poorly focused, but nice shot<\/div><\/div>Loving my view spot here. I took my lawn chair to the other side of the road and had a sweeping panoramic sunset.<\/p>\n

I am going to reiterate a long standing pet peeve here – dickwads in RVs who leave their bright porch lights on all night in remote, dark places<\/em>. Leave your light on all you want at Kamperland or the Walmart, but when to are at a low key desert\u00a0campground where the pure night sky is a big reason\u00a0why people are here, turn your f—ing light off, because it is taking away from the quality of the night for everyone near you. Those people so far fall into two categories, clueless RV renters, and over-entitled old white dudes who literally don’t even understand that anybody else’s wishes matter. Guess which I got tonight :) The redneck dudes that just don’t give a f— are elsewhere, at the off-road vehicle campground 80 miles away.<\/span><\/p>\n

… actually the old white dude turned the light off after his guests went back to their trailer, but I enjoyed my\u00a0rant so much\u00a0I’m leaving it for posterity …<\/p>\n

Monday<\/a><\/h3>\n
Dang, people get going early here! As I feared, my parking angle, which was perfect for sunset and seeing the waning gibbous moon at bedtime, also caught the sunrise perfectly, since the sun and moon do follow very similar apparent paths, duh.<\/p>\n
So anyway, the sun full on my face woke me up at 7:30, and every last vehicle was gone from Camping Loop A already. I existed in this situation for an hour or so, but finally started the van and 180’d myself, for a happy rest of the morning.<\/p>\n
The road from here to Reno is very familiar. The sameness and emptiness has a kind of austere grandeur to it, but basically it’s pretty boring, with very few options to liven the monotony. It is literally over 100 miles to the first cup of coffee, much less a gas station or a restaurant. No phone bars of course…<\/p>\n
A big find from last trip was that the ice cream\/hamburger joint in Adin has wifi! So I planned my boring day around that. I had one of their gutbuster meals (pulled pork bbq and mac salad) and did all my daily internet rituals – stockpiling pages to read tonight and with my phone and laptop connected to the same router, I was even able to get most lf my photos uploaded via PhotoStream. Since it was 1:40pm and my destination is 40 minutes away, I took a lot of time.<\/p>\n
Studying the camping app one more time I had a brainstorm, namely to drive another 40 minutes to the fancier south end of Eagle Lake. It’ll be an extra $6 ($12 for you kids :), but a nicer, shadier place. That was a great idea!<\/p>\n
Merrill Campground<\/b><\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
WHUFU page for: Merrill Campground<\/a><\/b><\/p>
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huge-ass campground on ever-diminishing Eagle Lake. Full of giant RVs with hookups and run by a concessionaire, so it is much more bureaucratic and rule-bound that most.\r<\/p>\n
Site 159 is pretty sweet, unobstructed lake view (150 yds away), open, but the tall pine behind (south of) me give it pretty good afternoon shade.<\/p>\n<\/p>
<\/p>tonight<\/b>:
\n
huge-ass campground on ever-diminishing Eagle Lake. Full of giant RVs with hookups and run by a concessionaire, so it is much more bureaucratic and rule-bound that most.\r<\/p>\n
Site 159 is pretty sweet, unobstructed lake view (150 yds away), open, but the tall pine behind (south of) me give it pretty good afternoon shade.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>
<\/a>
Eagle Lake<\/div><\/div><\/p>\n
So here I am, a card-carrying senior,\u00a0still having problems with authority :) I got dinged by the Camp Host for not filling in enough of the twenty or so fields on the receipt clipped to my site post. Any\u00a0sane operation\u00a0serializes\u00a0the payment envelopes, so you can make an easy and infallible correspondence between the envelope with the payment and the receipt at your campsite. Not these bozos, so their idea is that\u00a0you must print\u00a0your full address, phone, drivers license # and Senior Pass number on BOTH. aaarrrgggh.<\/p>\n
<\/a>
Merrill Campground in the evening<\/div><\/div>Notwithstanding its bureaucracy, this place turns out to be pretty cool. I will come more often in the future. Where I am is very close to the beach parking area, so I trundle down there three times:<\/p>\n
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6-ish, a bit of a swim. very shallow, but nice water.<\/li>\n
