Heading north on the 95 to Beatty to see old stuff. Probably overnight in Tonopah. There's a Big R store in Fallon (she's a crazyhorsechick, see) and I've got a sister in Gardnerville, friends in Reno.

We've got the 26th through the 1st budgeted for time....what do we wanna see, and where else do we wanna go? Guns, military surplus, stupid horse stuff are high on the list. Might go to Elko, just to say we did.

Suggestions?

Ammo cans in Beatty

If you make it to Elko keep your valuables locked up and out of sight.

Since your she is a horse person she needs to stop at Capriolas it has been around for a looong time and if she does make sure you bring a shit ton of money.

Elko is more enjoyed for the views in the mountains than anything else otherwise it is close to the arm pit of the world.

Plenty of brothels along your route to visit also.

-  CAL Ranch Store in Carson City (very similar to Big R and you won't need to make it out to Fallon if you don't want to)

-  Virginia City is always fun and right now there are a lot of wild horses roaming along Geiger Grade in the Virginia Range that your wife would probably get a kick out of seeing.

-  Twin City Surplus in Reno is worth a look.  A lot of similarity to Hahn's in North Vegas for reference.

-  We could always see who may be up for a impromptu shoot at the Carson range on Sunday the 28th if that meets your schedule.  There may be a few folks that have some shooting related gifts from Santa to try out.

-  If you don't already have hotel reservations for Reno, let me know and I can get you a good deal, even for New Year's Eve.

West from Beatty you have Scotty's Castle which is very cool IMO. Maybe just a touch out or your way.

The old WW2 hangers at Tonopah Airport:
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tonopah_Air_Force_Base

Once it gets dark, drive up to the towns water tower and look southeast. Good light show sometimes

Dude.

Just throwing options out there. You and the woman could be swingers for all I know.

 

^ This.  V.C. is an awesome little town to visit.

I always stop at that Frontier Liquor/Gun store next to the Big R in Fallon.  
A six-pack of Shiner Bock, a Lo-Carb Monster, a box of .44 Special Hornady Critical Defense loads, and .338 250gr Sierra GameKings, all in the same shopping bag.

I like stopping in at the Ordnance Museum in Hawthorne, too.  Great stuff.

Best,
JBR

If you want a heckuva good dinner, stop at the Heyday Inn in Smith Valley Fri-Sun between 5:30-8:30pm.

Big R generally has crappy horse tack.  If she likes good stuff, swing through Elko and check out Capriolas.
Winnemucca has Tip's - similar to Capriolas, but smaller.
Carson City has a great used tack store - The Thrifty Equine.

Sorry, no help on anything other than horse stuff this morning.  

The Hawthorne Ordnance Museum would be on your way.

Lots of cool stuff there.  You should check it out.

So - we fo'd early on the 26th. North on the 95 from Vegas, and....

Halfway to Beatty is this Area 51 gas station which, apparently, has a whorehouse in the back. It was around 0700 and we were entertained by two women carrying bags of food into the 'rooms'. Both were early twenties, both looked like they had a rough night.

Beatty a little later: still asleep. The guy with all the .mil trailers and ammos cans was MIA. Shame, as he had some cool stuff out there.

Traveling north, one sees signs alleging more brothels on the sides of the road. None of them appear to have any vehicles or life in attendance, which is similar to 90% of the homes and businesses we'd see on the 95. Maybe they all went home for the holidays. Maybe the aliens got 'em.

Goldfield is, uh, different. I'm not really sure what supports living here, unless the mining is still going on. Slowing down was sufficient to see what we needed to see.

Tonopah in the daylight is pretty cool (only been through there at night before). Looking at the layout of the town speaks to it's mining history, boom and bust. The hotels stand in defiance of gravity, and in mute testimony to craftsmanship of that age. The newer - as in, within the last fifty years - buildings are empty, vandalized motels, restaurants and who-knows-what. The homes are literally built nearly atop one another, as the residence area scales the steep mountain, and reflect ingenious use of whatever was on hand to keep the cold and heat out.
A couple of antique/junk havens were well-stocked with cool stuff, and had nice people working in them.

You'll pass through a number of smaller, I-wondered-what-happened-here burgs astride the highway as you continue. Some mechanical junkpiles suggest mining, others a futile attempt at farming. Each shares the same proclamations of diners, groceries and gas stations open and ready for your business...which simply is not true.

On to Hawthorne, then. Needed fuel and food as it happened, since nothing was open since Tonopah anyway. Impressed by the hundreds of weapon revetments scattered about the south end of town; they looked much like the ones we used to see off the 84 up by Umatilla, WA. Diesel was cheaper here than back home in Nye County. We ate a pretty good meal at the casino restaurant, which was pretty plush and admirable sometime in the early 1980's or so. And I completely forgot about checking out the arms museum...my bad.

The 95 takes you out of town along the western shores of Lake Walker, which looks awfully nice. Not one soul was on the lake or even around it, likely due to the wind and snow flurries blowing in. We saw but one functioning business on that stretch of road by the lake, but a number of decent homes built further down toward the shores on terraced lots.

The above mentioned scenes of mystery and depression largely repeat themselves until one gets to Fallon. I kinda like this town; reminds me much of growing up in CA's Central Valley a half-century ago. We stayed at a pretty good motel and had a pretty good meal; we learned Fallon had exploded in population after the Navy drug about 10K personnel there when they moved Top Gun. The Big R Store was a profound disappointment to the Housewench - nowhere near as good as the ones in OR and ID.

But right next door: a liquor/gun store. Decent ammo prices, mostly Fudd stuff. Marvelous selection of bourbons and ryes.

Didn't see a single jet, Tom Cruise or any beach volleyball games. But, it was pretty cold outside.

Off the next morning to Carson City to see my sister and my niece; saw a couple wild horses and a few burros on the way. Drank coffee for hours and laughed at how smart her grandkids are, caught up on family stuff. We split around noon and checked out the antique/junk stores around Carson, which are plentiful.

We doubled back to the Virginia City cutoff and took Geiger Grade over the hill to my friend's place in north Reno. Wow...just wow. This was a Saturday, and Virginia City's road twists up to the most hilarious festooning of Silver Rush-era homes and businesses converted to overpriced photo ops and tourist mills I've ever seen. It was like driving through a County Fair broadway. You get to see some fantastic views and architecture at 3 mph, because there is NO PLACE LEFT TO PARK and everybody wants to anyway. Note: if it is snowing, do NOT drive on Geiger Grade.

As you leave VC, that road gets wider, somewhat less curvy and offers a gallery of random homes built by those burdened by more money than common sense. Seriously....the money paid by someone to have a D6 cut any of the individual roads to these homes is more than I've spent on every home I've ever owned. One must have been 10K square feet, with every square foot of roof in solar arrays...makes sense. That home had at least a 340 degree view of the Reno valley a few thousand feet below...breathtaking. But the house literally occupies 95% of the flat space on that mountain; I wouldn't go outside unless I was tied off to some part of the house. God knows how they make it to those homes when there's snow on the ground, but I guess they do.

Stayed at my friend's Reno home overnight; had a great dinner of candied ham and sweet potatoes, then a bottle of Dickel's was smitten. Got up the next day and fled south, back to the house.

Three days, two nights and 1025 miles. Saw some stuff we'd never seen before, saw some loved ones, but basically just drove places with the Housewench next to me. It was good.