Slots of fun

Today we drove around the east side of Lake Tahoe. The first stop was Cave Rock. This rock has two tunnels cut through it for the road. There is also a nice photo opportunity of the lake with lots of boat people launching and recovering boats. We headed round to the top of the lake and made another stop and went for a paddle in the lake. It was quite warm and people were swimming off the beach.

After Lake Tahoe we made our way to Reno for a night out at the Eldorado Casino. This is a huge place full of restaurants, bars and obviously slot machines.

Goodbye God I am going to Bodie

Today we had lots of driving to do as we wanted to stay in Tahoe. We set off from Mammoth and took the scenic route out to the 395. We then headed North until we came to the June lake loop which is a really scenic detour around all the lakes we had seen the previous day from the top of mammoth mountain. We had a short stop at Mono lake and took some photos and went to the museum. This was very well done with lots of information about the brine shrimp that are harvested there every year.

We carried on North for another 20 or 30 miles then headed east to Bodie. This is an amazing ghost town which used to be a big gold and silver mining town back in the 1800’s. I was expecting a few old buildings, but it turned out to be really big with loads of the original buildings to look at. We took the tour of the stamp mill saw how the gold and silver was extracted from the rocks. We stayed here a bit too long and I didn’t realise how far away Tahoe was. We decided to come off the 395 and go through monitor pass. This climbs to 8314 feet and you get a great view of Topaz Lake from at the top. We finally found a hotel in Tahoe and even managed to get a room with a north facing view of the lake.

Mammoth

Today we went to Mammoth and went to the top of Mammoth Mountain on the gondola. This mountain is 11,053 feet high and has several mountain bike trails down from the top. From the top you can also see the June lakes. It was quite windy at the top with speeds of up 40mph.



After this we caught the bus down to the Devil’s Postpiles. The postpiles are hexagonal columns made of basalt formed from a volcanic eruption about 100,000 years ago. They are really worth a visit and you can climb to the top of the postpiles and see the hexagon shapes all fitted together like a giant honeycomb.

Packing up

Today the container was arriving at white mountain research centre. There were five of us loading the container and it was soon all in and ready to go.





After this Denise and I made our way up to the ancient bristlecone forests. They have dated some of these trees as old as 4000 years old and they think these are the oldest living things on the planet. The trees are quite small considering how old they are but have fantastic shapes and colours.

After this we headed through Independence and stopped at Manzanar. After the bombing of Pearl Harbor the Americans sent anyone of Japanese decent to live in internment camps Manzanar was one of these camps located in the middle of the Owens Valley. There wasn’t much of it left only the main school building which has been converted into a museum,

Obsidian dome and Cathedral lakes

Today Denise, Rich, John and myself went on a trip with the intention of getting some good photos. Between us we were armed with three digital slr cameras and a multitude of filters and lenses.

The first stop was at the Obsidian Dome which is North of Bishop. This is a massive mound of naturally formed black glass. We parked up and wandered up to the top of the mound and looked at the big piles of mostly black rock. Apparently the Paiute Indians used this rock to make their arrowheads. There is also a great deal of pumice stone up here as well so if you have hard skin on your feet this is the place for you!

The next place on the agenda was Cathedral lakes in Yosimite. This is quite high up in the park and quiet compared to the valley bottom. We walked up to the first lake (3.4 miles) with many stops along the way with John and Rich giving us photo hints and tips. Both Denise and I ended up with some really nice shots.

Welcome to my first ever blog, I thought I should keep up with technology and start blogging.

I am currently in the states on the T-Rex field trip for the final tear down. We have done really well this trip and actually managed to stay ahead of schedule. Now all the masts are down and we are just waiting for the container to arrive then we can load up all the kit and get it shipped back to the UK.