Summer Vacation August 2008
It was time for a long-delayed family reunion, this time scheduled near Portland OR, so we decided to make a road trip of it. The plan was to drive up the east side of the Sierra on US395 then cross the mountains north of Yosemite, then slog north on I-5. The return trip would take us across the Cascades in Oregon then southeast toward Reno, then south to Las Vegas to visit the grandchildren. Along the way we would visit railroad museums at Bishop, Jamestown, Sacramento and Portola, all in California.
As usual, we hadn't made any reservations. A couple of hours out of Lone Pine, I suddenly realized that towns were far and few between and thanks to an old Best Western map I dug out of the side pocket and a cooperative clerk at the sold-out Best Western, I was able to find a room at another motel in Lone Pine. By the time we arrived at the inn, there was a line of travelers being told there were no more rooms. We had failed to take into account the fact that this was high season in the mountains and that Lone Pine is the jumping off point for hikers planning to scale Mt. Whitney.
I'm pretty sure Mt. Whitney is one of the peaks in this shot from the motel parking lot. We were literally the only people with English as a first language in the breakfast room that morning.
There is a loop road westward from the town of Lone Pine that is noted as the setting for many western movies. Well worth the side trip.
By the time we reached the museum at Bishop, the temperature was reaching toward 102 F. I thought at this altitude we'd left the blazing desert heat behind. I liked the weathered effect on this old wooden box car and would like to replicate for our model railroad. The museum contained a number of funky buildings that could be inspiration for more modeling. Frankly, though, I was too hot and sweaty to appreciate the finer points of all the exhibits and retreated to the shade while Al made his leisurely way through each and every one.
This time we had learned our lesson and called for a motel reservation at Mammoth Lakes earlier in the day. Long a winter ski resort, now the town caters to mountain bikers in the summer. You and your bike can ride a bus to the bottom of the ski area, then ride trails downhill back to town. The next day, we drove to the ghost town of Bodie. Every California guidebook sold to the European tourist must rave about Bodie because English was a minority language. Near the headstock shown in the photo, we met a couple from Italy (she's the one in the photo) and since neither of us has any Italian, we conversed in a kind of French, which worked. I took more photos of picturesque buildings and ruins than anyone would want to see. It was hot this day also, at 6000 feet, and despite sunblock, I got a mild sunburn.
From Bodie, we turned west on one of the most interesting mountain roads we've driven outside of the Alps, state highway 108 which goes up to over 9600 feet. A sign near the turnoff warned that there was a 25% grade ahead, and they weren't kidding. There was a switchback at the bottom of this grade so you couldn't get a head of steam up and Al had to manually shift our poor little Honda CRV into first gear to make it up the hill. Wonderful scenery and I recommend the drive highly.
Our next stop was Steamtown 1897 State Historical Park at Jamestown. I snapped this shot of assorted junk next to the roundhouse because this is the kind of thing that model railroaders are always trying to model to add realism to their layout. We had purchased tickets for the train ride and were lucky enough to see the steam locomotive being backed out of the roundhouse and onto the turntable. Another hot day--maybe we bring the desert heat with us. From Jamestown it's a quick hop to Sacramento where we made a return visit to the wonderful rail museum.
The family reunion was a great success and we finally managed to get north of the heat. My sister told me I should quit complaining about the Portland weather, it wasn't raining all that hard and I certainly wasn't made of sugar and wasn't going to melt in a little water. Always nice to see the family.
On the way home, we stopped at the rail museum at Portola which was a complete disappointment since we weren't there when anything was happening and the museum aspect is a bit unpolished. But as we headed east toward Reno, we realized we were being swept along in a great tide of humanity headed toward the Black Rock Desert for the annual Burning Man festival. This "vehicle" was the only one that I was able to photograph, but it was a delight to see all the creativity streaming toward that magical place. I'd love to attend but that desert is definitely way too hot and I suspect we're also way out of the demographic so I just follow it on-line.