7:40-ish sunset.<\/li>\n
9-ish, moonrise, over a little angle of the lake so I get the sweet reflection!<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
I was surprised to have\u00a0the moon rise where it\u00a0did. It was spectacular, but as noted last night, that means the sun will come up at about the same spot, so I am f—ked for tomorrow morning. Oh well…<\/p>\n
Tuesday<\/a><\/h3>\n
<\/a>
Eagle Lake<\/div><\/div>Sure enough, 7:30 I awake to the sun in my face. My thermostat thinks it needs to keep pumping out heat, but as a sentient being rather than a mechanical regulator, I know better.\u00a0So I streeeeetch over to click\u00a0off the heat. I notice my stylish neighbors across the road packing up their stylish little Airstream, getting ready to vacate\u00a0their well-shaded spot. I an too inert to hop over there right now, and it’s a good thing, since Herr Kommandant Camp Host swung by on his electric cart to collect all those information-rich receipts and make sure all is in order.<\/p>\n
9:30-ish I do swing across the street to enjoy\u00a0three more hours of delicious shade. I get away with it, I feel like such a rebel!<\/p>\n
Today’s path\u00a0is sooo familiar. But I do\u00a0make some discoveries. The Susanville Starbucks<\/strong> sucks today because they charged me for a refill and were actively rude. The Primo Deli<\/strong> will get my business next time. They have coffee, sandos, goodies and wifi, and they are not a corporate behemoth manned by hipster assholes. There was a long line at the Safeway deli (next to the Starbucks). Standing in the deli\u00a0I had time to Yelp and decide that the Primo Deli would actually get my business. It was okay, kind of dumpy and disorganized, but the sando was good.<\/p>\n
<\/a>
Los Dos Hermanos = yum! Eat now, start my 24 hours at Sierra Hot Springs after<\/div><\/div>The f—ing long road repair stoppage on 395 was still going on, and was still f–ing long. Twenty miles later I decided I would indeed go to the hot springs instead of home. So after a lovely meal at Los Dos Hermanos<\/strong>, \u00a0here I am sitting in the pine needles and volcanic dust at the SHS camping area – “campground” is too elevated a term for our little new age slum :)<\/p>\n
Sierra Hot Springs<\/b><\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
WHUFU page for: Sierra Hot Springs<\/a><\/b><\/p>
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Camping is just the edge of the forest behind the lodge. Next to a very pretty cow pasture at the edge of the huge Sierra Valley. \r<\/p>\n
\r<\/p>\n
Nice lodge to hang out in, wifi and kitchen, free to campers. \r<\/p>\n
\r<\/p>\n
The Hot Springs has also taken over the hotel in town. There is also a breakfast place and aMexican restaurant in town, both pricy but good!<\/p>\n<\/p>
<\/p>tonight<\/b>:
\n
My usual spot has two RVs on it, so I am forced back into the trees. It's pretty nice here! Better shade, still got a really nice panoramic view of the valley.\r<\/p>\n
\r<\/p>\n
Again had Dos Hermanos on the way in. That place has good food. This is Burning Man week, but things seem pretty calm here.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>
<\/a>
camper has my usual spot<\/div><\/div><\/p>\n
A feature of where I am parked over my usual spot across the road is that the dust raised by the endless stream of efficient little yuppie-mobiles driving past to the Meditation Pool blows onto them instead of me.<\/p>\n
The check-in dude said it’s quiet today, but it sure seems pretty f—ing busy to me.<\/p>\n
Had a nice\u00a0moment tonight. About 10:30 I looked for my lovely orange towel and realized I left it hanging on a hook at the pools. After stewing for a while, I decided to simply walk back and retrieve\u00a0it right now. Thus doing a thing I always think about doing, returning to the pools for a\u00a0late night soak when they are\u00a0finally not crowded.<\/p>\n
Wednesday – Thursday<\/a><\/h3>\n
The greasy spoon at the big intersection in Sierraville has reopened as a more elevated greasy spoon. New tables and chairs – they REALLY needed that\u00a0–\u00a0and some fancy choices\u00a0on the menu, \u00a0to wit: venison for breakfast<\/em>\u00a0– really tasty, well seasoned and well cooked!<\/p>\n
Now I’m back at the lodge enjoying the big, wide, pretty green valley from the porch as I always look forward to doing.<\/p>\n
