Things You Find in the Field: Roads You Shouldn't Take

View Bad Road in a larger Map

The road we'll be taking a look at begins at a circular parking area (above and below), and heads up the ridgeline to the right of the drainage centered in the "Bad Road" Google Earth image (above). I haven't attempted this particular road myself, and don't plan on it without walking the mid-slope part of it carefully. Actually, I don't plan on attempting it at all: It looks like a road for "high-markers."

The Prius parked in the circular parking area below the hill climb, which begins just left of the photo.

Having no photos of the beginning of the road, here's a view from Google Earth.

This first part of the road really looks just fine, and there is an almost flat area just over the first rise for turning around.

View of the upper part of the road, which forks.

The main part of the hill climb continues uphill on the right-hand fork, into or through one patch of rocks, and beyond into another. The left-hand fork looks like it's been used to access vehicles that have rolled or slid downhill into the gully.

Closer view of the bad area below, through, and above the rocks.

This part, and maybe the curve just below the fork, looks rather sidehilly from below.

If you happen to make it up this far (into the first set of rocks), don't look back! Instead concentrate on going forward!

Otherwise you might end up in the gully. Vehicle parts are scattered all over.

Interestingly, it appears that Google Earth and Maps captured a vehicle in the process of being dug out. (Click to enlarge, or view here.)

Uphill, the road appears to end in rocks and a series of individual tracks, some of which go back down into the gully.

Instead of this questionable road, I'd recommend taking the switchbacked road that takes off just left of the circular parking area (first photo, with Prius). This road is very rocky in a couple places and requires a high-clearance 4WD vehicle. (We saw a low-clearance vehicle turn around at the first switchback just the other day.) The switchbacked road will take you up to the main ridgeline road, an adventure for another day.

Photos taken in middle and late March during two hikes up the switchbacked road.

Busy Days!

I haven't been blogging much, and there is a reason — well, there are several reasons, a major one being the move I've been involved in since at least late April, another major one being my new job with it's longer drive time that results in essentially 11.5 to 12 hour days: leave our new place at 5:30 in the morning, arrive back sometime between 5:00 and 5:30 in the early evening, depending.

Here we are on our first U-Haul van trip, driving past some Ely Limestone on the left and right side of Highway 50 near the turnoff to Ruth, NV, with a reddish hill of Rib Hill Sandstone (??) in the sunlight straight ahead:
And we're not done with the move yet, although we're getting closer to our goal of being out of the old place and entirely ensconsed in the new place, which will entail unpacking, reorganizing, and making preparations for a related new adventure that is more MOH's than mine, but which will involve completely cleaning out and refurbishing my old truck.

The caravan on our first trip, in Jakes Valley.

Our caravan this trip will not be quite as complicated, nor will it involve my old truck or the Prius.

And here's a shot of the van with Prius in tow heading north on S.R. 278 toward what *might* be a ridge of eastward-dipping Eureka Quartzite.
Maybe we'll have time to stop and take a look at the supposed quartzite today or tomorrow or whenever we get out of town — or maybe not.

For now, back to packing, cleaning, packing, more cleaning, calling utilities et al, loading, last minute packing and more loading, driving and driving, arriving, unpacking at storage and new apt, reorganizing, trips from apt to storage and back, and whatever else I've forgotten.

Location shown below is the approximate location of the last photo.

Marathon Summer Summary

It was a busy summer, and now with fall here, I'm once again about to go back for another work stint, which for me will involve working about 18 days in a row, depending on a few unknowns. Last month, for various reasons, I wasn't looking forward to going back to work after my days off; this month I'm merely a bit tired.

In the middle of my typically long work stints, if I feel I've gotten into a bit of a rut, I will often have to renew myself, usually by refocusing my mind, sometimes by something as simple as a hot bath (no hot springs are currently handy). A little burnout or rut development here and there is normal. What has been somewhat atypical this summer is the intensity of our days off, my 10 or so, MOH's 7. I usually spend about one day (sometimes two if I'm lucky) getting ready for days off by catching up on home paperwork and chores, by getting laundry done, and by running a few errands. Then, off we go. The where is usually a great place, and although the where sometimes involves chores of other kinds, the where always involves some needed relaxation. This summer has included two major trips, Alaska and a camping expedition to Wheeler Peak; these trips have been rewarding, enjoyable, relaxing, and offtimes intense. The comings and goings related to these trips — and to smaller trips like one earlier this summer and one earlier this month — always involve getting ready, and the return always involves unwinding from the trip and getting ready to go back to work, often with more paperwork and chores, more laundry, and more errands, giving the whole several days a symmetry of sorts.