It was time for a long-delayed family reunion, this time scheduled near Portland OR, so we decided to make a road trip of it. The plan was to drive up the east side of the Sierra on US395 then cross the mountains north of Yosemite, then slog north on I-5. The return trip would take us across the Cascades in Oregon then southeast toward Reno, then south to Las Vegas to visit the grandchildren. Along the way we would visit railroad museums at Bishop, Jamestown, Sacramento and Portola, all in California.
As usual, we hadn't made any reservations. A couple of hours out of Lone Pine, I suddenly realized that towns were far and few between and thanks to an old Best Western map I dug out of the side pocket and a cooperative clerk at the sold-out Best Western, I was able to find a room at another motel in Lone Pine. By the time we arrived at the inn, there was a line of travelers being told there were no more rooms. We had failed to take into account the fact that this was high season in the mountains and that Lone Pine is the jumping off point for hikers planning to scale Mt. Whitney.
I'm pretty sure Mt. Whitney is one of the peaks in this shot from the motel parking lot. We were literally the only people with English as a first language in the breakfast room that morning.
There is a loop road westward from the town of Lone Pine that is noted as the setting for many western movies. Well worth the side trip.By the time we reached the museum at Bishop, the temperature was reaching toward 102 F. I thought at this altitude we'd left the blazing desert heat behind. I liked the weathered effect on this old wooden box car and would like to replicate for our model railroad. The museum contained a number of funky buildings that could be inspiration for more modeling. Frankly, though, I was too hot and sweaty to appreciate the finer points of all the exhibits and retreated to the shade while Al made his leisurely way through each and every one.
This time we had learned our lesson and called for a motel reservation at Mammoth Lakes earlier in the day. Long a winter ski resort, now the town caters to mountain bikers in the summer. You and your bike can ride a bus to the bottom of the ski area, then ride trails downhill back to town. The next day, we drove to the ghost town of Bodie. Every California guidebook sold to the European tourist must rave about Bodie because English was a minority language. Near the headstock shown in the photo, we met a couple from Italy (she's the one in the photo) and since neither of us has any Italian, we conversed in a kind of French, which worked. I took more photos of picturesque buildings and ruins than anyone would want to see. It was hot this day also, at 6000 feet, and despite sunblock, I got a mild sunburn.
From Bodie, we turned west on one of the most interesting mountain roads we've driven outside of the Alps, state highway 108 which goes up to over 9600 feet. A sign near the turnoff warned that there was a 25% grade ahead, and they weren't kidding. There was a switchback at the bottom of this grade so you couldn't get a head of steam up and Al had to manually shift our poor little Honda CRV into first gear to make it up the hill. Wonderful scenery and I recommend the drive highly.
Our next stop was Steamtown 1897 State Historical Park at Jamestown. I snapped this shot of assorted junk next to the roundhouse because this is the kind of thing that model railroaders are always trying to model to add realism to their layout. We had purchased tickets for the train ride and were lucky enough to see the steam locomotive being backed out of the roundhouse and onto the turntable. Another hot day--maybe we bring the desert heat with us. From Jamestown it's a quick hop to Sacramento where we made a return visit to the wonderful rail museum.
The family reunion was a great success and we finally managed to get north of the heat. My sister told me I should quit complaining about the Portland weather, it wasn't raining all that hard and I certainly wasn't made of sugar and wasn't going to melt in a little water. Always nice to see the family.
On the way home, we stopped at the rail museum at Portola which was a complete disappointment since we weren't there when anything was happening and the museum aspect is a bit unpolished. But as we headed east toward Reno, we realized we were being swept along in a great tide of humanity headed toward the Black Rock Desert for the annual Burning Man festival. This "vehicle" was the only one that I was able to photograph, but it was a delight to see all the creativity streaming toward that magical place. I'd love to attend but that desert is definitely way too hot and I suspect we're also way out of the demographic so I just follow it on-line.
Labels: summer vacation trains
posted by Al and Linda @ 2:20 PM
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