As we left Elko, we initially chased and then passed a Union Pacific freight coming out of Elko Yard. We saw no other trains today, but several track maintenance workers on the tracks.
Just west of Elko is the California Trail Interpretive Center, about which I've written in the past. If you're planning to come to Westercon 74 in Tonopah from the east via I-80 and US-95, I hope you budget some time to stop here and see this interesting museum of the settlement of the west.
I was very taken with how the snow-covered mountains beyond Carlin were lit as we came through.
Between Winnemucca and Lovelock, Star Peak was covered with clouds, and the weather looked very heavy ahead of us, but it turned out to be only light rain.
Even with frequent rest stops, we made excellent time because the roads were mostly dry. If you do take that I-80 trip from the east to Tonopah, here's where you turn south toward Fallon and Tonopah.
Around 2:30, only around five or six hours after we left Elko, we rolled up in front of our house, roughly 1130 miles after we left.
"Restarting" the house was helped by it apparently not having been too cold during the four days we were gone. I took advantage of the situation by digging out the ashes and cleaning the fireplace glass before building a new fire. It will, however, take a while to get the fireplace warmed up again.
This trip shows us that, using Elko as the midway point between Fernley and the Salt Lake City area, we can easily make a four-day trip like this for attractions in the SLC area, even if I should try to stretch my time off by taking half-days on the weekdays as I did on the Loscon-SMOFCon trip. We may do that in the future, as there is at least one more train-related attraction there that we want to visit someday.
