We saw several adventure bikes in Jarbidge when we went through. That area of Northern Nevada was amazing and surprising. We never knew that type of landscape was in Nevada.
I think the saloon in Genoa, NV might take issue with that “oldest saloon in NV” claimWe continue on day two of the NVBDR. This day was kind of a boring slog because most of the track basically followed major highways and wasn't all that out in middle of no where. That doesn't mean there wasn't things to see. First thing, as promised, was a Christmas tree next to the track. This is on point because we were in fact going over Christmas Tree Pass.
20210719_193701 by Wayne Larson, on Flickr
I have mixed feelings about this type of thing. On one hand it is garbage that could harm the wildlife but it is a bit of fun to see along the trail. We did end up leaving it but just before leaving camp we did clean up the mess the previous guests had left. This is my biggest pet peeve. Clean up your crap before you go. Luckily there wasn't a whole lot of stuff to pick up as we've seen other sites that are basically a land fill.
20210720_080602 by Wayne Larson, on Flickr
The next stop along the way is the small town of Searchlight, NV. My wife found that there is an abandoned mine that you can get pretty close to. Many of the mines that we drove past had fencing up or were very difficult to get to so this looked to be a fun little side trip. There are several structures still standing including the mine head and the four stamp mill.
20210720_094003 by Wayne Larson, on Flickr
20210720_093820 by Wayne Larson, on Flickr
20210720_093924 by Wayne Larson, on Flickr
After a bit of exploring it was time to go and make it to our second fuel stop (forgot to mention our first stop was in Bullhead City) in the town of Primm. To get there most of the trek was along the Joshua Tree highway or Hwy 164 and it is very on point for the name. We thought there were a lot of Joshua trees in the National Park but we drove through forests of them along this route. We got a good look at them since we were still aired down to 25psi so we kept it to around 45mph.
20210720_104523(0) by Wayne Larson, on Flickr
20210720_104521 by Wayne Larson, on Flickr
We also dropped down onto one of the solar collector plants in the area. Instead of using PV cells to directly convert sunlight into electricity they collect the sun's heat with giant mirror arrays with a central collector. Pretty cool to see.
20210720_105317 by Wayne Larson, on Flickr
I said that this was kind of a boring drive and the animals agree. Our dachshund Mya was not impressed and napped most of the time.
20210720_110626 by Wayne Larson, on Flickr
Adventure Cat likes to literally chill on our small cooler. You also get to see my awesome day glow Speed Gate shirt. I won't be missed with that thing on.
20210720_110630 by Wayne Larson, on Flickr
Next we stopped in the old mining town (see a trend here?) of Goodsprings. This is home to the oldest working saloon in the state which started in 1913 to service all of the miners and cattle ranchers that were in the area. As a bonus, apparently you can have your own whiskey barrel out back to age.
20210720_142256 by Wayne Larson, on Flickr
20210720_142308 by Wayne Larson, on Flickr
20210720_141808 by Wayne Larson, on Flickr
It was getting late in the day and we wanted to make it to Pahrump for our next gas stop. On the way through pretty desolate land we came across a sudden ravine carved into the landscape. On closer inspection down inside we noticed that there were some kind of religious relicts and old rooms carved into the sides. This turned out to be Cathedral Canyon where Roland Wiley built this back in 1972. At the time we didn't realize it was that recent since the state of it now was pretty poor. It was still an odd thing to see in the middle of the desert.
20210720_155815 by Wayne Larson, on Flickr
20210720_155818 by Wayne Larson, on Flickr
After getting fuel in Pahrump it was getting time to find a camp site. We didn't have anything noted on our maps so we decided to head out along the track and see what we could find. After about an hour we came upon a burst of green and went to check it out. This area turned out to be a great place for mesquite to grow and it gave us a little shelter from the wind and sun. After some turns through the woods we found a nice turn out and set up camp. Adventure Cat did his best to supervise from up high in the shade of the tent. This would turn out to be our hottest night of the whole trip (around 95F when we went to bed) which is weird because our track would eventually take us through part of Death Valley NP but I'm getting ahead of myself. I also think that the weather gods were messing with us because since it was so hot we decided to take the rain fly off of the tent so we could use the roof windows for some star gazing and letting the heat out. More on the rain fly later.
20210721_075548 by Wayne Larson, on Flickr
20210720_192158 by Wayne Larson, on Flickr
20210720_184133 by Wayne Larson, on Flickr
20210721_081115 by Wayne Larson, on Flickr
20210720_190940 by Wayne Larson, on Flickr
That was the end of day two on the trail. The next day we drive through rain in Death Valley, visit a glass bottle house, do some actual rock crawling in a spider canyon, and camp near a creepy cabin in the woods.
Lies! Does not exist.
Yes it is. Actually Genoa is the oldest settlement in Nevada. About 45 minutes from our houseI think the saloon in Genoa, NV might take issue with that “oldest saloon in NV” claim
Amazing area! We stayed in Minden last year for a motorcycle rally. The roads and scenery around Lake Tahoe and Virginia City were awesome. We even spent a day riding through Yosemite. Such a great trip!
There's a trip planned on the Overland Bound forum right now. My buddy @tjZ06 did a portion of the IDBCR last year as well
I have done the NMBDR and loved it. This one looks even better. Is there a time of year that this can be done without hot weather? I get enough of that here in Texas. Also, what is the slide out you have in the rear bumper? Thanks for sharing an awesome trip and write up.
It's tough to do the entire thing without some hot weather. If you go too early in the year the northern sections still have snow. My guess would be late fall before the snow flies is your best bet.
