Another long day today

So it was goodbye to Las Vegas today; a good couple of days but enough. We headed out north, through Nevada, getting off the Interstate for a short way then criss crossing the California/ Nevada border numerous times on smaller roads. The plan was to get within about 100 miles of San Francisco and find a place to stay, ahead of getting to our booked accommodation before heading to the airport to pick up George and Wilf ( my two sons) who have been in Vancouver.

But that meant another long haul - 530 non interstate miles, and relay driving. We’ve got a relay system of two hours about, no excuses, and it works well and nobody gets too bored or too tired, despite the mind blowingly tedious scenery. However, it was  a bit more interesting today, wandering along the border roads. There were some tinpot towns, but also a few interesting things, like Creech Airforce Base, near Indian Springs It is one of the bases from which drones are flow globally, to do whatever drones do -attack things I suppose. Anyway, several came into land as we drove past. Weird looking things and probably forbidden to get pics but we had a go anyway.

Found a great place for lunch too; Dyer, Nevada, a little one horse town complete with dust a broken down cars on the street and a great little general store where the lady made us fab sandwiches for lunch.

After lunch, the road became a bit more interesting, winding up over higher ground., and into the Sierra Nevada foothills. The Mono Basin was up there too, stretching out to the right of us and giving us glimpses of Mono Lake. 

The water level was quite low but I guess its the end of summer and most of the water must come from seasonal snow melt as there are no rivers ( that we’ve seen) up there. Eventually, we reached Lee Vining, formerly known as  Poverty Flat would you believe, the town where we planned to turn off and go over Tiago Pass but the signs said it was closed. Lee Vining founded the town 100 or so years ago, as a mining place. He accidentally shot himself, then the place got taken over, but in the 1950s, it was named after him again.

 A quick question in the info centre revealed that the pass closure was nothing to do with the government this time, but impending snow. Snow? It was still sunny and warmish but they wouldn’t let us pass, so we had to go the long way round, via Carson Valley. But that was OK, just different to what we’d expected but that's what happens with trips. Its the getting round things that matter.

It was dark well before we found a place to stay, but we did almost immediately we arrived in Angel Camp, about 100 miles from San Fran, and not far from Jackson. And yes, it did snow on the the closed road, so its just as well we didn't go that way!