or on the road again, as it seems there are ever more roads to follow.

Thursday I was early out the Wall Spring gate,

447 to 50 to Fallon for a much-needed oil change, then 50

east as far as Middlegate, right on 316 looking for [and finding]

a suitably minimal spot for lunch prior

to Gabbs, beyond which

it was the Poleline Road for an hour or so of dirt and other attractions

culminating in the solar array outside Tonopah,

just north of which 89 intersects 95, and through which, as advised by Seth, I motored without

pause to continue for another hour and a half

[including but not limited to Goldfield, also sans stopping despite its role in Vanishing Point*],

a first Joshua Tree sighting,

a bit of armor on the move and finally El Portal Motel in Beatty,

gateway to Death Valley [somewhere I wouldn’t be going] and a short evening’s walk away

from Gema’s Cafe which proved admirably beyond adequate for enchiladas.

…plus I got coffee for the morning before an early night.

Second morning I was out of Beatty before eight, taking 95 south with a detour

down 373 to 127 to a most moribund Death Valley Junction, back via Stateline Road into Nevada

to Pahrump [no sign of Larry Wahl nor the ’39 Chrysler Coupe Bryan** sold him when he left

SF some forty years ago] and thence into and through the depressingly beige wastelands

of suburban Las Vegas, Las Vegas, out the other side, more depressingly beige wastelands,

ditto Boulder City and down, down across the Colorado

to Arizona

where road maintenance worsened and speed traps proliferated.

*The radio station in the movie was located in downtown Goldfield.

**His mother put it in his nine year old name so we sold it to Larry who promised to restore it once he got settled in Pahrump. Never found out what happened after that…