Hot Springs Swing: 2500 Miles Of Nevada Dirt

Ahh…nothing but 2 weeks of my favorite things…dirt, desert, hot springs, maps, camping and Eric. No agenda, no real route, no plans. Our only "must do's" were not running out of fuel, and making it to Paso Robles in 2 weeks for a concert which we'd bought tickets for long before our vacation was on the books.

We left town early on Sunday morning, Eric's KTM 950 and my Husky 650 loaded as light as possible for 2 weeks of camping in a state where water and fuel are scarce…




We slabbed it up 80 towards Truckee, hopped off the highway at Prosser and headed north…



Man it felt so good once we got off the pavement! 2 weeks of dirty bliss ahead of me and I couldn't have been happier about it!


There was a cool little regatta going on at Stampede Reservoir…



We went north on Henness Pass to Long Valley, and down into Bordertown for fuel. We wanted to immediately head into Nevada, but instead we headed north for burgers in Chilcoot and then up past Frenchman Lake. I'd never been in this part of the Plumas National Forest before and it was beautiful! We found a nice place to camp on the eastern slope of the Diamond Mountains, and had the place to ourselves. We were traveling light so we made use of the available water and did some laundry...



Turns out my decision to splurge on new warmer sleeping bags for this trip was a brilliant one! it was cold but we slept super toasty. Yay for our Mountain Hardwear Ratio (and Heratio…cute…) 15º bags! I was also quite pleased when I spotted this bit of graffiti while enjoying my morning coffee…


I had to laugh, as I had a feeling this was going to be one of my BEST trips ever! I was not wrong.

Packed up, cleaned up, saddled up…


Doyle Grade was fun, and it brought us to this lovely little church. There was a graveyard behind it for the parishioners…






We took off through the southern edge of the sandy Honey Lake Valley, where it pays to keep your eyes on the road. Oops! And, no, this was not me



"Well, we're on OHVs, right, Eric?" "No." He never lets me have any fun...



100 yards from the road on the edge of the Smoke Creek Desert…



State of Nevada Game Preserve…



Lunchtime!



Gerlach was buzzing with post-Burning Man activity. The semi trucks were hauling load after load of…of…stuff off the playa. Non-stop. incredible how much crap was rolling out of the area. There was still quite a bit of activity and dust and tons of stuff still out there. We could see it from across the playa where we landed…



This will do…










Time to highlight where we've been on our map and decide where we want to go tomorrow!



2 days down, 12 more to go…




WoodsChick

Awww...
Some.

Looking forward to this journey.

Yay!!!!

OMG I'm so jealous of your adventures!!! Thanks for taking us along! WooHoo!!!

WoodsChick said:

2 days down, 12 more to go…

WoodsChick

Click to expand...

12 more days, double-yay! arty

... love the pics of the church ...
looks like it's all front door ...

Two weeks! Thanks for letting me live vicariously through your RR. Man it sucks having a garage full of bikes and not being able to ride. But then, you know all about that don't you?

In for the Journey

WoodsChick fanboy

m0t0_ryder said:

Awww...
Some.

Looking forward to this journey.

Click to expand...

Right on! Thanks for checking it out!

two wheel tramp said:

Yay!!!!

Click to expand...

You crack me up, girl!

1962siia88 said:

OMG I'm so jealous of your adventures!!! Thanks for taking us along! WooHoo!!!

Click to expand...

I'm happy to be doing it! Thanks for coming along

SFMCjohn said:

12 more days, double-yay! arty

... love the pics of the church ...
looks like it's all front door ...

Click to expand...

Yeah, the front door was cool, had stained glass above it with birds in it. Wish I'd gotten a photo of it! Cool little place, Doyle was. No fuel there, though.



WC

Leo_jb said:

Two weeks! Thanks for letting me live vicariously through your RR. Man it sucks having a garage full of bikes and not being able to ride. But then, you know all about that don't you?

Click to expand...

Unfortunately, I do It sucks big-time, and feels like a complete waste of time, but I finally figured out there were other things I could do that normally wouldn't get done if I weren't hurt. I went on a scanning binge after breaking my ankle (the 3rd ankle break) and I'm so glad I did! I need to do more of that! I still have boxes of old photos sitting in my dining room over a year later!

budman said:

In for the Journey

WoodsChick fanboy

Click to expand...

Thanks, budman!



WC

arty

Our day began before sun-up in 102º water...
[youtube]xd5b3yn8hKY[/youtube]


Took a nice walk before breaking down camp…




Ready to go. Note the proximity to the train tracks. It was pretty incredible when the train went by in the middle of the night!




So, if you're ever cruising through the desert and you see a big ridge of travertine sticking up out of the ground, you might want to stop and check it out!



[youtube]C9B-pbW1Nyg[/youtube]






From the looks of this place, this spring used to flow a lot more water. There were very old and narrow wooden troughs that at one time directed water from the source to the pools below...




