2012-35 Carson City Nevada

2012-35

Carson City Nevada
The State Capital
Virginia City

Carson City, Nevada's Capital

Well here I am sitting in the flat valley of Douglas County with bare mountain ranges on either side.  Though the mountains to the west of me are also forested at the higher elevations as they reach into California and spidery lines indicate where the ski slopes are.  There isn't any snow on those peaks but it won't be long before they turn white with powdery snow.  Hwy 395 which runs through Reno and Carson City is constantly busy and from my campers windows I can see traffic heading in both directions night and day.

Here at the Silver City Resort I stopped up at the front desk to enquire about when the mail arrives daily as I’m waiting for mine to arrive.  Super nice owners and as I went to get a cup of coffee in the store, they told me as a camper in the park the first cup of coffee was free and they even gave me a fresh donut.

I checked out the monthly fees at a campground nearby that was advertising a rate of $295 a month.  Apparently that is the starting rate for the winter rates.  Summer rates run in the $465 range.  Why folks would want to summer in Nevada is a bit of a mystery to me.  I was talking to a biker who lives in the area and he said it was a very mild summer and the temperature never got over 100 except for a couple of days.  Now I don’t know about you, but that’s awfully hot to me.

I picked up the local Sunday paper today and it cost a whole $3.00.  It was $2 until just recently when the Reno Gazette-Journal decided to up it a full dollar more.  Seems kind of redundant to call the paper a Gazette and a Journal.  Surely one would suffice.  Wonder how much you pay for your local Sunday paper these days.  I haven't been buying the paper much anymore since I get most of my information over the internet, but it is nice to read a local paper and find out what’s happening around town.

Nevada’s legislature meets every other year to enact laws and do whatever legislators have to do.  Seems they’ve had a ballot to change it to a yearly session, but the public has soundly defeated it every time.

People out here enjoy doing things like gluing a coin to the street or even on a hand railing.  I’ve seen it in Oregon, Calif. And here in Nevada.

I wish I could tell you I’ve been touring and exploring, but this is a down week for me.  Down being a good thing in that I’m just enjoying the area without doing any of the touring type stuff.  Today I signed up for one more day at the campground and had to pay the full rate.  Well, actually I got about 25% off with my D.o.D. card and then I used a $25 coupon from Good Sam’s that I got when I signed up for the Camping World discount card, bring my final cost for the extra day down to $6.25.  Best one day camping fee of the year.

an old mining operation at the entrance to Virginia City

No mail, so I will stay another day or two.  In the meantime, you know I had to do a bit of touring.  I decided to drive over to Virginia City NV.  It’s only about 11 miles from Carson City.  I’d visited this mining town years ago and remembered the main town and train ride I took back then.  This trip I drove in from the south end and was surprised by the 15% grade in the road leading into this mountainous mining town.  There’s even an Rv park up here, but you’d best take the “truck route” to get to it.

15% grade to the left

The town is well preserved and now serves as a great tourist destination though I did see an open pit mining operation on the outskirts of town.  Nice to see an old mining town still having some mining activity in the area.  I got hear early in the morning to be able to enjoy a cup of coffee and pastry at a coffee shop in town before strolling the boardwalk through town.  Many of the shops and building having covered walkways making it very pleasant on those hot sun drenched days.  What fun antique and consignment shops up and down the main street, interspersed with saloons, museums and even the occasional old fashioned casino.  There were T-shirts and the usual tourists gifts for sale, but not as intense as so many modern day tourist destination towns.  Going through some of those stores was like walking back in time.  Seeing all those knick knacks from years past.  I even took a 30 minute trolley tour around town.  Something I always recommend when traveling to an unfamiliar town.  It helps the traveler to get a bearing on where the important buildings and tourist things are so one can go back and explore those things that are most interesting to you.  And if the tour guide is good, I get to learn more about the history and interesting tid-bits on an area.

The Spite Houses

Like the two houses that were almost touching each other.  Seems two miners hated each other.  One of the miners moved to the other side of town and built his modest house.  While it was being built, the other miner bought the land next door.  When the first miners house was completed, the second miner had his house moved to within inches of his nemesis.  Or over at the Silver Queen Saloon where there’s a painting of a lady covered in 3,261 silver dollar coins making up her dress.  The belt around her waist is made up of 28 $20 gold coins.  The silver coins are supposed to represent the 3,261 feet of the deepest Comstock mine in Virginia City and to honor the miners who had to go down to those depths which was so hot down there (120 degrees) that they could only work for about 20 minutes before out to cooler levels of the mine then taking a 20 minute break.

The Silver Dollar Lady 

Back at the camper I did a bit of investigation into the Roku media streamer.  It’s a small device that you connect to your tv and the internet via a wi-fi signal.  It works well with my 4G connection on the Verizon smart phone, but unfortunately, most of the “channels” that are available cost money to stream.  Like HULU-Plus which cost $8 a month instead the free vanilla version of  HULU which doesn’t cost anything to view tv programs.  I guess I’m not quite ready to spend $8 or what ever each month to view tv.  Movies are also available on a per movie cost basis.  It’s an interesting product for sure in that you can access movies, video, and tv programs and lots of free obscure programs without the use of a computer.  It even comes with a remote control so you select the show just like you would a tv program from a menu on tv screen.  So I guess if I want to watch tv via the internet, the computer connected to the tv is the way to go for me at this time.  Now if you were able to follow this little discourse it means your techno savvy.  If not, it means you have better things to do with your time than play with electronic toys like I do.

One of the joys of being on the road is when you get a chance to meet up with fellow Rv’ers.  Elaine and John arrived at my current campground here in Carson City and we had just the most delightful get together.  Using our smart phones, we found a great Mexican restaurant in town called El Charro Evitia. A truly authentic Mexican restaurant that we all enjoyed.  John’s meal came with the usual beans and rice but he said they were the best he’d ever had.  Nice to find really good food.  I even had dinner over at their La Casa Grande the other night as well.

Elaine

John

My travels will be coming to an end in another month but I’ll more than likely send out a few reports from my winter destination once I get there.  Wishing you all the very best of  journeys.

More photos on Picasa