Summit day.....

7:58 am - Friday - October 22nd - Bishop, CA - 39° F,  48% humidity, wind 7 mph out of the northwest.....clear skies today with a forecast high of 75° F.  Our view this morning.....↴

The Eastern Sierra Nevadas as viewed from 

Bishop Tri-Counties Fairgrounds

....on this date in 2017 TLE and I were hiking in Bryce Canyon NP........↴

All trails lead to TLE

Two days was really not enough time in Carson City, but it will have to do this time around.  We would have loved to drive up over Spooner Summit to see Lake Tahoe once again, have lunch at the Bridgetender in Tahoe City, and visit friends in South Lake Tahoe, but it was not to be.  We need to be in SoCal by this weekend to move our stuff out of my son's warehouse.

We were on US-395 heading southbound to Minden, NV just before 9 am.  Our first stop of the day would be the Maverick fuel station there where we would take on 139 gallons of #2 diesel at $3.54/gallon for a total cost of $493....ouch!  Fortunately we will not to 'pay the rent' again until sometime in December.

Standing between us and Bishop, CA was 160 miles of mountainous terrain, amazing, breathtaking, adjective defying scenery, and many high altitude passes.....the first one of the day being Simee Dimeh Summit at 5,987' above sea level just south of Minden, NV......

Topaz Lake

.....we re-entered California just past Topaz Lake, and continued on through Topaz, Coleville, and Walker toward Devil's Gate Summit......

.....standing at 7,519' above seal level.....a lot of grinding along in 2nd gear at 33 mph.....right at red line (2,100 RPM's)......

......after Devil's Gate Summit we took a long break in Bridgeport, CA before heading out of town to tackle Conway Summit, the highest elevation point of the entire length of US-395 at 8,131' feet above sea level.....

Bridgeport, CA.....City Hall

Looking north....

....and looking south

.....and it was another grinder.....8 miles to the summit before the Mono Lake Vista Point.....

.....we took another long break before continuing southward down to Mono Lake, and the small town of Lee Vining, CA.....

Still snow on the ground at the Mono Lake Vista Point from the latest snowfall

.....we always stop at this vista point whether going north, or south, to take a picture.  My parents did this when we were small kids, and TLE and I have continued the tradition.  The sky was amazing.......

....there were only two more summits to crawl over before we began our long 14 mile descent into Bishop, CA......the first.....Deadman Summit at 8,036' feet above sea level.....

June Mountain Ski Resort in the distance

Mammoth Mountain Ski Resort

.....and finally we passed the Sherwin Summit sign at exactly 7,000' above sea level.....

.....from there it was a slow slide downhill in 2nd gear for 8 miles at 6% grade, and another 6 to the Bishop, CA city limits.......

.....we arrived at the Bishop Tri-Counties Fairgrounds just before 2 pm, and opted for a site out in the field with 30 amp and water.  We've stayed here numerous times over the years....it is right downtown within walking distance of restaurants and services, and it is pretty quiet at night....

....and the view is not too shabby either.

We were going to go out to dinner, but TLE enticed me with the promise of a BLAT (bacon, lettuce, avocado, and tomato) sandwich for dinner....an offer I dare not refuse.....lol!  Only 200+ miles until we reach SoCal, and our home for the next 5 weeks!

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500 miles from SoCal......

 7:24 am - Thursday - October 21st - Carson City, NV - 48° F, 87% humidity, wind - CALM.....partly cloudy today with a forecast high of 67° F.....another great Carson Valley day in store, but we will roll our wheels in a couple of hours heading ever southward to Bishop, CA today....some 160 miles, and 6, or 7 summits away.  The views this morning......↴

.....on this date in 2013 TLE and I were having brunch at the Campbellsville University cafeteria in Campbellsville, KY.....↴

We had two main reasons for spending two days in Carson City.....1) Shop at COSTCO and Trader Joe's, and 2) Have lunch with two of my cousins.....Lois and Liz.  I haven't see Liz for at least 7 years, and Lois for 4 years, although we have stayed in touch.  I had contacted Lois about 5 days ago to let her know we would be coming through the Reno/Sparks area on Tuesday, or Wednesday, and she responded that cousin Liz was in town, and that they were having lunch with Liz, and her husband, Rick, on Wednesday....perfect!  Our lunch date was at 1 pm, and we were going to go shopping after lunch, so I had time to kill in the morning.  

I've had a few maintenance projects on the back burner for a while, and since it was such a nice, sunny day I decided to dive into a couple of them. First up was to replace the male and female ends on a short, white fresh water hose I have not been able to use for some time as the original male and female connections leaked badly.  I happened to have on hand brass male and female connectors, so I cut off the old, and installed the new ones. 

Next, I noticed a number of missing rivets on the Newell aluminum siding when we were in John Day, OR....8 to be exact, so I retrieved my pop rivet tool, and supply of aluminum rivets, then went to work.  I had to drill out a couple of the old rivets, but the rest went in pretty easily.