These last four months have felt time or event crowded to me, with every day off for both of us seemingly scheduled in advance. Oh yes, we have had time to stop in Middlegate, time to ride our mountain bikes, time to hike to the Pony Express Station (maybe twice!), time to stand in the river and fish, and time to stare deeply into several campfires. We've been fortunate in these things, and in having opportunities for travel, even when some of our travel has been done to accomplish chores and repairs of various kinds. We have also been fortunate in having two jobs, and two cars in which to get to those jobs. Our jobs start at different times of the day; we sometimes pass each other on the road, one coming home from work while the other is going. We wave at each other or flash our lights.

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The other week, my truck broke down in front of our little house, fully blocking one of the roads. After trying a few things and getting out the shop manual — hurriedly, because we didn't know what we were going to do if we couldn't get the thing started and dusk was threatening — we determined that the fuel pump, located inside the gas tank, was kaput. I called the emergency number of the place that usually works on my truck; the owner recommended a towing service. I called them, they recommended another outfit. That guy came over immediately, pulled my truck onto his tow truck while neighbors watched, and hauled my malfunctioning truck off to the auto shop. He dropped the truck and keys there (after hours), and delivered the towing bill to my insurance agent the next day. Two days later (a colleague drove me to work and back while I was sans truck) I had my truck back. Yes, it was the fuel pump.

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A few days or a couple weeks later, while out camping miles from anywhere but Baker, a town of minimal services — card-reader gas station, a couple motels, a place to get showers, a place that sells firewood for camping, and an operating cafe-bar with small general store of the mini-mart variety — the other car, our Prius, broke down in a way that left it somewhat driveable, driveable only because of its strange hybrid system. We finally determined, after replacing most of the coolant, that the "fan" belt to the water pump had broken or come off. The Prius is not an easy car to work on without a full lift, and it has very tight spaces around most of the parts that one might want to work on, including the belt. We were able to coast it down to Baker without it overheating, and with me driving another vehicle loaned to us by our campmate-SIL. We pulled the Prius into the card-reader gas station, drove the other vehicle over to the cafe-bar. Baker has no cell service. No place near Baker has any usable cell service whatsoever, although I got sniffs on the mountain above 8500 feet. We were able to use the landline at the bar to call the number of my auto shop (which I had on my not completely useless cell phone), and were able to find that they were probably the only place for hours that could work on a Prius. So we called the same towing company, met the tow truck by the Prius a couple hours later, and had the car dropped at the auto shop. We drove SIL's vehicle back to camp.

Now we have a whole campfull of gear, ours and SIL's, and one vehicle, when it took two fully loaded vehicles to get the gear and the three of us to camp. We left with SIL the next day, the day she was planning on leaving anyway, picked up my truck at our little house, drove back to camp, and stayed an extra day! The luxury of having an extra day! And the luxury and good fortune of having the vehicles to pull this thing off! (We weren't as overscheduled as I thought, it turned out.)

We stayed overnight, packed up camp the next morning, drove in and unpacked, then picked the Prius up at the shop. Yes, it was only the one belt, the one running the water pump.

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It has seemed like a bit of a marathon summer, perhaps fall will be more steady-as-she-goes.

Snow Days = White Christmas

Yes, we'll be having a white Christmas, thanks in part to the recent (and now tapering) Pineapple Express. Image is from NOAA, the evening of the 19th (2:30 Dec 20 UTC).
Here's what it looked like yesterday in front of our little house...
...and here's what it looked like this morning.
The Prius yesterday...
...the Prius this morning, slowly getting buried deeper and deeper.
We don't have all that much room to pile up snow when we shovel it, so we use a wheel barrow to haul the snow uphill out of our driveway, down the street where it can be piled out of everyone's way.

