Our mini-adventure started out a few minutes later than planned—which may have led to the whole problem. We started our journey to Eureka with no problems. Our purpose was to sit at the Gideon booth at the Eureka County Fair and give out New Testaments to anyone interested, but specifically for 5th graders through 12 graders.
We drove the first 23 miles or so, traversing Carlin and were stopped at the southbound Union Pacific tracks—many reddish-brown boxcars were sitting there without an engine in sight. Two vehicles were in front of us staring at the crossing barricade and while we waited 30 minutes or more, at least 10 others were queued behind us.
Dean knew how to get to the Palisade Canyon road which would enable us to travel over the tracks if this batch of cars ever got moving. We did a u-turn and headed back toward I-80. After taking the exit for the ghost town of Palisade, we travelled along a well-maintained gravel road. Soon Dean was saying, “I don’t recognize any of this country.” I didn’t either, which of course, meant nothing. We finally stopped and Dean got out his Nevada Gazetteer. Sure enough, we were on a road maintained by the railroad; not the way to get to Palisade and ultimately, the highway to Eureka.
We executed u-turn #2 and headed back toward a turn-off to a road with a much-less well maintained surface. It didn’t say it led to Palisade but Dean felt sure it did. Sorry I did not take any pictures of the sheer cliff sides, but I didn’t expect a rather mundane trip to wander off the beaten path this way.
Fortunately, this bumpy, little-travelled road was the right one and within 30 minutes we were back on the highway to Eureka, traveling at a good rate—until the first road repair sign stopped us. By this time, I did not dare to check the time; we would get to Eureka when we would get there.
As we followed the “lead car” we came upon the actual work in process and noticed something new to us. There was a machine “chewing up” the old road surface, then the result was spewed out in a sort of windrow, then another machine spread it out and another, rolled it out, packing the material down. The recycling process was impressive. (When we returned in the late afternoon, that section was finished and had been oiled. Voila! A brand new road surface, ready for the wintry extremes it will see in a few months.) We had one more road work slowdown and then we were back to regular speed.
The outcome of our 235 mile trip was being able to give out a few New Testaments, visiting with fairgoers and other vendors and being grateful for a safe trip during the miles traveled.
What an adventure!
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