Category: Travel

Road Trip / Fishing Trip – Reno, Nevada – Rigby, Idaho – Billings, Montana

Duke and I are on a road trip / fishing trip. We are driving to Fort Francis, Ontario and then flying to  a remote lake for a week of fishing with some of Duke's family.

We left on July 4 and drove 660 miles from Reno to Rigby Idaho. We stayed in a wonderful Bed and Breakfast that we stayed in on our road trip last year. The Blue Heron Bed and Breakfast is right on the Snake River. We sat outside on the balcony and had wine and cheese and crackers for dinner.
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On our drive on the fourth we stopped in Elko and caught the last of the Independence day parade.
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Nevada, Montana and Idaho have had a lot of rain this year and everything is green.

On the 5th, Sunday, we drove from Rigby, Idaho to Billings, Montana. North of Rigby we saw the Tetons in the east and drove through the far western edge of Yellowstone National Park.
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Today, July 6 we are driving from Billings to Bismarck, North Dakota.

I am uploading my trip pictures to Flickr here.

Looking for Baby Pronghorn

When Duke and I took our road trip in April we saw lots of baby horses, burros, dear and cows.

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Apparently pronghorn have a longer gestation period than most animals and the babies aren't born until May so we didn't see any baby pronghorn. So earlier this week we decided to take a one day camping trip up to Sheldon National Wildlife Refuge to see if we could see any baby pronghorn.

It was a bit cold and rainy but we still had a lot of fun. It always amazes me how few people we see. We didn't see another sole once we left the blacktop. It is a beautiful area.

Because of all the rain we have had the wild flowers were abundant. We saw literally hundreds of wild horses but only about 20 pronghorn. We did get to see one baby so we can say mission accomplished.

The pronghorn baby pictures didn't come out to good but I really like some of the other pictures. Here are a few of them. You can see the rest on Flickr here.

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American Safari AKA April 2009 Road Trip

Duke and I decided to go on a ten day road trip as soon as tax season was over. We left April 17 and spent 10 days exploring northwestern Nevada and southeastern Oregon.  The area is a combination of mountains and deserts. There are lots of wide open spaces, big sky and very few people.

After we left paved roads on Friday at the town of Nixon east of Reno we didn't see another person until Saturday morning. We saw less than 10 people Saturday and Sunday until we surfaced in southern Oregon Sunday afternoon. We had a wonderful time camping. On BLM land you can camp almost anywhere  you want.

This is our Friday night camp site.

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And here is our Saturday night camp site at the north end of the Jackson Mountains Wilderness at the top of the pass. We could see forever.

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On Sunday night we had a beautiful spot right by a road surrounded by huge boulders. There were wonderful echoes. Since there were no other people we built our camp fire right in the middle of the road. Duke dug a hole, put the fire in it, and then buried the ashes the next morning. We left no trace!  The steam in the picture is from our camping pressure cooker that Duke used to cook the jambalaya for dinner.

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Once we reached Oregon we stayed in hotels and at a field station. We explored the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge and the areas around it.

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In the picture below you can see Duke clearing a tree off a forest service road we were exploring. Eventually on this road there was too much snow so we had to turn around.

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For our last two day we headed back into Nevada. We spent two nights in a wonderful cabin at the Old Yella Dog Ranch. It was snowing when we arrived but by Sunday when we left the weather was beautiful.

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It struck me that this trip was like a safari within a few miles of home. We saw lots of animals. Hundreds of pronghorn antelope, wild horses, wild burros, coyotes, cattle, and sheep. We also saw an amazing variety of birds. Sandhill crane, Great blue herons, egrets, coots, cinnamon teals, avocet, ducks, chickens, geese, Northern Harrier and Ibis.

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The weather really worked with us. It had snowed less than a week before we left so there wasn't much dust and we only had problems with muddy or snowy roads a couple of times. When we were camping the weather was warm and when we had the cozy cabin at the Ranch it was cold. The pictures will give you a better sense of some of our adventures. They are available on Flickr here.

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It was a wonderful adventure. We are ready to go again!

