Day 6 – Austin, Nevada to Marin, California

We awoke quite bleary-eyed from a restless night’s sleep. We were both ready to head home to a hot bath and to our own mattresses and pillows. We purchased a couple of coffees to go from the same diner (the only one) where we got the ice cream the night before. Unfortunately, the coffee was not of the same caliber, but it was hot and we really needed the caffeine. We weren’t really looking forward to more of highway 50, still being sick of our cds, and drove the first hour or so in relative silence. Then we saw an antelope on the side of the road which lit up our morning. He was a beautiful animal, so unlike anything we’d seen, and we wished we could have pulled over. But we were going over one of those mountain passes, with no shoulders or pullouts, so we had to drive on. He became something mystical in our short memories, having disappeared as suddenly as he’d appeared in our sights. We longed to see more, but he was the sole antelope of our trip.

An hour down the road we came across the shoe tree. Apparently someone started a hot trend by throwing a pair of shoes up into this tree some years ago, and now there must be thousands hanging from its limbs, as well as lying at the base of the trunk. There was nothing around it for miles but open range, which was probably why the Nevada department of transportation decided to build a car pullout there, to mark the spot and make it easier for RVs to get their photo souvenir. Even though we were acutely focused on getting home at this point, we pulled over to nab our shot. It reminded me of the bra fence in New Zealand - who knows how this kind of tradition gets started, and why so many join in. It does seem to be a middle-of-nowhere phenomenon, though.

The rest of our trip down Highway 50 was uneventful. When we reached Fallon, the biggest town on that stretch, we stopped by the county historical museum to get our passports stamped, and were pleasantly surprised by the interesting exhibits. It was definitely a worthwhile stop, if only to validate that the rocks we'd been given were indeed dinosaur gastrolites - they even had some in one of the museum displays. If we were to drive this stretch of road again, I'd either stay in Fallon, or drive right through the whole highway in one day and stay in Truckee. I was hoping to stop in Truckee to check out the cute shops, but it started snowing again. It was coming down so thick we decided we'd better get over Donner Pass before chains were required. I hadn't planned for snow at all on this trip, as weather at home had been so warm and sunny, and didn't realize how much of the time we'd be up over 7 or 8,000 feet in elevation. The car made through all of the weather we met, but we didn't end up having much opportunity to go "topless". So we continued down the road through driving rain in Sacramento, and back home again to sunny Marin. Contented to be back in our own space, take a long hot bath and dream on our own pillows of more happy trails.