Marathon Man.....

 6:25 am - Tuesday - April 11th - Bishop, CA - 45° F, 65% humidity, wind 7 mph out of the northwest....partly cloudy skies today with a forecast high of 78° F.  On this date in 2017 TLE and I rode our bikes from the Elks Lodge in San Luis Obispo to Avila Beach, and back.....about 18 miles round trip.....↴

.....the view this morning.......↴

I turned over in bed to look at the time, and it was 3:30 am.  On moving days this happens often as my mind is tabulating all the things which must be done before we haul anchor and roll our wheels for the first time in virtually 6 months.  I had planned to get up around 5 am, take care of the final things, and depart GNHS around 6 am, but I began to realize what needed doing would take well over an hour, so I decided to get up at 4:30 am, which I did.

We wanted to arrive at Parkhouse Tires in Thousand Palms as closed to 7 am, their opening time, as possible so we could get our 4 new Michelin drive tires installed, and be on our way before 10 am.  By 5:45 am we were rolling our wheels, and watching GNHS fade from sight in the rear view mirrors.....TLE kindly took this video of our exit down Mineral Hot Spa Road to Highway 111.....

.....by 6 am we had reached Highway 111 then pointed the nose of our Newell Classic northward.  Within 30 minutes we reached the junction of Highway 111 and I-10, and within another 20 minutes were exiting the Interstate at Bob Hope Drive, then turned right on Varner Road, and within 60 seconds arrived at Parkhouse Tires....

.....I promptly parked the Newell in the long line of trucks which had formed for service that day, and walked into the office.  When purchasing tires I deal with a company called National Tire Concierge out of Florida.  I call David Ward, the owner, and give him the information on what tires I want, and he finds them near where I am, gets them to set aside the four tires I want, and sets the date for installation.  His prices per Michelin tire are over $100 less per tire than I can get.  In this case he found them at Parkhouse Tire in Thousand Palms, CA, about 60 miles north and west of GNHS.  Within a few minutes Becky, the office manager, had pulled up my info on her computer, and told me it could be 3 hours before they got to us, but was fine....our current drivers were 8 years old, and we're just rolling the dice to push them any further.

Amazingly, by 8:45 am they began to remove the passenger side tires, and by 9:45 am we were done.....I love it when a plan comes together.....

.....and by 10 am we were merging back onto I-10 headed for I-210, and ultimate I-15 to take us over Cajon Pass where we would pick up the Mother Road (for us anyway)....US-395....

.....if you know me, and I think you do by now, we prefer 150-175 mile drives per day, but we need to be at Likely Place Golf & RV Resort by Thursday, and wanted to spend a couple of day in Minden, NV shopping, topping off our diesel tank for the summer, and visiting with some friends from our college days.  Plus, for past 3 months US-395 has been closed at Lee Vining, CA (Mono Lake) due to avalanches, and landslides covering the highway just north of town.  Since we thought we might have to take the long way around out of Bishop to get there by Tuesday, we had planned on a couple of long mileage days.  The distance from GNHS to the fairgrounds in Bishop, is 368 miles....over twice our desired daily mileage.

Soon we were passing the wind mill farms that line I-10 as you head for Banning Pass....

...and within 45 minutes we were descending into the Pomona Valley......

....where we picked up I-210 west to I-15 north.  We were over Cajon pass (4,200') by 11:30 am, and merging onto US-395 shortly thereafter.  

It was a beautiful day to drive almost 400 miles.  I just set the cruise control, and held onto the steering wheel as the miles flew by.  We stopped for about 30 minutes in Kramer Junction to add 50+ gallons of diesel, as we were down to a tad over 1/3 of a tank, and I knew that was not enough to get us to Minden, NV and cheaper diesel.  We paid, ouch, $5.39/gallon for bio-diesel, and managed to get around 56 gallons, putting us back at 2/3's of  a tank, more than enough to get to cheaper diesel in Nevada.

We passed by 'Little Lake' just before Coso Junction to find the lake completely full for the first time in years.....

....soon the Sierra Nevadas came into view.....there is a lot of snow up there for mid April....

.....around 2:45 pm we passed by Owens Dry Lake to find it full of water for the first time in almost 60 years......

......I've been driving by this dry lake bed since 1953, and have never seen water in it.  Was it completely full...no, but it was about 70% full...amazing!

Our drive north continued to be with out incident, and the scenery continued to impress....

...we never get tired of the drive to Bishop.  

We arrived at the fairgrounds in Bishop just before 4:30 pm....I had been awake for 12 hours, and driving for over 6 of them.....368 miles down!

When I was checking in for our site I asked the lady if US-395 was still closed at Lee Vining, and she advised it had just reopened Sunday!  Wow!  We don't have to drive the detour, and now Minden is less than 150 miles away!  The drive from Bishop to the Carson Valley is our all time favorite drive, especially at this time of year when there is still snow on the Sierras.  Within minutes we were parked, had connected to shore power, deployed our Starlink dishy, and the Winegard satellite dish.....

.....the high in Thousand Palms was forecast for 100° F, but the high in Bishop was just 81° F.

By 6:50 pm the sun was touching the eastern flank of the Sierra Nevadas, and the temp was under 78° F.....perfect!

......I was extremely tired after our marathon travel day, but we now have 4 new Michelin drive tires, are enjoying much cooler temps, and are about to begin the drive from Bishop to Minden.  Stay tuned!

Thanks for stopping by!