TLE and I took a long, slow walk around Silver City RV Park around 11 am.  There must be in excess of 400 sites here.  The park was sold to the current owners about 3 years ago, and they have invested quite a bit of money in sprucing up the park, and it shows.  Usually when we pass through here in October it is about 60-70% full, but this time around I would say it is close to 95% full.

We arrived at Red's Old 395 Grill in Carson City just before 1 pm to find Liz and her husband already there.  John and Lois arrived a short time later.  It seemed like only a short time had passed when TLE suggested we needed to get going as it was after 3 pm, and we still needed to shop....I don't think there was a break in the conversation for the entire +2 hours!  We said our 'until next times' and bid them adieu around 3:20 pm....by the time we got back home it was closing in on 5 pm.

Since we want to get an early start Thursday morning I disconnected the sewer and water, added water to our fresh water tank, and finally, we inserted the VW into the trailer.  We find ourselves less than 500 miles from SoCal.  You notice I didn't say 'home'......SoCal is not really our home anymore.  It is a place we visit a couple times a year to visit our kids and grandkids.  We'll take three days to cover that distance.

For some reason whenever we get together with our cousins I forget to take pictures.....it never fails.  I am usually pretty good about taking the requisite 'usies', but virtually every time we have seen John and Lois I have forgotten, and my record is still intact.....doh!

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Familiar stomping grounds.....

 7:51 am - Wednesday - October 20th - Carson City, NV - 48° F, 43% humidity, wind - CALM....partly cloudy today with a forecast high of 61° F....looks like it will be a nice autumn day.  On this date in 2017 we were visiting Bryce Canyon NP......↴

When we awoke in Alturas, CA Tuesday morning the outside temp was 24° F....brrrr.  While I had turned on the block heater around 6 am, there was no way I was going to do anything outside until at least 9 am.  Counting the block heater we had 5 electric heaters going, and were using close to 50 of the 100 amps to which we have access.  With no wind, and few clouds the temps got into the high 30's pretty quickly, and we were rolling our wheels by 9:20 am.

While I was 'pretty sure' we had enough diesel to comfortably get to Carson City, NV where we planned to fill the tank, our analog fuel gauge tends to get very inaccurate when it reaches the 1/4 tank line, which should mean we have at least 45 gallons of diesel left, which at 6 mpg would give us a range of 270 miles.  Theoretically, if we have 45 gallons left we should need 135 gallons to top off our 180 gallon tank.  Often we have taken on less than 120 gallons in those situations, which means we really had 60 gallons.  There is no doubt in my mind that if I trusted that gauge even one time that would be the one time being 'pretty sure' would not be a good thing.  I say all that to say this....we decided to drive back into town to put in another 30 gallons to be on the safe side.  In California diesel prices run over $1.00 more per gallon than most other western states, and the best local price we could find was $4.72/gallon....that is the most I have paid since 2008.  In Pendelton, OR we paid $3.61/gallon on Saturday.  At any rate I reluctantly gave the cashier $150, and pumped in 31+ painful gallons.

We were on US-395 heading south once again by 9:40 am....

.....about one hour into our day we hit our highest elevation point in over 6 months......

.....and from there it was pretty much a downhill slide to Reno where we crossed I-80 for the first time since last February.  From Reno we continued south on US-395 to Carson City where we had planned to fill up using our TSD Logistics fuel card for $3.55/gallon, but soon discovered that most regular stations were selling at the same price, or lower, so we decided to defer the fill up until Friday, and continue on to our destination, Silver City RV Park, where we arrived around 2 pm.  Whenever we are going to be in the area for more than a day we stay there....they have sites large enough for our 62', and it is just 3 miles to the Trader Joe's and COSTO stores....

.....we stopped two, or three times over the 200 miles to Carson City to take breaks, and the big views were just stunning.....

One of our rest stops was a large turnout just before our descent into Standish, CA

....once again we arrived at an RV park without a reservation and snagged a long pull through site for two days before heading out in the VW to have a late lunch at the local In 'N Out Burger.....

I always get their #2 combo plate (burger, fries and a drink)....I think I got too much catsup.....lol!

I'm a happy boy!

.....we didn't do any shopping....we'll save that for Wednesday....so we were home before 4 pm.  I had forgotten the Dodgers NLCS game started at 2:08 pm, so I turned it on to see how they were doing.....they lost two games in Atlanta in the bottom of the 9th both times, and were now back at home where they were losing 5-2 as the bottom of the 8th inning began.  By the time the dust settled the Dodgers had taken a 6-5 lead on a three run home run, and a run scoring double.  They managed to strike out the Braves 1,2,3  in the top of the 9th to win the game.  Smiles all around!

Thanks for stopping by!

When you shop Amazon, please use our link (below) to access their website.......we will appreciate every purchase you make using our Amazon Affiliate link, and  remember, using our link will not add one penny to your purchase, plus we will receive a small commission which over the course of a year adds up to enough to by a tank of diesel for which we thank you very much!