Well, it was time to do a roundabout aim towards Max’s rendezvous with Gus in Lost Wages, NV. We chose to complete a type of lazy circle which would take us into Idaho to dump some stuff off at our storage. First stop was a couple of nights at the Arco KOA. We tried to take Max to The Craters of the Moon Nat’l Monument, but he quickly showed LESS than no interest in viewing that unique piece of real estate and exploring some of the caves, so we aborted that mission just after we got there.
Mountain Home RV Resort in Mountain Home was good for a couple of nights during the 4th of July, we lucked into a spot. We used this as our base to do a day trip into Star, ID so we could load more stuff into our storage unit. No sightseeing in Mountain Home, but I did take the time to give Rosie a bath and shine her up.
It was straight south to our next stop in Elko, NV. I gave everyone on board of Rosie an in-depth 4-letter word vocabulary lesson while on the drive to Elko. We just happened to run into the biggest swarm of Mormon Crickets I had ever seen. Mormon Crickets are not God’s smartest creatures, they tend to stay on the ground and go airborn very little. The swarm was so thick that all the vehicular traffic squished a nice thick layer of cricket guts all over the highway, creating a very slick surface. And just like water, when you drive over the “cricket slush” you spray behind the wheels. Just what I needed after giving Rosie the painstaking hand washing that I did in Mountain Home. “@&$%#@&*!” We stayed at a previous stop for us, the Double Dice RV Park. I’ve been on the lookout for somewhere to go out and do some shooting and sight in my new AR-15 and I was going to introduce Max to some handgun shooting with my little .38 S&W. However, Max again showed no interest in shooting a real gun, but we found the next best thing…an airsoft pistol at the local farm equipment & westernwear shop. Then, while picking up another box of 5.56 ammo, the guy at the counter pointed me to the local public shooting range just outside of town. We loaded up (OK, pun intended, I can’t help myself sometimes) and drove to the range where Max got to blast away with his airsoft and I got to sight in my rifle. He also got some airsoft time at the back of our RV park, he sure enjoyed it.
Elko in our rearview mirrors, we continued south to our next rest stop, a couple days at the Ely Valley View RV Park (kinda a dump). Ely is just a speck in the desert with nothing to do but go for ice cream.
After sufficient rest it was off to the Sam’s Town KOA in Lost Wages to await Gus’s flight into Vegas in a few days. Being Vegas, in mid July, we were treated to lovely triple digit temps 24-hours a day, WHEWWWW! When we weren’t in the pool, we spent our days walking through the air-conditioned casino compounds and letting Max play in the arcades. The one sightseeing outing we did do was to take Max to Hoover Dam & Lake Mead. That poor lake is diminishing quickly!
Well, again, all good things must come to an end. We picked Gus up at the airport and delivered he & Max to their motel next to the Raiders stadium where they were to attend a soccer game the next day. Max seemed happy to be back with his dad. We said our tearful goodbyes and headed back to our own reality.
The following 2 nights we stayed at the No. Las Vegas Cummins center getting my yearly maintenance service on Rosie. Then it was westbound back to the viper’s nest—Kalifornia. We did get a pleasant opportunity to spend a day with Hailey & Ellie, swimming at the Vines RV Resort. Then it was date night at Cane Tiki Room in Paso Robles where we relaxed with a couple of tropical adult beverages that I have to say were WAY WAY WAY WAY overpriced! $20 for one drink is highway robbery! But we still had fun…
Our final loop through Kalifornia took us to the Flag City RV Resort in Lodi for a few days, then back into Sonoma County and our stay at the Petaluma Elk’s Lodge for our medical appointments. I had a follow-up upper endoscopy so the GI Doc could see if the damage remained. We were more than a little disappointed in that neither of our children ever called us and asked how everything went and in fact, that was the second time in a row we were in Petaluma and not even the smallest of effort was made by our only daughter to try to see us. But I can say my scope went well, no damage, onward and upward, saddened but hey, life goes on.
Winnemucca, NV was our next stop off, at the “lovely” Model-T Casino and RV Park. I say that facetiously, Winnemucca is another speck in the desert and the Model-T is a dump. Continuing eastbound, W. Wendover Nugget Casino/Hotel/RV Park was good for a couple of days. We hit most of the big casinos in the area, pretty much breaking even, then took a walk down to the historic Wendover Army Air Base. You can look out into the desert and see some of the buildings & bunkers that were instrumental in the development of the nukes used on Japan in WWII.
The Provo (UT) Elk’s Lodge was our next stop. This time we spent 2 weeks in their lot, FHU’s for (5) total sites. Provo Elk’s has a very nice building and lounge compared to many we have been to. We settled in for a relaxing stay, checking out Provo, Orem, Springville, and Spanish Fork. We took full advantage of Costco, Trader Joe’s, the many Walmarts, and several malls. We even got the opportunity to hit a movie theater, something we have not done in numerous years. We saw “Top Gun Maverick” and it was actually a very good film.
BYU has a large white “Y” on the side of the mountain above the school, with a pretty steep trail that covers a little over a mile to the top of the “Y”. Again, we loaded up (sans Woodrow Wilson) and headed up the trail bright and EARLY one morning. We were sucking wind pretty good, my pulse soared to around 150 BPM at one point, but we made it! The views were well worth the effort.
One fine day we broke out the bicycles and wanted to head out on the Provo River Trail that wanders through downtown and out to Utah Lake in one direction, into town and finding its way out to Bridal Veil Falls & Vivian Park. We quickly found the path out to the lake was closed with construction in some parts, so we headed out to Bridal Veil Falls & Vivian Park to the tune of about 15 miles of biking.
Mt. Timpanogos off the Alpine Loop up by Robert Redford’s Sundance Resort contains a large system of trails leading to the top, about 17 miles worth. That being a little bit too aggressive for us, we chose a couple of the lesser hikes. One day we set out on the Stewart’s Cascade Trail, about 2 miles one way, which culminated at Stewart’s Falls. It was a steady moderate ascent and again we got some pretty spectacular views. I was also reminded why I should have worn long pants while hiking the hills…stinging nettles! I got out with minimal damage. The second day we took the other fork of the Timpanogos Trail to Timpanogos Falls (both upper and lower). Beautiful views everywhere and we managed to run into a family of moose right on the trail. In fact, momma moose and daddy moose kinda pinned us down on the trail (baby moose was in the brush nearby) for about a 5 minute period, both of them about 30 feet from us, one up trail and one down trail. But they eventually disappeared into the brush so we could get by. This one was almost 3 miles round trip.
Our stay in Provo was certainly a step up more enjoyable, weather-wise, than the triple digits of Las Vegas. We got some sporadic rain but temps did not reach 3 digit. Our 2-week stay finished, it was off toward Colorado where decisions on locations are on a day to day basis. So, our first stop was…Until next post.