Driving back to the lodge I followed a slow-moving truck pulling six porta-potties. Turns out the big event that requires them is the end of Burning Man. Makes sense. Before B-Man (right now!), everyone is in a dither, getting their shade structures and art projects perfected, no time or inclination for a relaxing side trip. But after B-Man, the idea of soaking away a week’s worth of playa dust in the hot pool would be really, really compelling.<\/p>\n
Thinking about this makes me glad to be here now instead of later. The Dome Pool<\/strong> (the super-hot one in the geodesic dome) was crowded enough these two days (7 (8?) people in that little tub!). I would hate to see if next week full of burnt out burners.<\/p>\n
I follow\u00a0my routine – hang out at the lodge till 1-2 hours till time to go, then hit the pools. This gets me on the road 4:45-ish and home 5-ish. Facebook tells me that there is good (very good!) jazz at the Se7en tonight, but I foolishly take a bit of a nap and sleep through it.<\/p>\n
Thursday<\/h5>\n
Since I am home for only one day and two nights before heading back into the hinterlands, I will\u00a0continue to blog this as if\u00a0“home” is\u00a0just another stop on my Nor Cal adventure.<\/p>\n
home<\/b><\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
WHUFU page for: home<\/a><\/b><\/p>
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nice kitchen, good heat and a\/c, satellite tv, comfortable sofa and nice coffeehouse nearby. Why do I ever leave?<\/p>\n<\/p>
<\/p><\/div>\n
Home has a shower and many other amenities. A shocking personal development is\u00a0that\u00a0I am sitting in the living room without a compelling desire to turn the TV on. It\u00a0would be cool if I can keep that up.<\/p>\n
I do my usual thing,\u00a0Java Jungle<\/strong> in the late AM, home for the afternoon.\u00a0Five-ish walk down the river to check the progress in the new Virginia Street Bridge on my way\u00a0to the\u00a0Nevada Museum of Art<\/strong> for the First Thursday party.\u00a0One beer at the Jungle bar<\/strong>, home by ten. Not an epic evening, but very pleasant.<\/p>\n
Friday – Sunday<\/a><\/h3>
<\/a>
Virginia Street Bridge being pre-built<\/div><\/div><\/p>\n
Java Jungle in the late AM again, home again. I call my buddy Jeff in Chester so he can talk me into going up there today for the weekend. I’m easy to convince, so I carry back down\u00a0the van all the\u00a0stuff I carried up to my condo two nights ago. By about 4\u00a0I am\u00a0on the road to Butt Lake<\/strong>. Our campsite is spectacular!<\/p>\n
Ponderosa Flat<\/b><\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
WHUFU page for: Ponderosa Flat<\/a><\/b><\/p>
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Here three days, for a Labor Day party with friends. \r<\/p>\n
Sites 7 and 9 are the PERFECT sites, roomy and shaded, and adjoining the lake. Everybody else has to walk around the edges of us to get to the lake. \r<\/p>\n
Pretty excellent place to hang out for the three day weekend.\r<\/p>\n
The only drag for me is that $25 is pretty steep for little ole me to hang out in the van. For me and six of my friends, whole different story!<\/p>\n<\/p>
<\/p>tonight<\/b>:
\n
Here three days, for a Labor Day party with friends. \r<\/p>\n
Sites 7 and 9 are the PERFECT sites, roomy and shaded, and adjoining the lake. Everybody else has to walk around the edges of us to get to the lake. \r<\/p>\n
Pretty excellent place to hang out for the three day weekend.\r<\/p>\n
The only drag for me is that $25 is pretty steep for little ole me to hang out in the van. For me and six of my friends, whole different story!<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>
<\/a>
happy kayaker, Butt Lake behind me<\/div><\/div><\/p>\n
Hang out all Friday evening, up and at ’em in Chester by midday Saturday, more friends come. Mid afternoon we all paddle around the lake for a while in their kayaks for a while. Big\u00a0party Saturday night! \u00a0Sorry neighbors … On Sunday\u00a0everybody is too hungover to even go into Chester and open the store, so we hang out all day. I miss my first Sunday Chronicle for a while – this means\u00a0a trip to the Eureka Public Library copying machine.<\/p>\n
Monday<\/a><\/h3>\n
Monday we decamp. We all go into Chester, Jeff to close the store for the season, the rest of us to grab some free food that is his leftover stock. I get a half of a pecan pie and loads of fruit – bananas, apricots, peaches, apples – awesome! Everyone but me goes back to their workaday lives, I do one more night on road, because I can.<\/p>\n
