Historic Goodsprings Nevada

We drove the road we’ve been on about a billion times as we made our treks to California. We have been along the I-15 heading to LA, or San Diego, or Wrightwood, or Palm Springs – we couldn’t believe that there was an unexpected treasure here to be discovered that we had somehow overlooked over the decades we had been here. Not only that, we had ignored having access to the largest Cheveron fuel station in the entire world!

It’s amazing what has been in your backyard all this time, but you don’t figure it out until a pandemic takes hold. Established in 1900 was the historic town of Good Springs, named for Joseph Good, whose cattle frequently found water at a nearby spring, When the railroad came through town in 1910, construction boomed, and most of the town’s buildings were built in the next few years.

In 1901, J. F. Kent founded the Yellow Pine Mining Company outside Goodsprings. Kent decided to construct a railroad line linking the mine to the Southern Pacific rail line running though Goodsprings. The mine, along with the 8-mile spur, operated through 1031 when it was abandoned. We found the foundations of the old mine, as well as some historic ties from the bed of the abandoned spur.

The former site of the mine and spur are now a Clark County Park. We hiked the route from where the spur connected with the SP main line to the location of the original mine site. Historic ties still are buried in the soil marking the route of the spur in 1910. The pooch and the Woman enjoyed this nice hiking area, particularly because there was pretty much nobody else there.

We saw several rail trestles, although the original trestle structures have long ago crumbled. Clark County erected a few examples of what the original narrow-gauge trestle structures likely resembled, and we enjoyed crossing them. I was lucky enough to actually find one of the railroad spikes originally set here in 1910.

In Goodsprings we found the historic Pioneer Saloon. Built in 1913 by prominent businessman George Fayle, it is one of the earliest saloons to open in Nevada. Current lore suggests the saloon is haunted, perhaps by Clark Gable. The movie star allegedly drank for three days straight at the Pioneer Saloon while waiting for news on his wife of two years, Carol Lombard, whose flight from Las Vegas had mysteriously disappeared on January 16, 1942. A few years ago I hiked to the sight where Lombard’s plane crashed on Mount Potosi that fabled day.

Nest we visited the town of Sandy Valley. An unincorporated community, I have not been able to determine when the area was first established, although it appears it might have been in the 1950’s. We spotted this bighorn sheep as we made our way into town – I guess he understands the plight of Coronavirus, hence the mask.

As we left Sandy Valley, the Woman said that Lori Loughlin was nearby. The Woman was sure she had been sentenced to the federal correction facility in Sandy Valley for her college admissions scandal. While I took a pic of the facility, I wasn’t quite sure that was actually where Lori was. Turns out that Lori is actually in a female federal corrections facility in Dublin California.

We hope to be talking to you soon.

Sticking with Thanksgiving traditions

Like all of you, even though we have caved into the CDC and are not traveling, we are sticking to the lifelong Thanksgiving traditions. We figured it might give a little sense of comfort, and maybe even help drown out all the COVID noise. Nick gave us the scoop on how to go about accessing this tradition – our Thanksgiving turkey is being supplied by, none other than, Popeye’s Louisiana Kitchen!

Talking to you soon!

Socially distanced meeting with BFFs

Our friends who were so instrumental in our 550-mile pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostela across Northern Spain happened to be visiting family in Las Vegas. Back in 2016, the Woman had been connected with Alicia Darius Zara who graciously helped her plan the venture and mitigated the fears that may have prevented it. She and her husband, Marino Zara, also hosted us at their family home outside Pamplona – Marino cooked us a wonderful pasta dinner! They came over to see our new home, and enjoy a campfire on our patio – socially distanced and masked. We got to reminisce about the Camino de Santiago, which we have only done once, but Alicia and Marino have done many times.

We hope to be talking to you soon.

Long before the CDC no-travel recommendation

Nick and Valerie had a weekend planned in Laughlin Nevada, just to blow off some Covid steam. We volunteered to Moose sit their pup, as long as they were willing to come for an early Thanksgiving dinner, masked and outside on our patio. Karen decided to try her hand at flying in this strange time – the plane she was on had nobody sitting in the middle seats, and the terminals were virtual ghost towns. Our traditional turkey dinner was a success, and as far as we can tell, no Covid transmission occurred. This was a week before all hell broke loose on the virus front, and the CDC recommended no travel or gathering for family Thanksgiving dinner. We would have sadly complied had that recommendation had it come out before our gathering. Check out who is the only one actually masked!

We had hoped for a bit more interaction, however, one of the roommates of a friend Nick and Val visited had a nasty cough. So, that ended our interactions with Nick and Val for this visit – luckily that didn’t happen before dinner. We still did some hiking with Karen as she had not interacted with Nick after his sketchy exposure. It’s sad that our ability to interact with loved ones is dictated by the uncertainty caused by Coronavirus – dang!

We hope to be talking to you soon.

Dealing with Covid

Like all of you, we are trying to find anything to keep us entertained during the pandemic, while still sheltering at home. We have subscribed to HBO and are in Season 3 of Game of Thrones. We don’t know what the next thing we will watch during lunch and dinner on days when there is not a football game or some other sporting event. The Woman spends pretty much all day on her phone exploring anything of interest. She keeps finding new sites to explore and new aps to play with. This new ap caught her attention – I believe the aps caption tells it all!

We hope to be talking to you soon.

Some progress

So, there is an awful lot to do to get moved into the new house. We have given notice on the house we are currently renting, and luckily, we have until the end of November to get out. We still have to clean it and get it inspected before we are free of the lease, but we have arranged to have it professionally cleaned by the same folk that the property manager uses – should be a cake walk. We gave notice at the storage unit we were leaving, and as of Wednesday, we had emptied it. Huge!

The Woman has been spending a lot more time on her phone – just like the rest of the world, I guess. She has discovered new features she never knew existed before. The caption tells it all!

We hope to be talking to you soon.