Saturday, June 14, 2008

Father's Day Road Trip

Dad and I are in Lovelock and crashed at a hotel after a serious caching day.



So, I ask Dad what he wants to do for Father's Day. He's been talking about this "little loop" outside Rye Patch for awhile now and we decide that it'll be fun to spend the weekend out that way and bagging some miles and caches.

So, stopping in at the store to grab the supplies needed for an all day dirt ride, we head out to north central Nevada. Along Hwy 50, up Hwy 95, and out onto I-80. Mostly quiet trip, the excitement was when we saw a huge plume of dirt and dust explode up into the air and, as we drew closer, saw the dirt bike rider who seriously bit it standing and shaking off the sudden wreck. His bike was caked in dirt and he was understandably shaken. But he got back on, the bike relunctantly coughed to life, and he was off to head home.

Once we got onto 80, we grabbed a cache in Toulon and then headed towards Lovelock, grabbing a second one at the Big Meadows cemetary. We checked into our hotel, found the second of three caches in Lovelock (the third being a 5 star terrain that even John of jahoadiandjohn confirmed was a 5 star), and headed out into the desert. Our initial trip was just along I-80, picking up the caches that neither of us had gotten since we hadn't been this way in a long while. The coolest being a bizarre rock formation that has a cache appropriately named "The Wall." Then we turned and headed down towards Unionville.

We'd been in Unionville before, but it was during that period when I wanted nothing to do with caching, so we didn't get the cache that was up the canyon from the State Historical Marker. Now a second chance to drive down there and explore was before us and we had fun walking around a mine that Garmin labelled "Boston Tunnel." I was unable to find the "tunnel" but I think the mountain runoff has created a grove a trees that happily took up residence in the mine shaft.

Back up to I-80 and back down the road to pick up the caches that lie further off the road than those quick drive bys. By now the smoke from the California fires was getting thick and the sun was turning a bright red. Rye Patch itself was a dusty grey color and unless you knew it was there, you simply thought it was a dry patch of desert. But, our adventure into the canyon revealed not only a cache, but the ruins of Humboldt City - some of the neatest building foundations I'd seen in a long while!

As we continued our way down to Lovelock, we made another stop along the Humboldt to grab a cache at the old mill site of Etna - and were promptly eaten by mosquitos! Bailing out of there quickly we headed towards the airport near Toulon (gee, haven't we been here before) to attempt to find a cache that had a rather discouraging DNF report as the last log. Sure enough, we also failed to find it. Drat!

As we headed into town for the night, we went over the count for the day and felt pretty proud of the 12 we got, considering the distance and location. The inn had Wi-Fi which let me log in, check my email, and post the above blurb. Dad crashed early and I ended up watching a little bit of "In the Mouth of Madness" with Sam Neill. I'll have to check that one out another night as it's getting late, and tomorrow is an early start!

6/14/2008
You found Toulon Plains, "BIG MEADOWS", California Trail Nearing Big Meadows, Willard, The Wall, A Lonely State Historical Marker, Humbolted, Star City-SHM #231, Unionville Cache, Downtown / Main Street USA: Puckerbrush, NV, Got Mugged At Humboldt, Etna

6/14/2008
You couldn't find "DE FIELD"

6/14/2008
You hid It Had To Have One

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