July 28th: Cruising the Backroads to Carson City, NV
By: Steve Goode
Edited By: Judi Goode
July 28th- Squaw Valley, CA to Carson City, NV
My original plan was to ride through Yosemite National Park and then take Rt. 395 north towards Reno. Unfortunately, I had to change my plans and turn to Plan B. The wildfires, just north of Yosemite made it impossible to take that route. I needed to go west and then northeast in order to circumvent the wild fires. This new route took me through central California, which is the fruit and vegetable basket for the United States. You just can’t imagine the magnitude of farming that is happening in this area. It literally supplies the United States with most of their produce. I was in awe to see all the farming that was happening in this area.
I have learned, over the years, that when you tell Google Maps that you want to stay on backroads, it literally can put you on roads that pass-through people’s driveways and yards. Those are the real backroads! Today, I told Google Maps to take me on the backroads and suddenly I go from a fairly tame two-lane road to a roller coaster of twist and turns, blind rises and rough pavement for 30 miles. What I didn’t realize was if I just continued on the prior road another mile it would have put me on a beautiful newly paved two-lane road that paralleled this motorway torture track. I guess the good news is that I made it, but it took a lot out of me both physically and mentally.
I finally pulled into South Lake Tahoe, which is loaded with high end hotels, restaurants, gift shops, etc. The commercial district went on for at least 5–7 miles and the place was packed with tourists. As soon as I hit the Nevada line, there were casinos everywhere…on the corner of the Nevada-California border, there was a Harrah’s Casino and Hard Rock Hotel/Casino. The casinos sat at the doorstep of California and the city of South Lake Tahoe.
The first thing I noticed once I entered Nevada were the gas prices. Good-bye $4.89/gallon gas in California and hello $3.65/gallon in Nevada!
