Shin's Baseball Vacation - (1 of 5)

On the Road Again

...And so it came to pass that I had decided to take in Spring training down in Arizona.  I needed some scenery along the way, however.  The solution?  Take highway 50 up towards Lake Tahoe and catch 395 south.  I'd heard that Mono Lake was really worth seeing, so I packed up my new SUV and headed out.  I actually got away at about 6:00 a.m. so long about 9:00 I was well east of Sacramento.  Bright sunshine, cool clean air, yep, this is gonna be epic!  I got out of the car to walk around.  This is the American River.  How patriotic.  Note the snow on the far bank.

A few hours later, I'd reached Mono lake.  Following the usual script of tourists everywhere ("Hey, I'll be happy to thke a picture with both of you in it. Oh, you'll take one with me?  Gee, thanks!") I had this one taken.  That's Mono Lake in the background.

This is Mono Lake from the ground.  It's easily accessible from 395 although this being March and all I couldn't go all the way around it.  The odd rock formations are called "tufa".  Fascinating stuff.  The lake itself is over 3/4 of a million years old, likely the oldest lake in the U.S.   Of course, you can Google "Mono Lake" and learn lots more about it.  The Wikipedia entry is great.

As recommended, I spent most of my time here on the south shore.  Given that the weather was perfect, I was surprised that I pretty much had the lake all to myself.  Somehow that seemed fitting.  I suspect that some day I'll get ambitious and read enough about the place to learn what the dark gackdrop on the far shore is. I remember the many cries of several years ago urging us all to "SAVE MONO LAKE!"  Now I see why.  The effort was successful. There's a ghost town nearby called Bodie.  The road to it this time of year was blocked off.  There's a Visitor Center not far from here in the booming metropolis of Lee Vining.  I stopped in and found that many just drive around the sign.  I really need to be more rebellious! More later.

To see the long-awaited rest of the trip!

BACK