W. Wendover, NV

Left Reno at 1:00 p.m. after the Peppermill Tournament and headed east - first day of a long journey across the country.  Beautiful sunny day.  Waved at OJ as we passed his residence at the Lovelock Correctional Facility :-). 

When you take I-80 heading east, you mostly drive through the Humboldt River valley after you leave Fernley.  It's mostly a broad valley winding its' way between mountain ranges.  It definitely is not a straight line route.  You actually head north out of Reno and then top out at Winnemucca and head east. 

The I-80 route was originally an Indian trail which they used to cross the area, then the wagon trains came, then the railroads, and now I-80.  Everyone used the same route because it avoided the mountains and kept them near water supplies.  Driving I-80 through the Humboldt Valley always brings to mind the emigrants who made their way across this country in the 1850's. At one rest area (Cosgrove), the sign read - look right and look left - that's one day's journey by wagon train.  The next rest area at Beowawe had a sign which said it was ninety miles to Wells, NV - six days travel by wagon.  We made it in slightly less than that.

As we neared Wendover, we passed Pilot Peak which is a 10,000' mountain which served as a landmark for the travelers on their way west.  We topped the mountain range and dropped down into W. Wendover.  It's a beautiful sight because as you come over the mountain, you see the Great Salt Lake in front of you for more than a hundred miles.  It's also the home of an old US Army airfield which was used to train the B-29 crews which dropped the A-bomb on Hiroshima.  Most of the base is deserted now, but some of the buildings have been repurposed and there are several memorials to the training area as it was in the 1940's.  Easy to build a runway on the salt flats - didn't need a lot of grading!

We're staying at Montego Bay  (although I haven't seen any water, just a lot of sand).  Tomorrow we head across the salt flats to Salt Lake City and on through Utah.  Should be a fun trip - starts out flat as a pancake and then quickly climbs into the Wasatch Mountains - the eastern boundary of the Great Basin.