(Posted 251008) The next segment of our Nevada saga would take us to Elko for a few days, with the "main event" being a visit to Lamoille Canyon.
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The Eureka Rest Area ended up being amazingly devoid of road noise despite being right on Highway 50 - possibly because folks weren't traveling much that stormy Monday night - and pretty much the only thing that woke us up in the middle of the night were brief periods of intense rain hitting our roof. After one of these interludes, Tom laid awake thinking about the Bee-bag business card (or lack thereof) situation described in the previous post, and how we could make interim (paper) ones on the road if we could find a place to print them - say, the library we had parked outside of yesterday. A quick check online confirmed that Eureka County Libraries have printers in them (albeit only black and white ones) so Tom continued his research to try to figure out what service he had used to make the original blog QR code (figuring it was probably Adobe Express, since it's free, can be done online, and the the codes "never expire"), and then tapped out the text for the new landing page as a note on his phone before going back to sleep.
In the morning, we agreed that taking some time to go back to the library and generate the cards was a good idea so we did our morning routine, took some daylight photos of the Rest Area (by now being the only occupants since our two neighbors had left earlier in the morning) . . .
. . . and returned to the library just after 10 am when it supposedly opened. The librarian didn't arrive for another 15 minutes, though (small town libraries operate on "or whenever" hours, we guess 😉), but we eventually went in and confirmed that there was a working printer that we'd be able to use without having a library card. With everything in order, we returned to the T42 to do the final prep work.
Creating the new Blogger landing page and QR code to link to it went fairly smoothly, but laying out the business cards with the QR code graphic and desired text in Word was an absolute
bear. After struggling with it for almost an hour, we finally had a PDF that we could take in to the library to print. Since we were the only ones in the library, we also asked the librarian about the siren the night before and she told us that it's used to summon the volunteer fire fighters when they're needed (which kind of jives with what the gas station attendant told us the night before).
By now it was close to noon. We got gas at the gas station of Eureka's one and only supermarket and headed 113 miles north for a couple of hours to the Walmart in Elko, where we replenished our supplies and then ate lunch in the parking lot. From there we proceeded to the Sherman Station Visitor Center to get some information about hiking Lamoille Canyon, as well as other sights to see in the area. We got what we needed - as well as some free mini packs of gummi bears and s'mores flavored salt water taffy from the friendly young lady inside, so the visit was a rousing success - and then spent some time browsing the historic buildings on site.
Sherman Station was originally built in the 1870's in Huntington Valley, 60 miles south of Elko. Starting out as a single family's homestead, it eventually expanded to become a stage shop, post office, and community center with a blacksmith shop, creamery, and one room schoolhouse added to the property. The buildings were all moved to Elko in 1995. The main structure is the two story home that took 7 years to build, and was the largest log house in Nevada at the time of completion.
To the left were the Creamery and One Room Schoolhouse.
To the right was the Blacksmith Shop.
This bench didn't look like it was a "Sherman Station Original" - but we still thought that it was a creative use of an old pickup truck tailgate.
In between was the old Stable - but it was closed up, so we couldn't look inside.
Also on site, we found one of the many Elko Centennial Boots - hand painted 6 foot tall boot sculptures that were commissioned as part of the city's centennial celebration back in 2017. One of the items we got from the Visitor Center was a map of all the boot locations around Elko, that we might use if we have time.
Then we drove 4 miles northeast to the Valley View RV Park, which would be our "home" for the next 3 nights, and checked in.
Sites here are in pairs, with services between them: so our dump hole (under the rock with the board on top) is right next to our neighbor's, power is on opposite sides of the same post, and water is opposite sides of a red dome thing. Unbeknownst to Tom, they had been repainting the red domes earlier in the day and didn't bother to put "Wet Paint" signs up - despite the fact that they smooched the faucet handle on ours. Luckily our first activity on arrival was a dump+flush, so Tom was wearing dump gloves when he went to use the faucet and only got red paint all over them instead of his hands. And for some reason, our weird little faucet is pointed up instead of down too - which makes filling water bottles directly from the faucet nearly impossible (although its so low to the ground that its doubtful that we would've been able to fill bottles even if the faucet was pointed down like normal either).
We managed to finish our tank and water bottle chores without further incident, and then made a dinner of grilled salmon, IP rice, and salad. After dishes, we had showers in the shower house. The bathroom/showers here are a little odd as well: the men's and ladies' room each has a single toilet and two shower stalls, but with no divider between the toilet and showers, and the outer door when opened has full view of the shower changing area - so for all practical intents, the bathrooms are "singles" and you have lock the door when using them.
Tom spent the rest of the evening working on the second Nevada blog post, while Christine read a book. We headed to bed around midnight
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Wednesday morning we were up at 8 am to get ready for our day in Lamoille Canyon. After our morning routine, we drove 25 miles southeast to Lamoille Canyon which is over a hill and across a valley from Elko.
The tourist board calls it "the Yosemite of Nevada" - a comparison we were highly skeptical of. One thing that was very clear from our first glimpse, though: fall colors had arrived in the canyon!
