After three weeks on the road, I am back in Arizona

I made a fatal flaw and did not take my laptop with me. I thought I could keep enough notes for my tablet, but the tablet requires apps and patience, neither which I have time for.

Sadie was a perfect traveler for me. After two nights on the road she got the hang of it again. She stopped fighting with me for the cot in the back of the van. She learned to sit up front with the cool AC on. We hiked or walked around every day once we got into California. Unfortunately, the entire region was experiencing a heat wave. On the good side, we never had bad weather, and that included earthquakes and other natural disasters. Wildfires were just starting as I was leaving, and now central Washington is going through a bad time, with entire towns being evacuated and many people losing their homes.

I will start writing down the trip piece by piece, using my photos to jog my memory.

We finally left early on June 29th, at 5:33am. It was a Sunday and traffic was light. I missed my turn off in Phoenix, though, and ended up driving west on I-10 until I got off at the Quartzite exit, and then continued north on AZ95 which led into US95, hugging the Colorado River on the Arizona side. Kevin and I had been here before and it wasn't worthy for me to stop anywhere in AZ. I'm no fan of cities and most of the access points along the Colorado River were private property. It was hot and there was much traffic. I only stopped to pee or let Sadie out to pee or have water, but even she seemed to hold it in until it cooled outside. She never whined unless she had to pee or poop. My goal was to get as far north on that first day, to make up for lost time on Saturday.

Temperatures were quickly in the mid 90s as I got to northern AZ, and it hit the triple digits once I neared Laughlin, NV. A small detour into Needles, CA proved futile as gasoline there was over a dollar more per gallon than in Arizona. Feral donkeys, remnants of the mining years, were seeking cover under some palm trees. I thought feral donkeys were only in Oldman, AZ. I got back on the AZ side until we reached Laughlin.

We stopped in the river town of Laughlin for a meal at In-And-Out, where a double cheese burger meant Sadie got one of the patties. This is something I did all throughout our trip: I'd order a double cheeseburger and give Sadie the second patty. Laughlin is a colorful river town, with several tall casinos, but nothing else when it's triple-digit hot. It is not the kind of town worth exploring unless you are a gambler, so we moved on.

Las Vegas was also disappointing, and again because of the heat. It was late in the afternoon and I figured I could take Sadie out for a walk along the Pedestrian mall on Fremont Street. She seemed very uncomfortable with being there and I didn't force the issue. I had never been here; it's clearly where tourists go to shop. Twenty minutes of Las Vegas was all I could handle myself, so we got back on US95, now known as the "Silver Trail" and continued on our journey north. I drove past the Red Rock Recreation area, one spot on my list, due to the heat. My goal was to get as far as I could while there was still daylight.

This stretch of US95 north of Las Vegas and west of Area 51 is a desolate, depressing area. It's well traveled by RVs and people wanting to avoid the high California gasoline prices. RVs can pull over anywhere there is level ground as there is nothing in the way.

It's not until we got away from Area 51 that the highway became more scenic, more ghostly. Beatty was the first small town with amenities, with the small mountains of Death Valley National Park along the western horizon. Most of the homes were mobile homes with stuff in the yard and rusty old vehicles in the front. I stopped to fill up my tank at the "Area 51 Alien Center" where gas was $3.71 and noticed a brothel just behind the gas station. The place was getting business from lonely truckers. I did not go inside to explore the building.

Terrain got more interesting north of Beatty as the valley widened. We passed the abandoned Elizalde concrete plant, whose remaining structures stand painted with graffiti and broken glass. There is nothing else around the ruins but cactus-studded hills. It's obviously still a place where locals go to party as they sit around the crumbling ruins. We took a potty break here before resuming the drive north.

The road became hillier and the terrain more scenic. Goldfield was the next scenic town, and again we stopped to walk around some. There were more ruins here, and even a rest area that seemed to want people to park overnight. The main hotel was still standing off main street, and old miner huts visible in all directions. This could have been an overnight stay for me, as I found much to photograph, but Sadie was restless so I drove another hour into Tonopah, an old silver mining town nestled along a hill slope. Its Mizpah hotel was busy, but it had no other vacancies, and I didn't want to spend money in a gambling restaurant, although a lot of visitors from California were doing just that. We pulled over behind the Economy Inn, where three cars within the hour were pulled over for speeding (the limit was posted as 35mph in town). I was afraid I wouldn't get much sleep from all the sirens, being so close to the main road, but I lacked all energy to explore more for a better place to crash. It was 89F at 11pm; Sadie was panting and I was uncomfortable.

I decided to explore the town some more in the morning before resuming the drive to Lake Tahoe. This would give Sadie the chance to stretch her legs, too.

I drove 820 miles on this day, more than I wanted, but eager to get out of the heat.