Thanksgiving Break

We had lots of ideas for the Thanksgiving break, but one by one, they got eliminated. We tossed around the idea of going to Idaho to visit with the girls, but they never get more than the extended weekend off and they are usually busy anyway. Those professors never even give them the slightest break during the holidays. In fact, often times, they give them more to do because they have an extended weekend to do it, right?!

Our next couple of ideas went out the window because of the weather system moving in. It was going to be super cold everywhere we thought to go. We finally decided to just keep it semi-local and head into the desert as it was a little warmer than the other ideas we had. We were supposed to leave shortly after Christian got out of school, but they forecasted a lot of rain and wind that was supposed to sweep through the area. Most of it ended up on coming down this far south. We got the tail end of the storm and it didn't amount to a whole lot where we live. 

When we finally got the all clear to head out, it was already halfway through the week...which was okay as we did not plan to go far but we would miss Thanksgiving with the family. We headed back out towards Nevada but as we jumped on the freeway, we knew we made a mistake traveling so close to Thanksgiving. There was quite a bit of traffic on the roads. At some point, we were down to bumper to bumper traffic and decided to jump off the 15 and onto the 395 because if we had to sit in that any longer, there was a good chance we would just turn around and go home. Traffic wasn't great on the 395 either but it was moving for the most part. It did clear up, the further we went. We were supposed to head towards the desert when we got to Big Pine but ended up getting cut off by a train of Toyota "Overlanders" that were headed that way after we got gas. We decided not to get stuck in back of them as they were most likely headed to the same area we had planned to spend the night. 

After a while, we found ourselves all the way up in Bishop. There was not quite as much snow as we had expected up in the Sierras. It was getting late at this point, so we decided that maybe we would camp at the staging area for Coyote Flats, where we took the kids over the summer. We had never been there in the winter before and we wondered at the conditions of the road. Since they had obviously graded it somewhat recently, we wanted to find out how far we could get before the snow was too much.

It was very beautiful, but we got a bit uncomfortable with the trail about halfway up and decided that we didn't want to go any further. But instead of camping at the base, as we had previously planned, we decided to just go as far as we can towards our destination. We were also hoping that we would find a place lower and warmer to camp.

We ended up camping in the Piper Mountain Wilderness area. It was cold, but not too bad, all things considered.

We headed to the Reveille Range, stopping by Warm Springs on our way.

Because it was so cold out, the warm spring water looks pretty steamy, but by the time it travelled under the road, to the other side, it looks like it cooled off significantly.

Originally, we wanted to explore the area, but we also wanted to look for a possible camp site for when we travel to Idaho so that we don't have to do it in one day, which is pretty excruciating sometimes. The Nevada guidebook we brought along with us showed some interesting trails, but the explanations and directions were rather terrible at times. We were looking for short trails and Christian told me to choose between four that were in this area. The information in the book was a bit deceptive though. One trail claimed to be something like a 9 mile trail, but doesn't take into account that this trail starts halfway down another trail that is over 30 miles long. Most of the trails are just old mining trails. There are lots of old abandoned mines dotted all around the Nevada mountains.

When it started getting late, we decided that we needed to just find a suitable camping spot. Unfortunately, we were a lot higher up than we had thought and it was very cold out. Even though we were losing light fast, it was still fairly early out, so after we set up camp, we had dinner in the Jeep. Our Thanksgiving meal was a pre-packaged, ready to eat meal consisting of a slice of turkey with stuffing which was drenched in gravy. All we had to do was put it in a water bath and heat it up. It wasn't too bad. We've had worse. Caitlyn will never us live down the dreaded Thanksgiving we had going down the white rim trail. We had instant mashed potatoes and some weird Spam spread. I admit, it was pretty awful. We finished with a jello fruit cup for dessert. Not quite a Thanksgiving feast.

Christian managed to scrape together enough twigs and things to have a small fire afterwards. That lasted about half an hour. There is not a whole lot to burn out here but it kept us going for a little while. We then headed back into the Jeep to get a last burst of heat and read a little before finally calling it a night. At least it was no longer quite so early any more. You don't want to turn in too early as it would make for a VERY long night. I didn't sleep too well because it was so cold. It was hard to fall asleep and stay asleep. By the time I got some sleep and got warmed up some, I heard Christian get up to use the restroom, then I had to start the process all over again. We both got up pretty early. I quickly packed up my stuff and Christian started up the Jeep for me. I warmed up while he started taking down camp. When I warmed up some, I jumped out to help him. Everything was covered in hoarfrost. He could not really brush it off the tents. We did what we could and put them away.

