The Journey, Part IV

Well, I thought that driving through Utah was bad. Nevada is bad in it's own unique way. After a few hours, I took over for the last leg of the day. Our goal was to reach Winnemucca. Joel and Kezia had to use the bathroom, in the middle of nowhere, so we stopped along an exit. I could never figure out why they would bother building an exit from the interstate to a place that had nothing. No houses, no gas station, maybe an abandoned shed with an old mattress propped up against it. We had supper in Battle Mountain at the McDonald's. It seemed really isolated in that little town. Carl ordered and was amazed at two things: 1) how long it took them to get our food ready and 2) that the other guy ordering couldn't speak English, only Spanish. The Hispanic girls at the counter just responded to him with louder English.

Nevada has it's unique qualities, Carl pointed out. There are tons of rolling hills, and lots of sagebrush. To me it felt like we were driving along the Easterville highway up to Thompson, Manitoba. There were very few cars on the highway, hardly any small towns, no farms along the way. It felt way too wide open and lonely. But we did end up passing one of our first vehicles!! That was very thrilling for me; the most excitement all day. It was a middle aged lady who obviously had very poor night vision.

That night we stayed in Winnemucca. We arrived quite late and unfortunately all the hotels with pools were full, except for Shady Courts. The motel was off the beaten track and boy it was shady in more ways than one. Our motel room was right in the back and as soon as I walked in I knew I had seen this place before. It could have been the set for last week's CSI. But it was clean and they had an "indoor" pool; a makeshift structure overtop an outdoor pool . That night I didn't sleep very well. The room made me nervous, so I couldn't sleep with my back towards the door. But if I turned over, then the kids' night light shone brightly into my eyes. And of course, this night Asha slept soundly.