Note the conspicuous absence of my truck in these photos. It's parked on the street below because it wasn't possible to get it up the hill yesterday, though by the end of the day it probably would have been possible. It is, however, safe from becoming snowed in like the Prius, so we're just leaving it there for the nonce. If we do laundry today or tomorrow, we may have to haul our baskets down to the truck with MOH's snow sled, the one he uses to carry extra gear when snow camping.
Snow on our roof, as of this morning. Yesterday, after two days of snowfall amounting to about a foot per day, I measured 14 inches of compacted snow on the low roof behind our garden.
Here, MOH is measuring the snow on our rooftop. L-square height is 24 inches. His measurement of 17 inches agrees with my behind-the-garden measurement, also of 17 inches. Snow depth varies considerably from place to place, and the 2 feet of Sierra Cement that fell the first two days (after a day of rain) compacted immensely.
Another shot of the Prius.
Inside, I have found the view out my window to be fascinating: ice from icicles has melded with snow on branches.
Unfortunately, these shots can only be taken through the non-removable window screen.

Why does it snow?
More on the Pineapple Express, called an "Atmospheric River" at the WunderBlog.

Plants and Birds and Rocks and Things: Another Trip to Wheeler Peak

So, with some of my current field work complete, and with MOH fortuitously on his seven days off, we took a trip out to Wheeler Peak yesterday. I browsed through some old photos and found that this year's early May trip was the earliest of any year, except for trips that I would place into snowshoeing or other winter categories.
Consequently, although these first two photos are similar in location and orientation to several I posted last year as snow comparison photos, they are earlier than those by at least three weeks. Nevertheless, they do show that Wheeler Peak has more snow on it in early May, 2010, than in late May, mid June, or late June of previous years. No surprise there, really.
The Great Basin National Park website correctly reported that Wheeler Peak Scenic Drive (the paved road that goes to 10,000 feet) was open to Mather Overlook...
...so we drove up and walked around the rocky point, which is at the end of a short dirt road and not far above the 9,000-foot elevation sign.
I was fascinated by how the snow highlights a fracture set across the face of Wheeler Peak, the fracture set being sub-parallel to the ground surface on the right (north) side of the peak. Enlarge the photo to see these fractures, and also to see the rock spire standing above and behind the foreground trees, also on the right side of the photo.
We walked around, finding plants and birds and rocks and things.
Plants included a lot of sweet-smelling, unusually tall and somewhat twisted Mountain Mahogany, manzanita, small Ponderosa pine trees (I think), distant leafless aspen, and distant limber pine.
We saw and heard a few birds, including a small group of Clark's Nutcrackers, a raven or two, and at least one chickadee.
As for rocks, they were everywhere, in roadcuts leading up to the overlook, forming whole hillsides and slopes across the way, scattered all over the ground over which we walked, and jutting out as cliffs to make good foregrounds for pictures and good sitting spots between meanderings. The rocks at Mather Overlook are probably part of the late Precambrian McCoy Creek Group. They come in a variety of whites, pale greens, and purplish grays, with occasional other colors like this nice orange. The metaquartzites are shiny, sugary, and show swirled to laminated bedding.
This pale green metaquartzite is cut by a sugary, white quartz vein, probably a metamorphic sweat-out vein. This type of vein most likely doesn't contain gold, but given the proximity to the Osceola gold district located on the west side of Wheeler Peak, one never knows.
The ground, besides being littered with loose rocks and rock outcrops, was turning green with grass and soon-to-be wildflowers. The air was crisp and refreshing at 36° F (2° C), and the views into Utah were spectacular.
We finally turned away from the mountain, walked back to the Prius, and drove down the hill to the 6,825-foot elevation of the Lehman Caves Visitor Center. We were glad to find that the NPS website was incorrect about the Cafe and Gift Shop operating hours. We went inside and had lunch with chocolate milkshakes.

Yeah, It Snowed. So What?