Trip to New York City

Duke and I got back Wednesday night from a week in New York City. The catalyst for the trip was our niece's wedding on January 3rd. Here are a few highlights from the trip.

  • The wedding was beautiful and wonderful. The ceremony, the bride and groom, the wedding party, the reception were all perfect. A lot of family and friends flew in from all over the country. It was held in the chapel at Riverside Church on the upper East side of New York City. What a stunning church. It reminded me of the most beautiful European cathedrals.
To top it all off, sitting across from me at the reception was  a lady who looked very familiar. It turns out she is the wife of a good friend of the groom's family. I worked with her at Sun about 20 years ago and haven't seen her or talked to her since then. Small world!
  • We ate at some wonderful restaurants while we were in New York. Around the corner from our hotel we happened upon a little Italian restaurant that we liked so much that we ate there twice. Mario's Trattoria bills itself as having "New York's best Brick oven pizza and pasta from Napoli" Both times that we ate there we had pizza. Oh was it good! I had never had an egg as an ingredient on my pizza but it added a rich flavor to the pizza. The restaurant was tiny but the service was great and the ambiance was cozy and warm.
The bride and groom sent out a list of some of their favorite restaurants and we tried two of them. The Chow Bar in the West Village serves Asian influenced food. Kathy and Wes recommended the calamari salad and the spring rolls. We tried both. My mouth was very happy.

The Hummus Place was on a narrow little street also in the village. We went there for dinner after jazz at the Blue Note. It was raining out. We sat at a table in the window and ate a sampler of appetizers. It was our last dinner in New York and it was perfect.

  • Most people already have a mental picture of the New York sites so I didn't lug my camera around. Instead I just made my own mental pictures. The highlights include the view from the Empire State building at night. The lines during the day were terrible but at night they weren't so bad and the view at night was stupendous.
The tour of Rockefeller Center. The buildings themselves are works of art and the history and interiors are fascinating. There is a mural on the ceiling of the lobby of the main building that gives you an optical illusion. From one side of the lobby he is standing on his left foot and looking down. From the other side of the lobby he is standing on his right foot and looking down. It is not at all subtle and is very impressive.

We got half price tickets to see the play Speed The Plow on Broadway. I thoroughly enjoyed it. It was also fun to see an actress I really like, Elizabeth Moss who plays the female lead. I love her as Peggy Olson in one of my favorite television shows, Mad Men. I didn't realize it until I read the credits but she also played Zoey Bartlett on West Wing.

We walked everywhere and it was really cold. Luckily it only rained on us as we were walking to Penn Station to get the train to the airport. It was a wonderful packed week. I'm really glad we went and I am really glad to be home.

Petroglyphs at Lagomarsino Canyon

Last Friday Duke and I went exploring. Several people have told us about the petroglyphs at Lagomarsino Canyon. Our real estate agent said he used his mountain bike to find them and was blown away by the magnitude of the site. We used the directions on the Backyard Traveler blog and headed out in our truck.We drove over some very rough dirt trails.  I am kind of surprised that we found the site on our first try because there are no signs and there are lots of dirt roads. The site is probably no more than 10 miles east of Reno as the crow flies but we were the only people there on Friday. I'm sure the remoteness limits the visitors.

The  sign at the entrance to the canyon says

"Lagomarsino Canyon is one of the largest rock art sites in Nevada. Most
motifs appear to be 4-5,000 years old, but some may be as old as 10,000
years. Although we do not know what the images mean they still hold
great significance and deserve to be respected. This site is protected
by law and is monitored regularly by concerned local citizens and
Storey County law enforcement. If you want to learn more about rock art
or want to help protect this special place go to www.nevadarockart.org or call the Storey County Sheriff @ 775-847-0950"

We climbed up the rocks to the lip of the canyon. It is easy to suppose  that the ancient Indians who did this rock art used this canyon for hunting. It seems like it would be a good place to drive game over the edge of the cliff. The drive was really pretty and the rock art was amazing. If you would like to see my pictures they are on Flickr here.

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