Day 14 - Jarbidge, Nevada.

We screwed up the time somehow. Between Mountain Time, Pacific Time and the seemingly random patterns of Daylight Savings or Standard Time, I guess we never had a chance. We sat around for an hour goofing off at the Barn Motel, when in fact it was an hour later than we thought! By 0800, we were back at the Cafe, and having eggs and home made chorizo sausage and sourdough toast, but we'd lost nearly an hour of riding time.

We paid up, and headed out of town to the south, assured that Bear Creek Pass was clear and tranversable, despite it being a couple weeks earlier than usual. We immediately began to climb high into the aspens above Jarbidge.

Before we knew it, we were at the summit.

As fantastic as the view was on the north side, the south side was better, with an enormous valley opening in front of us, and the Ruby Mountains far off on the distant horizon.

The wildflowers were in full bloom, and carpeted the meadows with gold.

I saw a gold eagle on a rock, mule deer & fawns, and badger catch a chipmunk all within about two miles. Amazing stuff.

We neared the ghost town of Charleston - there's really not much left other than a few small log structures and soem foundations, but there is a little bit of history here. The town was originally called Mardis, named after Mr. Mardis, a miner who found gold here in the 1870's. He was killed by a Chinese miner, and by the 1883 the town faded away. It did, during that time, gain quite a reputation for lawlessness. In 1886, the town got a second wind, but was then called Bayard. By 1889, the post office again closed, and it went dormant once more. In 1894 or so, the town got it's third wind, but was named Charleston after miner Tom Charles. Somehow, the place survived until the 1950's, when the Post Office again closed, and the area became ranchland.

We decided to head south to Deeth where I-80 crosses. We needed to start planning some fuel management, as way out here fuel can become fairly hard to find - especially when you're working hard to make a route that stays away from civilization.

We'd pretty much figured out that there's nothing between Jarbidge and Deeth, except the emptiness and beauty of the desert. Some ranching goes on, and there are open range cattle here and there.

The snowcapped peaks of the Ruby Mountains are getting closer.

I came across this peculiar metal sculpture. I'm not sure what it was or why it was there, but it was a long, long way from anything.

By late morning, we were getting close to Deeth and I-80. That might mean cell phone coverage and a call home to let everyone know that we weren't dead yet.

The swallows weren't thrilled about us using the I-80 overpass for shade as we made a few calls and enjoyed the Ruby Mountains. Verizon didn't work, but AT&T did.

Deeth, NV had the promise of being a place we could get gas and maybe lunch, but that wasn't so. There really was nothing to Deeth other than a Post Office. It owed it's existance to the Central Pacific Railroad which opened a station here in the 1860's. It became a pretty busy shipping and supply point for Ruby and Starr Valleys. Numerous suspicious fires seemed to occur by the early 20th century, and eventually, the town faded away. About twenty people live there now, according to the postmaster.

While we were chatting with the Postmaster, we also inquired about fuel. Wells was about 20 odd miles to the east, and Elko was 20 odd miles to the west. I didn't want to have to go to either just for gas. We were hoping to cross over a low saddle in the Ruby Range, and drop into the Ruby Valley on the other side. But we couldn't do it unless we could get gas somewhere down there. She pulled out her Delorme Gazetteer, and showed us a spot about 75 miles away that she was sure had gas. Perfect!

A few minutes later, we were headed south toward the pass.

Shhhh.....don't tell anyone....

Zooming along the upper reaches of Ruby Valley, in search of gasoline.

We reached the site where gasoline was supposed to be available, but the pumps were locked up, and we were told there hadn't been fuel there for quite some time. I realized the jam we were in immediately. We didn't have enough fuel left in our tanks to go to Wells or Elko, and we didn't have enough fuel to reach Eureka or Ely. An older woman told us that if we took a dirt road across the mountains to the north, that we could get some gas at Jiggs. Not having much of an alternative, we rode the 25 miles over the mountains to Jiggs....

And guess what? No gas at Jiggs. They had a pump, but were out of fuel and didn't know when the fuel truck would be coming by. Seems like we'll become residents of Jiggs, NV now. We went into the bar and had a Coke. It was about 1530 in the afternoon by now, and we didn't have enough fuel to get anywhere. I was afraid that this could happen, and it did. The bar had nothing to eat other than candy bars and chips.

The local ranching operation was cutting loose for the rest of the day, and about 20 real, genuine cowboys piled into the bar.

It didn't take us long to get some fuel. One of the cowboys had a five gallon can of fuel in the back of his truck - he was supposed to mow his lawn that evening. We took two gallons each, and left him one - so he could still mow the grass. I think he was *counting* on us taking it all so he could tell his wife he could mow the grass, and here's why.......we thwarted him. That gave us enough fuel to nearly fill one lobe of each of our tanks - enough for another eighty miles or so. Barring a monumental FUBAR, we should make Ely or Eureka....

We headed back over the same pass we'd come over from Ruby Valley. A cowboy in the bar had told me it was called Harrison Pass, and that there was an old tungsten mine up there that had burned down in the 1940's.

We dropped back into Ruby Valley, and resumed our original quest - which looked like we'd try to make Ely tonight.

We ran south along the edges of the Ruby Mountains to our west, and Ruby Lake to the east. This place used to be flooded by a 200' deep lake thousands of years ago. Oddly enough, the lake isn't dry, yet there are no streams or rivers running into it. At least a couple hundred springs feed the lake - which at one time not that long ago, was filled with boats and waterskiers. Not anymore. It's a wildlife sanctuary now.

At the bottom of Ruby Valley, we headed southeast on CR3 and into Long Valley. Try to guess why they call it by that name? This would have been a helluva place to run out of gas. It was right about here where both BigDog and I ran out of water, our camelbacks dry.....

We turned off CR3 and onto CR8, seeking relief from the searing heat of the valley floor, and trying to shave a few miles off getting into Ely. Our fuel lights had come on, signaling us we had about 40 miles of fuel left. Maybe less on rougher terrain. We were still about 40 miles from Ely. This one's going to be a close call. It's 110 degrees, we're out of water, the sun is getting low in the sky, and we're running out of fuel.....No problem.

The CR8 intersected into Thirtymile Road.

Eventually, we hit the freshly oiled pavement of US50, otherwise known as the "loneliest highway". I'm sure it would live up to it's name if we ran out of gas as the sun set, and had to camp without food or water tonight.

But we made it, rolling into Ely with less than five miles worth of fuel left for each of us. We just made it, and it was a little too close for comfort. We made several mistakes today, and any of them could have really become a significant issue for us.

Ely has most of the modern things you'd like. We got a nice, clean room for about fifty bucks - where I promptly did my laundry and set it out to dry. BigDog got a couple quarts of automobile oil from the convenience store, and we changed his oil - well, at least performed an oil 'freshening'.

We wandered into town on foot, and had chinese food for dinner. The bigDog struggled with the hot and sour soup. He likes food no spicier than ketchup.

I had a plate of Thai beef and guess what.....?

We wandered back to the motel after watching three guys from California almost wad up their R1200GS's crossing the street back to the casino from the bar. They were all wearing shorts and flip-flops, so it could have been interesting.

BigDog was asleep before dark, and I spent a couple hours chatting with a geologist that was staying in the room next door to ours. He'd been involved in a good deal of the underground nuclear tests performed before they stopped testing, and was pretty well amazed at we each knew about it. Interesting stuff.

Today's map...

 

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