A desert hot spring adventure!

   I am still basking in the warm fuzzies of spending a weekend somewhere cool, hence the urge to write all about it. Part of this feeling comes from an increasing realization of what an incredible place I live in: not only is Tahoe so beautiful in itself, but a drive of 4 hours in any direction can bring one into completely different surroundings: ocean surf, redwood rainforest, glaciated volcanoes, jagged granite peaks, and of course the vast desert covering much of Nevada. The last one is admittedly the most foreign to me, having grown up in the soggy climate of the Pacific Northwest and preferring to be somewhat near water and/or mountains at most times. The beauty of the desert has been growing on me over the years, however, beginning with a week in Death Valley for a geology field course at Sierra Nevada College in 2008. Spending frequent weekends on the eastern side of the Sierra eased me further into the drier side of the mountains, but more for the climbing than anything else. Through it all the hostile climate, tenacious plant life, and colors and textures of the desert continue to draw me in and beg for further exploration.

Death Valley in 2008

   With this unusually dry winter in Tahoe and my inability to climb rocks as of yet, Kit and I were contemplating getting out of town for a weekend but not quite able to settle on the ideal destination. Soaking in hot springs was the best we could come up with, but Bridgeport or Mammoth didn't sound quite so awesome without climbing. Indecision reigning, I pulled out our Nevada hot spring book and flipped through it looking for some place new and different but not too far away. It turns out that the Black Rock Desert, of Burning Man festival fame, is home to quite a number of hot springs around its edges. Our friends Katie and Ryan had similar ideas of a fun weekend so they jumped on board and our last-minute hot spring hopping adventure commenced! 

   I'm going to note at this time that we are no longer traveling in a camper van, which Kit had sold to buy a smaller work truck. Having spent the majority of the past 4 years as a dedicated van fanatic (and Kit even longer with his old red van) this became quite a shock. So used to having everything we might possibly need already packed up to go, including extra warm clothes and bedding, this felt like a real "gaper" car camping experience: I had bought a camper shell for my truck in the fall, mainly to keep from having to shovel 500 lbs of cement snow out of the bed after every storm, so was not too worried about replacing the missing back window. Staying warm at night was the first thought coming to mind, but it had not occurred to either of us that driving on that dusty dry lake bed was going to do just what one might think--cover everything with copious amounts of dust. Because we didn't camp at the Black Rock springs across the playa this was more of a nuisance than anything else, but I can only imagine if we did. Dusty dishes, food, sleeping bags, pretty much everything. I don't know how people manage at Burning Man!

Looking back at the playa from Black Rock hot springs; Trego hot springs were near the farthest left peak.

   Our first stop was at the Nixon general store to grab a map and ask a few questions about the springs and driving on the playa. We decided to try the Frog Pond springs first, closest to town up a dirt road on the eastern side of the playa. That one was occupied by some aging naked hippies, and also not overly hot, more bathtub warm. Aside from the water temperature we felt a little awkward there so we moved just a bit farther north to the Trego Hot Ditch, right beside the railroad tracks where we found a tattooed older man shooting guns with his kids. He turned out to be pretty cool, a Burning Man employee for 13 years living in Fernley, NV, and they thoughtfully packed up and left when we were getting into the hot springs to leave us alone for the evening. A spectacular sunset spread across the sky, and the springs were the perfect temperature for the most part so we stayed in for probably close to 3 hours. It would have been wise to cook dinner first and then soak, because getting out and making food led to being absolutely frozen--we had forgotten all about bringing firewood to help stay warm. Kit and I had also just bought an old Coleman white gas camp stove and it took some figuring out to get it burning hot enough to cook the pasta and thaw frozen sauce. Meanwhile Katie and Ryan ate instant curry vegetables and minute rice...a much better choice than our meal for speedy preparation.

   It felt like nearly an hour went by and we finally had dinner, piling into Ryan's truck with the heat blasting to warm our frozen fingers and toes. It was similarly cold in Moab last fall but then we had the luxurious van to cook in, plenty of fire wood and many extra clothes; we managed by making fires every night and wearing insulated overalls and multiple puffy jackets. This trip would not have been so chilly had we prepared a little better, and maybe even had a fire to warm up by. Live and learn!

   As we warmed up and ate food, a freight train roared by only 30 feet away, the second one in a few hours. Crawling into our sleeping bags in the back of my truck I tried to fully absorb Pork Chop into mine but the lazy sack of taters wouldn't budge, so he wound up being halfway in with some jackets on top of him. Despite the low of 17 degrees I stayed warm enough and fell into a sound sleep, but was jolted awake by another train blasting its horn and rumbling down the tracks. Porky and I both about jumped out of our skin--a friendly reminder that it might have been wise to camp a bit farther away from the tracks for a peaceful slumber. This was repeated approximately every 2-3 hours throughout the night until the sun came up and we dozed lazily waiting for the temperature to rise.

