We stopped for lunch in Elko, NV. We ate a local Mexican restaurant called Sergio’s. It was pretty good food. I had a pork burrito smothered in green chili. On the way out of town, we came across a California Trail Museum. Wendy loves anything about the pioneers, so we stopped in. It’s still under construction, but what they had was really nice.
We made out way to Reno, NV where we spent the night. Wendy found a $18 hotel room in the Sands Regency Casino. First thing I noticed when we walked into the place was the cigarette smoke. In UT and CO, I had gotten used to there not being people who smoked indoors. It seemed everyone in the gambling hall was smoking. It was annoying. The hotel clerk told us we had one of the “newly renovated” rooms. Maybe I had my hopes set too high, but the room still looked like the 80’s. Not that it looked worn out, but the styling was just not current. That night we thought we’d experience the casino buffet meals that we’ve heard about. The Internet showed the best rated one being at Tucan Charlie’s at a Casino called The Atlantis. We headed that way and passed all manner of Adult entertainment establishments and other old “dirty” looking places. I can’t say that driving around this part of town made me want to return here. Anyway we made it to the Atlantis. I was once again greeted by cigarette smoke. I’ve decided that I’ve taken for granted that my state doesn’t allow smoking in restaurants. Unfortunately, the buffet was set to close in 30 minutes. What good is a buffet if you only get 30 minutes to tear it appart? That and it was $19. So we settled on one of the other restaurants in there.
Overall we were not impressed with Reno. I felt like its the trailer park version of Las Vegas. Nothing really seems new or nice. Seeing as how I think that gambling is like a tax for people who are bad at math, the casino part of the town had no draw to me either. Thankfully, we were only there for one night.
The next morning we found a city park in Reno to eat our breakfast at. We had brought cereal, fruit, OJ, and milk so we could eat a reasonable meal once a day. After breakfast we stopped at the Sierra Trading Post in Reno. We found a few good deals, like my replacement Chaco sandals for $50 as well as some new shoes and socks for Wendy. I tried to find a good daypack, but I couldn’t find anything that was really tugging at my heart strings.
On to the mountains. We began heading up into the mountains, and the plains/desert area below us became a beautiful forest. The mountains here in the Cascades are much more lush than the Rocky/Wasactch Mountains that I’m used to. There’s also the Redwood tree here.
We stopped in a town called Indian Valley for lunch at this little shop that advertised breakfast, lunch, and espresso. I didn’t see the sign hanging above the register when we ordered our food until after we had sat down, but I should have been more observant. The sign read “You want you order when?…” So I understand how small towns work when it comes to restaurants. Working at Philmont exposed me to that. At one of the tables in the cafe, there were about 8 little old ladies chatting away having lunch. I’m sure this is their big social hour. The staff seemed to be struggling to get all the orders filled for such a “big group” (their words) that I’m sure comes there regularly. Why they can’t fulfill the needs of a regular group like that, I don’t know. We waited a long time for our food. It was a simple order of a ham and cheese sandwich and salad plus 1/2 sandwich.
After we had been waiting a while, Wendy began watching the staff to see if there was any hint of when we’d get our order. Wendy told me she had watched and noticed that it had been 20 minutes since any food had been brought out. There were also two other couples in the restaurant besides the old lady club and us. At some point, our food came out, but I don’t understand what took so long. Over 1/2 hour for our food. We were not real happy with the experience. Neither was one of the other couples that voiced their complaint to the staff. In an example of why you don’t piss off restaurant workers, we noticed that the couple that had complained was sitting outside eating (once they got their food), and one of the staff was sitting on a bench right next to them smoking a cigarette. Coincidence, I doubt it.
We continued our drive on through the beautiful mountains. We found our way to Lassen Volcanic National Park. It was a beautiful little park. Unfortunately, the snow this year was higher than normal, and the road that goes all the way through the park was not completely open. We did drive up a ways to the trailhead for Bumpass Hell. The park is known for its volcanic and thermal features. There were some fumerals and boiling springs that we were able to see along the way. The scenery on our abreviated drive was very nice. The temperature up there was also very pleasant.
We ended up in Redding, CA where we stayed at a hotel called the Ramada Limited. Very limited. It was a very basic place, but all we needed. Wendy thought this was the worst one we stayed at the entire trip. For supper, we headed off to a Pizza place called Angelo’s Pizza. The folks on the Internet had given it good reviews. We ordered a Polynesian pizza, which was a variation on a Hawaiian pizza. It was pretty good, the crust was really good. When I went to get some tea to drink, I noticed it was empty. This was 8 PM on a Firday night. I asked the waitress if they were going to make any more and she gave a very frank “No” with a look that said ‘Are you crazy?’. I was taken aback a little, but nothing I could do about it. I’ve learned that you don’t give the wait staff a hard time until after you have all your food.
The next morning we weren’t sure what all we were going to do, so we just decided we’d figure it out as we went along. It all turned out really well. We stopped in the town of Shasta. It was an old mining town from the California gold rush days. There’s still some ruins left over from buildings from the 1850’s. They were brick buildings as the wooden buildings that had been built first had all burned up. These were the brick walls that had been built way back then. There were some volunteers that were helping to staff the park there. They were very friendly and gave some interesting tid bits of history. The couple that were running the old bakery were really nice to us. They gave us some lemonade from their Miner’s Lemons that they had grown and some home made bread. We spent a couple of hours looking around the old town and the museum. We had no idea that that town would be there, but we enjoyed the experience.