Unfortunately, the morning was somewhat overcast so many of our photos don't quite do the colors justice - despite the fact that we spent an inordinate amount of time at the first pullout along the 12 mile scenic canyon road trying to capture the colors that we saw.
The photo below shows the point where the two ancient glaciers that carved the canyon met. The Right Fork Lamoille Creek Glacier extended 3 miles back in the little valley seen right-of-center, while the Lamoille Glacier came in from 9 miles up the valley to the left where the current road goes.
The straight-ish path of bare rock in the next photo is an "avalanche chute" - a place where avalanches repeatedly occur.
At the end of the 12 mile canyon was the parking lot for most of the trailheads, including the one we were planning on taking. Somewhat confusingly, the trail information posted in the parking log - purportedly from the "Friends of the Ruby Mountains" and the US Forest Service had different distances listed for getting to Lamoille Lake and Liberty Pass than the trail information we had received at Sherman Station the day before. Surely the info at the trailhead - with the US Forest Service logo on it - would be the more accurate one, right? 🙄
The first tip-off that things might not be as ship-shape here as we might like to think is that we had quite a bit of trouble finding the actual
start of the trail. The trail supposedly started at the far end of the parking lot, and we
did find a little arrow sign that said "Hiking path" that pointed down a dirt trail there, which led to a pair of sign holders whose signs were long since gone. And from there, there were no less than 5 different path-like things leading outward, with no indication of which was the true path. We started down the most promising looking one, only to realize a few minutes later that it was heading in complete the wrong direction and turned back. We leap-frogged across some of the other paths that seemed headed in the right general direction (using AllTrails as a rough guide), passing by another couple we had met earlier in the parking lot who were trying to find the Island Lake trail with similar difficulties, and eventually found the "right" path. Most of the trail consisted of a narrowly cleared path between the plants . . .
. . . although there was a short "boardwalk" section (over ground that was completely dry at the time, but presumably must get muddy at some point) . . .
. . . although the trail crossed over Lamoille Creek a few times, sometimes with the help of a bridge . . .
After the first half hour of hiking, we both realized that we were both more winded than we usually would be from a hike of this sort. Our guess was that our lungs weren't used to the high elevation yet (the parking lot where we started was at around 8,800 ft above sea level), and things did actually get easier as we went along, despite that the trail itself actually got steeper.
Along the way, we passed by the Dollar Lakes . . .
. . . which were guarded by this ferocious tree monster.
Our brother-in-law had requested "many more photos of the two of you in front of gorgeous waterfalls" from this trip - which is a pretty tall order for Nevada. But we found this "fall" to take a selfie in front of, so: here you go (the video following it is proof that there actually was water falling behind us there, because it's kind of hard to make out in the photo)! 😜
Two miles in, we reached Lamoille Lake.
Now came the decision to turn back, or continue onward to Liberty Pass. The info from Sherman Station claimed it would be another mile, while the info in the parking lot claimed it was would only be another 0.5 mile; both claimed that there'd be significant elevation gain to the Pass, though. We decided to keep going. As we began ascending the switchback section of the path, we passed by this shockingly unmarked Rabbit Rock:
As we climbed higher and higher, we started getting a bird's eye view of Lamoille Lake . . .
. . . and eventually the Canyon itself. If you zoom in around the middle of the pano, you can see the parking lot where the T42 is parked. And on the far right you can see the Wise Old Lion (another shockingly unmarked rock), who is watching over the entire scene.
As we passed the patches of unmelted snow, Tom began to re-think his choice to hike in shorts and a short sleeved T-shirt today (but he really hates hiking in long pants, so was still ultimately happy with his clothing choice).
Finally, we made it to the Pass.
Both the Sherman Station directions and the old man we passed on his way back down recommended going past the sign a little bit until you got to the actual view on the other side, which we did. We crested the hill and continued outward for a few minutes onto an outcropping of rock until we reached a point where you could see Liberty Lake in the foreground and Castle Lake in the distance.
The distance from Lamoille Lake to this point? 1.5 miles - so
both sets of trail directions had been wrong about the distance. After a brief break for some more photo taking, we began the 3.5 mile journey back to the parking lot (which, of course, took a lot less time on the way down than it did on the way up). The sun was out as we passed the Dollar Lakes again, so we finally managed to get a decently lit photo.
Total distance for the hike was 7.14 miles, with an elevation gain of either 1482 or 1629 feet (depending on whether you believe Apple Watch or Pixel Watch) and took just under 5 hours.
The setting sun on our way out of the canyon brought a new depth to the fall colors.
Our final opinion of the whole "the Yosemite of Nevada" comparison? Lamoille Canyon definitely had a healthy dose of gorgeous glacier carved valleys and beautiful lakes - but it seems to be short a few waterfalls. 😉
We returned to the Valley View RV Park and had a dinner of grill-roasted potatoes, burgers, and salad. After dishes and showers, Tom continued working on the second Nevada blog post while Christine reworked the plans for the rest of our trip, since the government shutdown closed Big Basin National Park and cancelled our plans there.
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Next post: (coming soon)
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