Heading toward Black Rock Point

   Morning still held a chill as we ate breakfast and packed up, deciding to explore northward across the playa to the Black Rock hot spring below Black Rock Point. We didn't quite make it over to the main road crossing but wound up following a set of tracks that looked to be going in the right direction. A few stops to spin donuts in the dust and some attempted speed records later (boys will be boys), we wound our way through the dunes at the edge of the desert still following the tracks which we hoped were going the right way. We hit what looked like more of a main route and it led us right to the springs and a large group of campers. A party of students from UNR had spent the night at this hot spring; a giant pool with a dock jutting into it and the extremely hot source at one end. We hopped right in and enjoyed a beer, taking in the warmth and the expansive view from our position slightly above the lake bed. Hands down this was my favorite pool, being so far out there and so perfectly hot. One to remember for next time! Its only drawback is not being accessible when the playa is wet, so perhaps (and hopefully) not for the rest of this winter. We ate lunch and relaxed here, reluctant to pack up and head back to civilization, but eventually bid farewell with a promise to return again.

The pool at Black Rock Hot Spring

   I'll confess that part of the allure of the desert is the possibility to explore so much new territory, and that the insidious thought of riding a dirt bike has crept into my mind for this purpose: more efficient and maneuverable than a truck, and faster at covering large distances than a bicycle... Ack! Blasphemy!! On second thought, it may not be so bad, so long as I balance it out with plenty of human-powered adventures. Not motocross racing, just putzing around and finding really cool stuff in hard to get to places. I promise I won't try anything stupid! However, that thought will still stay merely a thought for the immediate future, because I'm not in a position to even think about buying new toys right now. On the other hand Kit is already shopping for a camper to put on his old work truck, which I would not exactly complain about. Regardless of that it's snowing right now so there's a good chance we won't be returning to Black Rock any time too soon. No need to get stuck in the mud out there! 

   

Goodbye and good riddance, 2013!

   It's a little bit late, but there, I said it. Farewell to the most challenging year of my life thus far, even though it could have been worse. Yes, there were some very good times, and so many valuable lessons learned, but so much time was spent making lemonade from all those dang lemons that I'm going to need a whole lot of vodka to be able to finish it all off... heh heh. Moving on!

   Even though the new year began in exactly the same way the old one ended--in bed at my parents' house with an ice pack on my head, recovering from an overzealous walk with my mom--it still feels like I'm finally going to get a fresh start. Never mind that I'm still spending 2-3 days a week icing my head and resting, and still haven't ridden other than 5 minutes on the trainer now and then. I'm just getting more positive energy from something somewhere and it's helping me pull myself together a little bit. Physical therapy has been helpful, especially the craniosacral sessions, though progress is slow and tension in my neck and upper back have made it hard to sleep the past few nights. It's just weird how my neck is feeling worse and worse lately after things seemed to be improving so well for a while last month. I'll get on a roll of doing my PT exercises a few days in a row and then feel horrible again for a few days, stopping all momentum and going back to moping around the house.

      In the continued absence of lots of exercise and playing outdoors I have been making an attempt at getting back into music, picking up the bass again and trying to remember everything I had down before, following at least couple of years of sheepishly ignoring the instrument. Also continuing my quest to figure out the 5-string old time banjo even though it turns my brain inside out--it sounds so cool to play it right! I'm hoping to get back into jamming with friends, meeting with a group of musical women at a friends house weekly, and getting Kit to pull out the accordion to play along. It would be fun to get some tunes down well enough to play at an open mic night sometime.

   As for the awesomeness to come: we're moving to the new house in South Lake Tahoe in March, into a whole new area to explore. Raising chickens, rabbits, and planting a real vegetable garden. I doubt I'll be able to grow enough to live off of but it would be nice to have more of the things we like to eat all the time. Now I'm waiting for the seed catalog to arrive in the mail so I can start planning things out. 

   I'm completely switching from a focus on downhill racing to enduro; something I've been considering for a couple of years but wanting to get "just one more season" of DH in, to see if I can compete at a World Cup level. Now I'm totally over it...for the time being. I'm going to miss DH quite a bit and the totally cool people I've met at the races, but I'm REALLY excited to get back into a more endurance-oriented racing format and have some fun with it. I don't have a race calendar sorted out yet, but am hoping to start racing in June with the California Enduro Series and go from there. Depending on how that goes I may try to do a few North American Enduro Tour races but we'll have to wait and see. 

   Fortuitously, I'm going to have a super rad new bike from Ellsworth to ride this season and I am SO excited for this!! That revelation came about something like this via text message: 

Lindsay: What do you think about riding an Ellsworth bike this season?

Me: Really? Me? Ummm...YES!!! 

Yeah, that was about it. I'll admit that at the moment I would ride a Walmart bike if I could, I am just so sick of not riding, but the Ellsworth is probably going to be a better choice in the end. Shine founder and team manager Lindsay Beth Currier is the nor-cal rep for Ellsworth now and I am so happy for her! I'd explored a few other options last fall, sent out resumes, and had only heard back from one company actually interested in sponsoring a 28 year old with a habit of landing on her head, so I am still beside myself having been presented with this opportunity. I just hope I can live up to everyone's expectations and keep it rubber side down at all times!

  To top it all off I have a job interview on the south shore this week--for a health coach position. I figure while I'm making so many changes I should try to see if I can make a career out of being all healthy and stuff. It's at least worth a shot, not like I have anything better to do with my life right now. From the bottom one can only go up, right?

Here's a parting shot, a recent sunset from the deck of our house in Incline: