Cathedral Gorge State Park

From Pioche we drove down a long hill for just a few miles and could see the thermometer adding another degree every mile or so, until we reached +10 at the entrance to Cathedral Gorge State Park.

The small visitor centre looked deserted, not a single car in the parking lot. It was probably not worth keeping it open in the winter, we figured. To our surprise, however, the doors were open – and the heat was on inside! Nobody was around to take our money or give information, but several brochures were there for the taking. Good! We could bring our cooler in here and have the breakfast we couldn’t get in Pioche. Bread, cheese and sliced turkey, plus a couple of oranges would sustain us through the first part of the day. Coffee I had been able to make in the motel room, so I was ready for anything.

Armed with a map of the hiking trails we drove the short distance to the fee station, happy that we could pay our dues after we had enjoyed the hospitality of the visitor centre. Here, too, the parking lot was completely empty. In the summer it must be a totally different story; the park has some magnificent scenery and nice camping facilities.

We had chosen a four-mile loop hike, long enough for a windy, cool day when we wanted to move on later. We bundled up, including hats and gloves, and, trusting the brightening sky, I left my rain jacket in the car and took my down vest instead. 

All around us rose the golden walls of the gorge, the spires truly reminiscent of a cathedral. Erosion had created the most fantastic shapes. We followed the half-mile nature hike, where signs explain about the flora and fauna of the area, to the picnic area. From there we started our loop hike along sculpted walls. The rain that fell the night before must have been heavy enough to make it muddy in many places, even though it is quite sandy. We had to step carefully to avoid the stickiest mud where we could. Soon a sign directed us to keep walking in the washout; sign posts would show us the way. Here, the sand was firm for the most part, like the sand on an ocean beach where the tide has recently receded. This was much better to walk on. The rushing water had created beautiful art work with the different coloured sands. 

After some time, however, we had to leave the winding draw and were back on the trail, which here, on the opposite side of the gorge, was not as muddy, covered with small gravel for the most part. There were small caves in the spired walls, but visitors were encouraged to stay on the trails. Tracks in the sand showed the presence of some small animals: pack rats and kangaroo rats make their homes here, but also coyotes, desert foxes and cougars, many lizards, plus a multitude of birds, including golden eagles. At least we didn’t have to worry about snake encounters today …

After a couple of hours we reached our car again, cleaned the mud off our hiking boots as best we could, and headed for the city of Las Vegas where we had decided to spend the night for convenience’s sake. 

From Wells to Pioche

When travelling like this, from one place to the next, it happens very quickly that I’m behind in my reporting. Already we are in Las Vegas, far away from Pioche where we spent the night before last. 

We left Wells on Monday morning, continuing on Hwy. 93, the ‘scenic route’, curious what expected us on the next stretch of the way. We weren’t really fixed on one particular town to stay overnight; Ely, closer, had a variety of motels to choose from, while Pioche, which sounded a little more interesting, had at least a few. It would be nice to get as far as Pioche so that we could stop at Cathedral Gorge state park earlier the next day rather than later.

It turned out to be not the greatest day for a drive along a scenic route: low hanging clouds and intermittent drizzle often obscured the view, and it was so windy that we weren’t much inclined to stop anywhere for any length of time. Thus we kept driving, the temperature hovering around +5, passed through Ely early enough that we didn’t consider staying the night. 

The sky got darker and darker, a gloomy end-of-the-world atmosphere had taken hold, and in the middle of the afternoon it felt as if it was close to nightfall. We were still at a rather high elevation and crossed a couple of summits around 2,000 m. Thankfully it wasn’t quite as cold as in Montana and Idaho, or we would surely have run into trouble with slippery roads with the constant drizzle.

It is a long and lonely stretch of road, devoid of houses and people, which, in the sunshine or at least with a bit of light, would have seemed like a wonderful thing. In vain did we look for Major’s Place, indicated by a small dot on the map; maybe it was the one house we passed shortly before the road branched and we had to turn right again to stay on Hwy. 93. A sign informed us that there would be no gas for 81 miles, which would have made more sense if there had been a fuel station to fill up before embarking on that stretch of road.

If possible it got darker yet, and, to add to the discomfort, it got foggy, though not for too long. The green mileage signs were counting down: 69, 49, 29 miles to Pioche. Nine miles. Almost there. But then the fog returned, and this time it didn’t disappear but got ever denser. At the last moment we saw the sign ‘Pioche, Business Route’ and ‘Pioche, Truck Route’, but by the time we had processed the information I had crawled by, no chance to turn around. Blue and red blinking lights appeared ahead: a police car, with a big truck right after, trying to back up off the road. It was that bad! Once the trucker had completed the manoeuver the policeman waved us on, and I asked him where the turnoff into town was. ‘About a quarter mile’, was the answer – yet I missed it again, although I watched for it carefully. 

Very slowly we finally drove up the hill through the small town, street lamps barely able to light the sidewalks, hardly anyone around. Johann inquired at a couple of places about a room: there seemed to be plenty. We settled for the ‘Motherlode Motel’, the cheapest of the three, very clean, with a big room. If the chef hadn’t been away for the week we even would have had the option of ordering supper or breakfast. We were just really, really glad that we didn’t have to go any further; it would have been a scary thing to do under these conditions. 

 

Herbert Hoover is reported to have stayed here at one time

Not much is left of the former glory

Pioche, a mining town, once considered one of the worst in the west where, according to one report, 72 people died a violent death before one died of natural causes, had sounded like an interesting place to visit. What we found in the morning, however, was a place mostly deserted, obviously not much used to winter visitors, and the cold wind tugging at our clothes when we went in search for a place to have breakfast didn't help. The only place in town to have breakfast was closed on Tuesdays, so we walked back to our motel and packed up, ready for some hiking in Cathedral Gorge, longing for a bit more warmth which we hoped to find there, since the elevation is a fair bit lower already.

 

Twelve Mile Hotsprings, Wells, Nevada, or How to (Not) Cross A River

After a hearty breakfast – not in the old town centre where no restaurant could be found, but in a casino restaurant at the intersection of the two highways - we embarked on another hotspring adventure. Johann had found the ‘Twelve Mile’ or ‘Bishop Creek’ hotsprings when he looked for ‘natural hotsprings’ on the internet, and this one, too, sounded as if it would not be overrun by people, even though the hike was described as  a lot less strenuous than the last one. A good mile of walking along a flat road – that couldn’t be too bad. I had read a few reviews, and it sounded as if the place was busier in the summer months, but in the winter, when the hot water made it just as attractive, hardly anyone found their way here. 

The description was a bit sketchy, but one of the reviewers had posted a photo of the turnoff from the road. We were to go across the railway tracks, turn left, and basically follow the road for about ten miles until a gravel road turned off to the right. There was mention of potholes, which might make the last stretch difficult to traverse for small cars, probably much aggravated by the conditions in late winter, but we were looking forward to a walk anyway after all the hours spent in the car the day before. 

We followed the narrow paved road out of town, hills to our right, sage brush flats to our left, until we came to the turnoff. There was no chance that we could drive any further, even with our all-wheel drive vehicle, so we parked at the turnoff and started walking along the dirt road, covered with grainy, mushy snow, towards the hills where, supposedly, we would find the hot springs eventually. The sky was grey, low clouds almost touching the ground, it was windy and a thin drizzle fell intermittently. Not the greatest day, admittedly, but it felt good to walk. Soon the mushy snow gave way to mud, and we had difficulty finding places to step. Time to move up on the hillside a little and walk among the sage brush, as others had done before us, judging by the tracks – not many, but a few. Cows and coyotes also had chosen that route, while some mud-hungry pickup or ATV driver(s) had chosen to chew up the road. 

The hills closed in more and more on both sides, and the vegetation changed. It now included juniper and piñon pine, plus a few shrub oak, and rocks jutted out from the rugged hillside, some reminding me of the lava formations we had seen in yesterday’s video.

After about half an hour we reached the end of the road: the small river that had been to our right for much of the way barred the way, the ford impassable after yesterday’s rain that added to the runoff. The description had mentioned a broken down bridge, no longer in use, from where it would only be about a hundred metres or so to the basin. There it was, sturdy at one time, the iron frame still standing, but little left of the boards covering it. 

 One look at the decrepit structure was enough for me to know that I would never dare to go across that bridge, which, at the moment, seemed to be the only way to reach the other side of the river and thus the hotsprings.  ‘Come on’, Johann encouraged me, ‘just hold on to the iron railing, you can do it. You’ll be so proud of yourself.’ This time, however, my pride was no match for my fear of the cold rushing water beneath me. My mind was made up: I had had a nice hike and was perfectly happy to spend some time in these hills without reaching the basin of warm water. 

Johann had no such qualms. In no time at all he had crossed the bridge and was on his way, the warm water a strong propellant. I walked down to the ford and found that there was another way of crossing: a board laid across the river where it was not too wide, supported by a cement slab in the middle. For a moment I thought I could manage this more easily than the bridge, but right where I had to start the crossing water was running over the board. The thought that I could slip and fall in, the water just above freezing, the air temperature a mere +5, with no change of clothes before I reached the car in a half hour walk quickly convinced me that this was no alternative either. I watched the swirling water for a while, then climbed up on the hillside to have a good view from above and waited for Johann’s return, not regretting for a moment that I hadn’t been able to come along. 

After some time he rounded the corner and crossed the bridge back to my side. As expected nobody else had been there, and he had enjoyed the soak. Due to the strong runoff, however, the water was hot only in the top layer, and only close to where the hot spring flowed out of the rock wall. The cold water found its way underneath the hot water, so it was only warm enough when he floated. During other times of the year, Johann said, the water temperature would likely have been perfect. For me, too, a different time of year would have been better: with only a little less flow of the river I would have been fine to cross using the board, or wade through if it had been warm enough, for that matter.

Once we left the protection of the hills to both sides the wind had a go at us again, and the drizzle was still falling. We were happy to get back to the protection of our car and be on our way south again on highway 93.