The Loneliness of the long distance driver.

OK , so it was actually Runner and not Driver but then I think even Forrest Gump would have struggled running down the US 50.

So why all this about the Loneliest Road in America, well, the section between the city of Reno , Nevada and the town of Ely in Nevada, has been called that for the unbelievable straight and in most cases very bland road that you drive down , in temperatures of in excess of 100 Degrees in summer and with snow in the winter. It is a semi - arid land and although there are pockets of heavy farming with some great grazing for the cattle it also has places that you wonder how anyone ever survived but they did

 

The US 50 is described as the backbone of America and it from east to west coast -- some 3000 miles in all.

 This is the section that they talk about being lonely and so it is with amazement that there was this burning desire for man to conquer these desolate places and hence why they came up with these fellows below---

 

 

Where we are now in Ely, was first started out as a pony express and stagecoach stop and has gone through a number highs and but more later --- back to our drive on this Lonely road.

 

Here are some images that we took along this 300 + mile drive yesterday---- They say lonely and it has been described by some

 as completely bland , boring , uninteresting and many other similar descriptions but for me and my traveling buddy here, we see so many interesting things that are all future memories for us, such as----

 

The Sand Mountain-- it is obscure that it just is there with no real reason-- the only other example of this that we have seen was similar near to Lake Havasau

These are salt lakes that are being worked for the salt extraction--

Now that is a road that the Romans would have been proud of --

You cant see from this but the mountains in the background definitely looked like they were floating and like they didn't belong there -- reminded me of Krull , where the mountain appears and then disappears--- it's ok , too much sun

 Yep, that is a road

Even the locals can poke a bit of the whole thing--

Amazing amount of keeping the heritage which is important

 

Well we survived--- I think

And then we get to today where people still have this ability to destroy the landscape and the environment for the materials within certain areas and whereby they must have thought that the mining for Copper in the town (city) of Ely had finished and yet there was another Boom in 2005 and away they went again.

Not only does this leave the handling of the millions of tons of the Overburden and bringing some kind of environmentally acceptability back but what happens with these incredible holes in the earth has yet to be sorted.

 

This is Ely and on the outskirts are the mines that look like this----

 

 

A bit naïve I suppose to think that we could possibly have a plan agreed to deal with this when the License to dig is issued.

 

And while Mr President applauds himself on the work to deal with Global Warming that he has introduced -- maybe a look at how environmentally friendly it is for the USA to close down its smelting plants and then by road rail and sea they ship the Copper Ore for smelting over to Japan -- real good work there Mr Obama--- and before anyone jumps all over me , I actually like the guy and the work he has done.

 

 

Well that's it for this leg and yes we did survive it -- not sure who Eggy is but he also did that--- Now for the next leg--- MOAB here we come.