Day 51 Friday February 28

Leaving the tanks this morning

     Made haste northward. 95 Vegas to Tonopah, 376 Tonopah to Austin, 305 Austin to Battle Mountain, I 80 Battle Mt. to Winnemucca, 95 to 78 to Burns, OR, and finally 20 Burns to Bend. Funky canyon town of Austin, NV for breakfast. Read a 3 page profile of the town and got a load of diesel. I liked the vibe of Burns, not sure what it was. Bend and the Hampton Inn and Suites again. Bend all modern and hip and bustling. Snow predicted for tomorrow; we will make a run for home anyway. B accidentally fed twice at dinner, no problem. Found a drink at Anthony's Home Port across the foot bridge spanning the Deshutes in front of the hotel, nothing to write home about.

Day 50 Thursday February 27

B poses in front of Tonopah Library

establishing shot of S, B and tank

105º

exiting camp on Friday looking west

Out of Vegas on 62 which was a lovely 4 laner new and shiny over the first range and into the great basin to the north. After switching to 95 and reaching Tonapah we stopped at the Brewery barbecue place which S said could not hold a candle to Coopers in Llano, TX and she was right. After a while S said something about a hot springs up ahead to the right on a dirt 5 miles easterly. We went. There was a large round galvanized cattle watering tank with a pipe coming out of the hillside that was 105º and in we went. So did B in the muddy pool in front of the tank and got a bit stuck. We rocked up the clay bank to a flat spot and set up for the night. After another while two tall young East Indian guys showed up apparently following a white Subaru with two young women who they knew not but who had disappeared up slope  to what S found out on a walk later were more tanks. The two guys were wandering down from Reno and eventually left without a soak. We had a fire and it was cold enough and we had been packing the wood for a while. S went for a 2 am soak and as she came back a large commercial truck drove up and the guy got into the tank below us and S went back down to check it out. Turned out he helped set up the site and was returning from a haul. He was still in the tank at 5 am. The whole thing was kind of a kick but B was a mess from the mud.