing hammer resting on top of the stowed patio awning where I had left it earlier that morning.  So, within a 10 minute period I found all three items thereby regaining a little of the self confidence I had lost over the past few days....LOL!  TLE and I laughed for a few minutes.  My frustration turned into joy in just a few minutes!

Now, let's talk about Tuesday, okay?  High winds were forecast along our route Tuesday from mid morning on, so we had decided Monday evening that we would be on the road northbound no later than 7 am in order to be as near to Bishop as possible before the winds got over 20 mph.  All night long the winds blew, and when we awoke at 6 am to get ready to leave they were blowing quite hard, and we wondered if we should spend another day at Fort Amargosa.  I rechecked the forecast and saw the wind was out of the south, which meant we would have a tailwind for the first 160 miles of our 240+ mile driving day.  Within seconds we went from staying another night, to 'let's get dressed, and leave ASAP!  We were on the road by 6:40 am cruising north with a 25 mph tailwind....it doesn't get much better driving wise.....

....with a tailwind there is almost no wind noise, and you can hardly hear the big Detroit Diesel 6v92 purring at the rear of our Newell.  As the morning progressed we began to realize what a great driving day this would be.  With that tailwind the need to downshift on hills almost disappears, and all you find yourself doing is hanging onto the steering wheel, and enjoying the view.....

So many long, long stretches of straight highway with views stretching miles and miles into the distance

Soon the Eastern Sierras came into view with their snow capped peaks

....we passed through Beatty, Goldfield, and finally Tonopah where we took a 20 minute break before continuing our drive north to US-6, which would take us over the mountains to Bishop....

Beginning the long uphill on US-6

.....as we crested the summit around 10:30 am the wind hit us full force from the left side, then mostly head on for the final miles into Bishop, but that was only 47 miles out of 240+ miles we drove that day.  We arrived at Bishop RV Park (Tri County Fairgrounds) around 11:30 am, and were in our site for three days by noon time.  We have water and 30 amp electric, which usually means we have be careful what we turn on electrically, but  I bought this special adapter a few years ago to use specifically at Bishop RV Park.  They have rows of 30 amp receptacles enabling me to use two of them and boost our amperage from just 15 amps per leg to 30 amps per leg enabling us to NOT worry about overloading either circuit.  We rarely use 20 amps per leg at a time, so this adapter allows us to live 'normally'....

There are about eight 30 am plugs I can plug into, and with very few people here it is not problem

The 50 amp plug from the Newell plugs into the adapter just like a pedestal

.....rain was forecast for late Tuesday in Bishop and it came right on schedule.  It didn't last long, but it was nice to hear rain our our aluminum room again.  While it only rained for a short while here it snowed up at Mammoth Lakes for 8 hours, so I would imagine when we head up Sherwin Grade Friday morning we will still see some snow on the ground.

Thanks for stopping by!