Chester is very close to Lassen National Park<\/strong>, so I drive over the pass there on Route 89<\/strong>. I thought I might stop at the Summit Campgrounds<\/strong> high up in the mountains in the park, but when I got there I wasn’t feeling it. It’s very hot today, it’s pretty early in the afternoon, and I jsut didn’t think it would be all that pleasant. Hanging in the shade at Hat Creek<\/strong> seemed much more enticing. So I continued\u00a0on down the north\u00a0side of the mountain to good old Cave Campground<\/strong>.<\/p>\n
Cave Campground<\/b><\/span><\/span><\/div>\n
WHUFU page for: Cave Campground<\/a><\/b><\/p>
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Smack on the way from Reno to Eureka, where CA 44 meets CA 89. \r<\/p>\n
A geologically interesting valley. A giant, recent lava flow that feels like the recovering disaster area it is. The Lava Cave is a short walk across the highway.\r<\/p>\n
\r<\/p>\n
The Forest Service keeps one campground open all winter, and it is this one.\r<\/p>\n
\r<\/p>\n
A deep blanket of pine needles makes it quiet except for the occasional truck on 89.<\/p>\n<\/p>
<\/p>tonight<\/b>:
\n
First time I've been here in season, so first time I've stayed in the Big Boys Loop. It's always been closed for the winter.\r<\/p>\n
So this is the first time I've experienced the bathrooms - they are nice! Porcelain sinks, actual knobs for the water - old school.\r<\/p>\n
A couple of areas are still taped off for storm damage, but most of it is open, and surprisingly crowded for the first day of off-season. \r<\/p>\n
This is Monday, effing night, don't you people have to be at work somewhere tomorrow?\r<\/p>\n
\r<\/p>\n
Now that it is dark, I find that each bathroom has a super bright light, which is a problem if you value the dark like I do and happen to have pointed yourself in the wrong direction.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>
<\/a>
Cave Campground, this part is closed in winter<\/div><\/div> <\/span><\/p>\n
It’s still very hot here, and much more crowded than I expected, so I did not get a really shady spot. I thought that after Labor Day the place would be deserted, but not so. There were quite a few folks that were staying one more day.\u00a0Around<\/span>\u00a05:30 it’s started cooling off and\u00a0getting civilized.<\/p>\n
I love Hat Creek. The people in my campground tonight I do not love nearly as much. There is a large ground of partying old dudes a few sites away. They seem like nice fellows, if a little loud. I guess they are\u00a0my karmic payback for our group being the loud assholes the last three days, But there were two different sets of folks that seemed gloweringly angry for no good reason. Weird vibe. Maybe they were cranky about having to go back to work tomorrow.<\/span><\/p>\n
Tuesday<\/a><\/h3>\n
The angry people were gone when I got up – good riddance. I communed with Hat Creek till about noon, then took the familiar road to Susanville<\/strong> and then home.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I was\u00a0awakened by my iPhone at 8am. The phone reception\u00a0was good enough for it to ring, but poor\u00a0enough that\u00a0the actual call dropped out – aaargh – a classic lose-lose. I read and wrote for an hour or so, then went … Continued<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-584","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-august-2015-eureka-and-oregon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.whufu.com\/wpwhu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/584","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.whufu.com\/wpwhu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.whufu.com\/wpwhu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.whufu.com\/wpwhu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.whufu.com\/wpwhu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=584"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.whufu.com\/wpwhu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/584\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.whufu.com\/wpwhu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=584"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.whufu.com\/wpwhu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=584"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.whufu.com\/wpwhu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=584"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}