The corrected route — how we actually drove!
Wednesday, November 21, 2007
We left Boulder Creek around 9:40am. I consider that nothing short of miraculous considering we had a plumber at the house until 12:30pm clearing drain lines of the clog that was causing all our problems. And, we were off. We headed up and out of the Bay Area, along the Sacramento River, seeing tons of Canada geese and one show-off of a White-tailed Kite. We drove up Echo Summit (Hwy 50) and down into the Tahoe basin. Lake Tahoe was beautiful but we cruised right through heading down the backside of the Sierras into Carson City. We got there around 4pm, I think. We found my mom’s house and got settled in. It was lovely to see my mom and Igor (my step-dad). Their dog, Ushki, was happy to see us — even Ruby. The kids were thrilled to be there. It was all good!
Thursday, November 22, 2007
The day dawned cold and clear. It was 20 degrees when we got up that morning. The birds at my parent’s feeder did not seem to care much, however. They were up and at ’em. Even the dogs coming out to take care of business didn’t slow them down at all. They’d flutter to the higher branches of the trees and come right back again. My parents get a fantastic assortment of birds at their feeder. My favorites are the Chickadees — they have Mountain Chickadees. I did not get a great picture of them so I’ll point you to a better one! [click] We got turned around pretty quickly and while my Mom stayed home, the rest of us headed off on a hike. Mom likes hiking but it’s getting harder and harder for her to do with any degree of comfort. Given the way that *I* ached for the rest of the weekend, I think that was a wise move.
First stop was a small ranch that is run by the local 4H. They rescue wild burros and mustangs and the 4H kids train them and find them homes. These guys are permanant residents. They were delightful — if pretty bad beggers. I guess a lot of people ignore the “don’t feed the burros and mustangs” signs. We did not feed them.
Ruby was not impressed by the gigantic wild animals. They were much too big for her and she’d just as soon be held by Greg, thank you very much! We walked back to the trailhead and started the hike. The children were, poor things, already exhausted. None of us were very much impressed.
Although, in retrospect, I think they had good instincts — this was a long uphill hike — about a mile and a half uphill. You can imagine the joy of it with that grumpy-faced boy along. It’s a little bit hard to tell on the map above but we went up and up and up. Here’s a view looking back from partway up. The small gray buildings in the middle of the picture are the ranch where we petted the mustang and burros.
We found an old abandoned truck and the kids had a blast climbing on it and playing in it. This is mining country and the hills are littered with old abandoned mines. So, sights like this are fairly common. The view from the top was well worth the walk up. This is the view down at Carson City.
Of course, we had to have all sorts of Hero Photos from the tops of high rocks. Gage is less than thrilled to be up there but he did it. Ruth, on the other hand, totally thrilled!
On the way back down, Igor and Ruthie took a different route — cross country! Greg, Gage, Ruby and I walked back down the trail. Ruby was a hiking fool — she loved it. She stayed close, didn’t protest, hiked 3 miles for our every 1 mile. And, wasn’t even remotely tired at the end! 🙂
Our reward at the end of the day was Thanksgiving Dinner at the Atlantis Casino buffet. It was truly decadent. The kids loved it — they could eat whatever they wanted and no one bugged them about it. We told them they could have dessert first but they both got “real” food first and then dove into the desserts. We ate snow crab and prime rib and duckling and all sorts of other great foods. It was amazingly good — and amazingly decadent.
mother. wife. friend. teacher. writer. reader. photographer. birder. quilter. blogger.
Liza Lee Miller 