We decided to just finish the long trail that led to the so-called short trail that we were supposed to be on. We passed a bunch of old buildings and mines. Unfortunately, people have made a mess of most of it, so they are usually not that interesting. They either leave trash everywhere or they knock down and deface the old buildings and equipment. It's pretty sad. It took us longer than we expected to finish the trail as it branched off all over the place and the directions were not very clear. We had to backtrack a little when we thought we were headed in the wrong direction and try to get our bearings. We finally made it out to the old mill where they processed some of the stuff they mined. It was the closest water source near here, so they didn't have much choice and it wasn't very convenient for them.

The sun had been up for a while by the time we got out here but the water was still very icy. We were surprised to find a good number of fish in the pond out here. It looks like someone put them in there at some point and yet they were able to survive and even thrive in the harsh environment. It was a really nice surprise.

The way out from here was a pretty straight shot back to the road. Some of Christian's clothes got wet when our water bottle must have broken while being jostled up and down some of the trails on the first day. We had spent the previous day trying to dry them but some of it was still a little damp because of the cold. He also hadn't really packed quite enough clothing, so to lose what little he had was not very good. In the end, we decided to head home as it was just way too cold on top of it all.

We got a hot dinner at our usual stop in Baker before continuing on our way home. We got back late and took nice hot showers. We spent the rest of the weekend cleaning up all our gear and airing everything out to make sure everything was dry and relatively clean before putting them away and looking over our pictures and videos.

November

We had a little more going on this past month than the last one...mostly because we made a concerted effort to get out of the house, plus Christian finally got some time off from work this month for the holidays.

We celebrated Christian's birthday this month. I got him a Black Magic Speed Editor which came with DaVinci Resolve Studio. Or, you can say that I bought him DaVinci Resolve Studio and got a Speed Editor for just a little extra!

We also went on a short camping trip for Christian's birthday. Every place is crowded these days, too far or too cold. We ended up in the desert on the border of California and Nevada. We had several places that we wanted to visit while out there. Our first destination was the Chloride Cliffs in the Funeral Mountains, overlooking Death Valley.

It was very remote and beautiful.

It was a long drive up to this point and we spent longer than anticipated in this area, so we decided to camp in the area. We found a suitable campsite at the site of an old mine, not far from the cliff. Because it was still close by, we decided to go back up to the cliff to see if the view was a little clearer in the morning light. 

It was a little clearer, but still not as clear as it could be. The skies are still hazy with smoke from fires for the most part. Afterwards, we headed to the end of our trail. Today's plan was to stop by Monarch Canyon on our way out to do a bit of hiking. It is an established hiking trail so we thought it might be a good option to get some exercise and push my knee a little bit to get some movement back in it. On the way there, we ran into our first signs of people in the Funeral Mountains. Two vehicles were heading in as we were heading out. 

However, when we turned into the area for Monarch Canyon, we found a couple of vans packed with people at the hiking area. We decided not to bother and headed back out. We decided to check out a different 4x4 trail further along in Nevada instead. It was still early and we were already way out here, so we decided to check off another trail from our Nevada trail book. Unfortunately, as we were traveling down one of the main roads in Nevada, the traffic came to a complete halt. We were wondering what was going on as we were still basically in the middle of nowhere with a line of cars as far as the eye could see and beyond. Even though we travelled a long way and was almost to our turnoff, we decided to turn around and head back before everyone else got the same idea and clogged up our road back out.

It was pretty disappointing and very frustrating. We started heading back into California and tried to make some plans for where we wanted to camp for the night. We stopped in Baker to pick up a quick dinner and decide once and for all, what we were going to do. Christian wasn't feeling that well and his back was bothering him. He was afraid that it was going to get worse and he didn't want to be stuck out here camping, not knowing how bad it was going to get. In the end, we decided to just head home, just in case. Of course, part way back, we discovered that the turn signal/brake light stopped working on one side of the Jeep, so that was a bit stressful. It was just a bulb that went out.

He did end up getting some rest and going to work on Monday, but he was suffering again by the time he got home and had to take the next day off. It was a bit more manageable after that and he managed to make it through the rest of the week before it got better.

We had Terry and Jackie over the next weekend. We got to visit and catch up a bit and celebrate birthdays.

We are kicking around ideas for the week of Thanksgiving already.