This round wooden tub has seen better days, for sure. The cattle don't seem to mind, though…



Nevada doesn't mess around when it comes to scarce water. NRS refers to the Nevada Revised Statute Chapter 533 (appropriation of public waters) which states "Unauthorized use of water to which another person is entitled, or the willful waste of water to the detriment of another, shall be a misdemeanor, and the possession or use of such water without legal right shall be prima facie evidence of the guilt of the person using or diverting it." Keep in mind that this water is on public land, not private property...

Even though this hot spring was not soakable, it was still very exciting to find!


Our blue skies were fading, quickly being replaced with dark clouds. Time to get a move on…




We came over a rise and found something I love most about Nevada…wild horses!


We shut the motors off immediately upon seeing them, and we just sat and watched. We wanted them to move out of the way so that we could pass without disturbing them, but they were grooving on the grass and they were not in a hurry. We waited.







We continued east…






Where we came from…



It's almost impossible to see from the summit itself, but as we rode up towards Imlay Pass I spied a stone boy, or "harri mutilak" in the Basque language. These were stone cairns built by the Basque shepherds. They were used to mark routes and territories, and to help pass the time and keep the shepherds company. I've seen a few in Idaho, too…



We could see the weather coming up the valley from the south, as it usually does, and that is exactly where we wanted to go. We figured if we bombed down off the summit and headed north instead we might be able to outrun it.
That didn't really work out all that well…





I don't mind camping in the rain if it starts raining after we're set up. I'm not really into it if we've been riding in it for awhile. We turned north, got on an incredibly wet highway, and found ourselves a dry place to stay for the night. I wasn't too happy about getting a hotel so soon in the trip, but it beat the alternative…



We chose a hotel close to Ormachea's so we could walk to a giant family-style Basque dinner. It was great! The generous glasses of wine took a little bit of the sting out of hoteling in, and it turned out to be a great night!


11 more days to go!




WoodsChick

I guess that was Trego hot springs ...?
I don't recognize it in
your pics ... is there more
than one pool?

... just have this strange image of hundreds of people
walking through the front door to all fit in that little church ...

SFMCjohn said:

I guess that was Trego hot springs ...?
I don't recognize it in
your pics ... is there more
than one pool?

... just have this strange image of hundreds of people
walking through the front door to all fit in that little church ...

Click to expand...

Yeah, it's Trego! I took the photo looking downstream with my back to the tracks. I am only aware of the one pool. This was taken with the tracks to my left…


And, yeah, tiny church! Matches the tiny community, I guess
It's in Doyle, south of Honey Lake on 395.




WC

Enjoying your trip

Tami, your ride reports are the best! I can't wait to see what adventures were in store for you on the rest of your trip.

WoodsChick said:

Yeah, it's Trego! I took the photo looking downstream with my back to the tracks. I am only aware of the one pool. This was taken with the tracks to my left…

WC

Click to expand...

... well, I have another hot-spring to look for ...

I think the Gerlach locals call the one I'm thinking of "frog springs" ...
I thought it was just another name for Trego ... it's maybe ten
miles from Gerlach and 500 yards from the railroad tracks ...
has a little discreet pool and
wooden ladder and trees ... Hobbs has a pic in one of her RRs
and I thought you guys do too ...
(edit, found my pic)

... anyway, carry on!

We awoke to blue skies and a dustless desert...perfect for exploring!

Look! I think he's smiling!



Hard to believe, but there were super-slippery puddles on this track!



We were looking to find a particular road through this range, as there were some interesting things on the other side. We found it, but this was posted right next to it...


Now, this was not like any other "private property" signs I'd ever seen. There was some semi-legal mumbo-jumbo on the yellow paper below, and the "not public land" statement, but, really, this did not look legit to me. The road was open, no locked gate to contend with. In fact, there was no gate at all. I wanted to continue, but Eric was against it. We have a lot of experience with private property and public lands, with gates and such, and this reeked of someone that just didn't want people traversing his "20,000 acres of history," as one sign suggested. In the end, after some spirited round-and-round with each other, we erred on the side of caution, as we always do, but it kind of got under my skin a little bit. Fuel was at a premium out here, and we were also burning daylight.

We ran across the guy grading the road that we'd seen earlier and I stopped to ask him about our friendly land-owner. He immediately confirmed my suspicions with an "Aww...that guy? He's a wacko!" He did say that he would try to stop us from using the road, even though we were well within our legal rights to do so. He offered up a route that he said was better, so in the end it all worked out!



Looking back towards the valley south of Winnemucca...



Spelling is not the strong suit of Nevada's finest boobie-loving locals...




Oooh! Thank you for the route, Mr. Road Grader!






Unionville...













Hey! Look! Hot water in the desert!



130 degrees...




84 degrees...








Not soakable but still pretty cool. At least the views were great! We tried to figure out how to increase the flow from the source but it was not to be, so we had lunch instead...





More later...




SlightlyDisappointedChick

I love that you stopped for the wild horses.

While it sucks your ride got diverted it looks like things turned out pretty well for the most part of your day.

It's amazing what sorts of fun routes and adventures can be had by taking the time to speak with the local folks. Great stuff. Oh, and I also love booies.