Day 10 - The Basin and Range Province
(Ashland, Oregon to Austin, Nevada, 497 miles )
Our Route, Friday August 2nd , 2002.
WeSTOC 2002 was over and it was time for Ken and I to continue our travels in the direction of home. The rally had been great with fun rides, great company and spectacular scenery. The first leg of our trip home would take us across northern California and into central Nevada, one of the most desolate areas of the United States.
The first order of business was to make it to Redding, CA. by 10:00 AM to have a new rear tire mounted on my bike. We got on Interstate 5 at Ashland and headed south toward California. This stretch of road turned out to be a veritable mine field of speed traps, especially once we crossed into California. Almost all of the speed traps were at or near construction zones. The California Highway Patrol were very serious about folks slowing down in those areas. Despite all this, we managed to make decent time and arrived at Lee's Honda and Kawasaki in Redding by 8:30 or 9:00 AM. I thought we were going to have to wait a while since my appointment wasn't until 10:00 AM, but as we arrived someone cancelled their 9:00 AM appointment so they got my bike right in. When they finished, I went outside to pick the bike up and they had washed the darn thing as a courtesy! I almost didn't recognize it. I was impressed by Lee's customer service.
With a new rear tire on my bike and fresh wash job, we hopped back on our ST's and left Redding on Highway 44 headed for Nevada. In an effort to make time we took Highway 44 all the way to Susanville rather than making a detour to visit Lassen Volcanic National Park. Near Susanville, Highway 44 became 395 which took us all the way to Reno, Nevada where we were greeted with a brief, light rain. It was my intention to get on Interstate Highway 80 and head east for Fernley but I managed to miss the exit. It turned out to be a lucky coincidence because while trying to find our way back to I-80, I spotted a Honda Motorcycle Shop.
The Honda shop was a welcome find because several days prior one of my headlights had burned out. As Ken and I wheeled into the parking lot of this HUGE, brand new dealership, I spotted a 2000 year model Honda Blackbird that looked awfully familiar. After parking our bikes I looked at the Blackbird and swore it looked like Dale Wilson's but I thought that it couldn't possibly be! I had just seen him, his bike and his daughter at WeSTOC and figured they had probably gone back home (somewhere in the Northwest). I blew it off as improbable and went inside, where after much anguish the parts guy managed to find a bulb that would fit (turned out my '99 had a '98 bulb in it!). I then went back out into the parking lot and managed to install the bulb without too much hassle. As Ken and I were wheeling out of the drive we spotted Dale and his daughter walking up the sidewalk! I thought to myself that this was getting too weird. First we met a complete stranger in Denver that just rode in out of the blue in the middle of a big city and told us he knows Dale. Then we bumped into Dale very unexpectedly in Reno, Nevada of all places.
Nevada is a different place to say the least. As the whole world knows, gambling and prostitution are legal in the state. While riding east on the interstate through Reno, a hooker was advertising her wares over the CB! The minute she hit the airwaves a jillion guys suddenly got on the radio and couldn't key their mics fast enough as they jostled to get a chance to talk to her. Ah, the free enterprise system!
Just a short distance east of Reno we got off the interstate at the town of Fernley to start a run across the desert to our night's destination of Austin, Nevada. While in Fernley, a rather eccentric old lady accosted Ken while we were at a bank getting cash and questioned him extensively about his motorcycle. Just a few seconds later an old man with a history of riding Honda Goldwings did the same. I didn't think we'd ever get out of there.
At Fernley we got on Highway 50, a.k.a. "The loneliest Road in America". This federal highway runs east to west across the width of the United States from Maryland to California but it's traverse across the barren desert of Nevada is where it got it's name. One travels on this route along arrow straight roads across valleys many miles wide then up very narrow mountain ranges, then back into the next valley and so on.
The Nevada and Utah portion of the highway cuts across a geologic feature called the "Basin and Range Province". It is an area where the forces of plate tectonics are trying to pull the Earth's crust apart, thinning it in the process. The result of this gigantic taffy pull is something which looks much like a washboard. A look at a Nevada highway map that shows shaded relief reveals an area in which the ridges (mountains) and swales (valleys) of this huge washboard are oriented north-northeast to south-southwest.
Haulin' ass across the Basin and Range Province. The roads were straight as an arrow and the scenery... well, there wasn't much scenery to speak of unless you count miles and miles of brown brush and dark colored rocks as scenic. NOTE: this picture was actually taken in the Utah portion of the Basin and Range but it all looks the same.
From Fernley we passed through Fallon, Nevada, home of the U.S. Navy's famous "Top Gun" training school. Beyond Fallon, we ventured into the heart of the Basin and Range Province as we went up one mountain range and down into the next valley, up the next mountain range, down into the next valley, ...ad infinitum. The scenery across this desolate landscape was not particularly attractive since it consisted of miles and miles of knee high, brown colored sage brush, with not a single tree in sight. In most places the roads across the valleys were so straight they disappeared to a point as we looked ahead. Finally, just about dusk, we hit the town of Austin, Nevada, located in a mountain pass that cuts across the Toyabe Mountains. After supper at the Toyabe Restaurant, we checked into our home for the night, the Pony Express Motel. It wasn't the Ritz but it was clean and comfortable.
The day had been a long and rather uneventful one. This would change the next day however, when we would encounter spectacular scenery in some of Utah's many National Parks.