Hwy 95 Las Vegas to Reno

One of our friends had been to the town of Beatty and she commented that it was a sad, sad town. Well, that’s where we were heading but not because it was Beatty. We were heading that way because it was on the route we were going to take if we wanted to visit the Rhyolite Ghost Town. We weren’t really sure whether we would be staying there but we still had to drive through it. Other than being close to Rhyolite and Death Valley, Beatty is well known for their hot mineral baths. That was an option. There is a little RV park a few miles north of town that rents out private mineral bath rooms. The charge is $5 for the hour and the private room comes with a dressing area and your own mineral water hot tub. We had to think about it but other than stopping to take a look decided to bypass it.

By the time we arrived in Beatty, we were glad we had decided not to stay. Unless you were intent on driving into Death Valley from there or soaking in the mineral baths, there didn’t appear much going on in Beatty. Even some of the RV parks looked sad. If we had decided to stay, we would have DEFINITELY chosen the Beatty RV Park. It looked to be the nicest one of all. However, we drove through the town and definitely agreed with Loralie that Beatty was a sad, sad town.

As we continued our trip north on Hwy 95, there were several other towns including Mina, Goldfield and Luning that we thought were also sad towns. At some time in the past, these towns must have been hopping but the life no longer seemed to be in them. We thought they were falling apart and in desperate need of repair. Tonopah was at an elevation of about 6100 feet and appeared to be thriving. Hawthorne was at the edge of gorgeous Walker Lake and also seemed to be a healthy little town.

The route from Las Vegas to Reno was a nice route. We thoroughly enjoyed traveling the back road and not on the freeway. The only issue we thought was the constant climbing. We’re sure the road never went downhill even though it must have. The terrain was high desert but the closer we got to the Reno area the more obvious the mountains to the west became. We even traveled through some green pastures. What a difference from the desert of Arizona where we had spent most of the winter.

One of the reasons for heading this way was because we had never done it. We also wanted to visit Virginia City. Remember the Cartwrights? Well, as we sit at the base of the mountains now and rock with the wind, we have decided that’s going to have to be put off for another day and another trip maybe. If we’re rocking here, the park manager warned we’d really be rocking on the mountain. Oh well …. we know not everything works out as planned.

We’ll probably hang around here for a couple more nights waiting for the wind to head on East. The terrain will definitely change even more from this point on. Tuesday was a 441 mile day. It was long and we were very tired. No ... we were actually exhausted. After we had decided not to stay in Beatty, we set the GPS for the Hawthorne Elks and that was to be the night's destination. Instead we forged on and went the additional 133 miles to Reno and I'm so glad we did. There are a couple areas between there and here that warn of high crosswinds. Travel on Tuesday was a little windy but had we waited until Wednesday it would have been horrendous. Sometimes things do work out.

Travel safe everyone.