Thanksgiving Trip, Report 2

Friday, we headed off to Virginia City, NV for explorations and shopping.  Virginia City is one of the fun little mining towns in the Eastern Sierra that often end up ghost towns but this one didn’t.  It is charming and commercial but not horrifically tacky — or maybe I was in a mood to overlook tacky.  The buildings are fantastic.  It was coooooooold there but sunny and fun.  We did some funky museums.  We went into the Bucket of Blood saloon — but didn’t buy anything — the food didn’t look great and it’s cozy for hanging out with kids.  We shopped — got a few Christmas items out of the way!

When we got back to my mom’s house in Carson City, things were weird and unpleasant with all sorts of family issues.  I won’t go into details except to say that it was horribly stressful and hard on everyone.  We did go out to a great dinner that night at a local BBQ place and then went to see the local production of The Nutcracker.  It is put on by a dance studio in Carson City and they bring in professionals to dance the major roles.  The performance was wonderful — nicely danced, the kids were fantastic, and the 11 year old who danced Clara stole the show.

Friday, we had a huge breakfast with my mom and then we headed off to our next destination.  A cabin in Arnold, CA at around 7000 feet.  Since the weather has been great and there was no snow to be found, we headed off over Ebbett’s Pass.  We stopped at the Markleeville General Store for road trip food (cokes and cheetos — we already had great beef jerky from a smoker in Virginia City).  The Markleeville General Store was where I got those great Goldfinch pictures I posted earlier!  Then we kept driving.  We stopped a couple of times to let the kids and dogs get their ya-yas out.  Throwing stones at frozen lakes was a huge bit of fun!

When we got to Arnold, we found the cabin with no problem.  The cabin belongs to Bob, my sister-in-law’s boyfriend.  Greg’s mom was there and all the cousins.  We ate and played games and lazed around.  It was delightful.  The kids and dogs ran wild. Gage became a wild boy with a stick for a gun and dirt all over is face.  And, then we drove home.  It was a great trip — mostly — and it was really nice to be home.

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