I-80 from Salt Lake to Grass Valley

We began our annual sojourn to California for the Grass Valley Bluegrass Festival on Tuesday though it doesn't actually start until the following week. The plan was to spend two nights in Winnemucca which is about 6 hours from home. I find that is about as long as I want to drive in one day without stopping. Following that, we want to spend three nights dry camping near Lake Tahoe.

The drive was fairly uneventful. I-80 is an easy drive. The Salt Flats between SLC and Wendover are pretty boring but it gets better after that. There are a number of passes to go over between 6000 and 7000 feet but the grades are long and easy. I love going through the desert in the spring. The sage and pinion pines are all green and there is still a good showing of wildflowers. Weather was very mild with occasional rain. Traffic was light though we saw a lot more RVs this year than last when gas was $5/gallon.

We picked Hi-Desert RV Park in Winnemucca because it got good ratings and comments on several internet guides. Well, it didn't turn out quite as reported. A culvert in a field next door overflowed and washed a fine silt into the campground the day before. The wind dried it out. When we arrived, the wind was blowing and put the dust all over the TM and TV. Then it rained and made a real mess. Yuk! The owners were quite apologetic but really couldn't do much about it. We were going to spend two nights there and make sure everything in the TM was working but.....that plan ended fast. We left in the morning (after listening to many mine workers leave in their diesel trucks at 5 a.m.) and drove our filthy rig to Verdi, just west of Reno. Nice people at Hi-Desert but I think we'll pass on it next time.

In Verdi (pronounced Ver-Dye) we picked the very misnamed "Terrible's Gold Ranch Casino & RV Park." This was the property of a guy who used to own a bunch of gas stations called "Terrible Herbst's" I'm sure there's a story there but I don't know it. The park is wonderful. Fairly new, grass and trees. Very level asphalt pull-throughs, a nice pool and hot tub, and great views of the eastern Sierra. Pricey but I highly recommend it.

We spent an hour wiping the TM down and getting set up. Drove the truck into town and found a car wash.

Plan is to leave in the morning for 3 nights of dry camping at Granite Flat campground, a NF campground on the Truckee river just south of Squaw Valley and north of Tahoe City. We'll fill the water tanks in the morning and let you know how it goes. Last year I saw a TM there when we drove by and it generated the interest to give it a try this year.

This is our second season with our TM and like last year, it pulls behind the Tundra like it isn't even there. I think I may need to adjust the WDH, though. I noticed that at night my lights on low beam are shining high which probably means the truck is not level. I assume that means I need to raise the gizmo on the frame that the bars sit on. I have an Equalizer hitch. Advice is welcome.

As usual, we have had the normal "visits" from neighbors in the park who are curious about the TM.

I won't have WIFI at Granite Flat but will likely make a Starbucks run some time during the three days. Will update you on dry camping then.

Thanks for the update Keith. I'll look forward to your next report. I'd like to see more folks post about trips - might find some places I want to go that I didn't know about!

Keith and Ellen: Somewhere on this site is an excellent tutorial on leveling the TM and TV with a WDH. It involves making measurements at the TV wheel wells and changing the chain links until all is well. It is easy to do and a search should find it.

Thanks, scott. I'll look

We're at Granite Flat campground, about 1mile south of Truckee. Our campsite is right on the river. The weather is about 10 degrees cooler than normal which means 30 degree nights. We anticipated this and brought a down comforter so we wouldn't have to run the heater all night.

We do have one problem - the fridge propane won't light. I figured either the orifice had a spider web or the spark plunger had no power. On my houseboat I regularly cleaned the orifice but I can't see it in the TM. So I bought some dry ice which seems to work. I also turn it on 110 when the generator is on.

More to come.

[mcgyver210]

Originally Posted by Scott O

Keith and Ellen: Somewhere on this site is an excellent tutorial on leveling the TM and TV with a WDH. It involves making measurements at the TV wheel wells and changing the chain links until all is well. It is easy to do and a search should find it.

Bill's Tutorial for Weight Distribution Hitch setup

Unfortunately, we didn't have WiFi that worked at Grass Valley. Nonetheless, it was a steady diet of bluegrass bands playing from 10 in the morning until 11 at night, then jamming all over the campground until the wee hours of the morning. Not much sleep.

There were three other TMs at the festival. One was John Turner's brand new 2619. The new colors immediately caught my eye. John is a banjo picker like me. There were also two 2720s there.

Coming home, being a history nut, Ellen and I talked a lot about the history of the areas we were driving through. It's astounding to think of the number of people who walked this route both as emigrants to the West as well as the huge horde during the gold rush. Most went over the mis-named Carson Pass to the south of I-80. The thought of walking 600 miles across the desert only to confront the Sierras is pretty daunting.

When you drive through Winnemucca, there is a Casino sign: "Butch Cassidy left here rich. So can you!" I don't think that's an invitation to rob their First National Bank. Cassidy and the Wild Bunch got around $36,000 if I remember right. I doubt many casino visitors get that much.

It's pretty amazing to consider the range that Cassidy & the Wild Bunch covered. We know he robbed banks in Wyoming, Idaho, Nevada, New Mexico and had that famous picture taken in Fort Worth, Texas. My posterior was tired just from riding across Nevada in a truck. Can't imagine what the Wild Bunch's posteriors felt like covering all that territory on a horse!

Coming across the salt flats of Utah, Ellen and I talked about the Donner Party. Everyone knows the story of being trapped by an early snowstorm at Donner Lake and the subsequent cannibalism that took place. What many don't know is that this party was originally led by a very experienced guide. But when they reached Wyoming, they met Lansford Hastings, a business man promoting emigration to California. He told them of a "short cut" going south around the Great Salt Lake (There was no Salt Lake City at that time) and that this more direct route would save them three weeks. The party argued about this and split, half taking the normal route through Pocatello then down to Nevada near Wells. The Donner-Reed group believed Hastings and went south, encountered great difficulty crossing the Wasatch mountains only to confront the Salt flats where they lost many of their oxen and had to shed much of their belongings. The "shortcut" not only didn't save them any time, it took them three weeks longer than the group that took the old California trail, and sealed their doom. The travesty is that Lansford Hastings had never taken the route he recommended.

What appears as miles and miles of sage brush is actually a history rich part of America. Retelling some of these and a bunch more stories made the time go by very quickly.