It's winter! It snowed a whole bunch last night, almost a foot of heavy, concrete-like snow. When MOH got up this morning to go to a mandatory overtime day at work - a day that was in the middle of his regular 7 off but at least wasn't a night shift - he decided to take my truck to work after determining that the Prius was snowed in. It turned out that he only had to serve 4 hours on his overtime day and then was sent home - because (guess what?) there was too much snow!

Getting home meant driving up the usual steep hill to our street, which turned out to be impossible for my truck, even in 4WD. So he walked home from part way up the hill - not a long way, about one and a half blocks.

Later, we went out and around town to buy a new snow shovel, to look at snow blowers (good ones were sold out), and to wish for an ATV with snow plow attached to the front end. Coming home with one plastic snow shovel and some egg nog, we made it up the less steep hill to our street and managed to back downhill into the driveway without getting stuck crossways in the road, an option which became a distinct possibility at one point. We both then proceeded to shovel like crazy, despite my incomplete recovery from whatever bug is going around.

We created a huge snow pile (well, five feet high) in front of the house, while managing to keep the pile away from the lower alley road as much as possible in hopes that my truck will make it up the steep road sometime soon. It's easier to back into the driveway if coming in from the steep road, thence onto the lower part of our split-in-two street.

Anyway, I'm looking forward to a little holiday cheer this evening, and am hoping the snow will not continue to pile higher and higher. It's fine to have a lot of snow, but when it all comes in the middle of the night, it's hard to keep up with the shoveling. Now, if only the city would plow our street! Or even one or two of the streets leading to our street!

Morning Snow

...in photos.

The way it looked while I was out shoveling snow early yesterday morning. I got up at 3:00 am, partly because I couldn't sleep, and went out and shoveled snow for almost an hour before having coffee. That way, I made sure the Prius could get out of the driveway, while MOH slept in just a tad.

It wasn't all that cold, probably right around freezing, and the snow was wet and heavy. Everything I wore got wet from sweating. I went in, changed into dry clothes, and after having coffee and breakfast went back out at about 6:5o am, just around sunrise, and took the snow photos. My hands froze.

A Road Post

Passing Peavine, with some fall colors.

Just Another Road Trip

Prior to taking off on yesterday's "just another road trip" trip, MOH and I went over to our newly rented storage unit, on the outskirts of the little town we stay in while working, he on his cycle and me in his Prius. Our storage unit is primarily for stashing the cycle during the winter, partly so we can have a bit more room in our gravel driveway. We will also be able to store a few other things there: our tiny rental is getting full, what with us bringing out winter stuff, then summer stuff, then camping stuff, then this-and-that stuff, and... Right now, it's mostly empty, though.
On the road we saw a few dust devils...
...and a couple lizards. This one was scampering around on some white tuff, either a base-surge tuff or an air-fall tuff, not that the photo shows anything particularly diagnostic, or typical, of either type of tuff. (Sorry, I just had to try for T-type alliteration, there.)
We duly stopped at a few faults, one barely shown across the road beyond the Prius, our erstwhile field vehicle.
It's hunting season out in the deserts, steppes, and mountains of central Nevada, and it's also that wood-cutting time of year. Notice how I neatly erased the license-plate number from the wood-hauling truck
We saw a nice sundog as we were approaching Reno. This one was in the sundog position on the right side of the sun, and showed good rainbow-like colors. A circle around the sun never developed, but a second sun dog vaguely showed up in the sundog position to the left of the sun. I looked hard for a Kern arc straight overhead, but didn't see one. I saw one once at Pyramid Lake. The sun was almost down, and straight overhead there was a circular rainbow, which is very rarely seen and even more uncommonly photographed. I had no idea at the time that such a thing could even exist, but there it was. I'd like to see another one someday.
The sunset while driving through and around Reno was wonderful and brightly colored...
...including this strange oval sky "hole." (That's not a technical term!)
We stopped at B+N, bought a few books, had some coffees, and bought some 16 oz bags of coffee at much better prices than we usually see in small-town Nevada.
After stopping on the road for some after-dark gas, we finally made it to our home at the lake. The air was cool - exactly 46 degrees F according to the Prius temp sensor - and it was nicely damp compared to the dry air from whence we'd just come. The past-full moon was up and shining through thin, high clouds, and haze from woodsmoke was hanging over the ground.