Day 2 – Wednesday, November 28, 2007
Talk about cold! I mean painfully cold. We awoke in beautiful Ely about 6am and were on the road by 7:30am, but the shock of stepping outside almost sent me scrambling
back to bed. The clerk at the gas station said the temperature was 7-degrees. Not 70 or even 17, but single digit 7! At that moment I wished we had taken a cruise to the Caribbean instead. Our car started, but did so in protest. The windshield was iced over and so was the window washing fluid. As it thawed we could hear chunks of ice swishing around. We stopped to take a few pictures on our way out of town, but my camera’s memory card malfunctioned and the few pictures I had taken were un-retrievable. I blamed the frigid weather.
Talk about cold! I mean painfully cold. We awoke in beautiful Ely about 6am and were on the road by 7:30am, but the shock of stepping outside almost sent me scrambling
back to bed. The clerk at the gas station said the temperature was 7-degrees. Not 70 or even 17, but single digit 7! At that moment I wished we had taken a cruise to the Caribbean instead. Our car started, but did so in protest. The windshield was iced over and so was the window washing fluid. As it thawed we could hear chunks of ice swishing around. We stopped to take a few pictures on our way out of town, but my camera’s memory card malfunctioned and the few pictures I had taken were un-retrievable. I blamed the frigid weather. We headed towards Elko via “The Loneliest Road in America”, Hwy 50. Indeed it was lonely, but I think it was because of the snowy conditions and the smart people were staying home. We saw a couple of coyotes that at first we thought (mostly hoped) were wolv
es, because of how healthy they looked. They weren’t the scrawny little ones we see in San Diego. We continued north on State Route 278 and reached Elko in good time. We stayed long enough to grab a couple of burgers at McDonald’s (big mistake!) and gas up the Element then we were northbound again on State Route 225. The drive was rather uneventful until we entered another pocket of Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest. As before it was beautiful and packed full of snow, but the road had been plowed so we had no problems maintaining a good speed. As we drove through the North Wild Horse State Recreation Area I hoped to see some wild horses, but the only horses we saw were a few undernourished pintos on the Duck Valley Indian Reservation in Owyhee. We also saw another coyote trotting across a frozen river and a half-dozen or so free-range cattle. We saw the cattle only because they were standing in the middle of the road. We either had to stop or hit them risking totaling the car. We decided to stop.
The border crossing into Idaho wasn’t much of a crossing, only a sign welcoming us into the "Gem State." I’m so used to being stopped by the Border Patrol and having the car checked for illegals that it was rather nice to enter into another state without scrutiny. Even though we didn’t have to, I made Robert stop so I could get his picture next to the welcome sign.
We reached Boise at about 4:30pm, but we didn’t account for the one-hour time difference so it was actually 5:30pm. Total mileage for Day 2 was 437 miles. Another good travel day and another great day spent with Robert.
The border crossing into Idaho wasn’t much of a crossing, only a sign welcoming us into the "Gem State." I’m so used to being stopped by the Border Patrol and having the car checked for illegals that it was rather nice to enter into another state without scrutiny. Even though we didn’t have to, I made Robert stop so I could get his picture next to the welcome sign.
We reached Boise at about 4:30pm, but we didn’t account for the one-hour time difference so it was actually 5:30pm. Total mileage for Day 2 was 437 miles. Another good travel day and another great day spent with Robert.
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