Sacramento Pass BLM Campground | Nevada

Most BLM campgrounds are wonderful, this was in the middle of almost nowhere, right off Route 50 in Nevada.  And it is free!  The little pond makes it interesting and that's my 5th wheel just beyond it.  It's only a half hour to Great Basin National Park.

I was in the lower section and if you go up a gravel road, they have the equestrian area, complete with a little corral. and more camp sites.

Somewhere in the past, they put lots of money in the place, including this concrete pad that's by the information kiosk.

Scenery was pretty also.

In different places in my travels, I keep finding new flowers.  I didn't expect these purple stripes on this!

This is a bit bizarre, it's only about 6' tall and looks quite new, although it's not in use. 

The information kiosk told me there was an old mining town - I took a drive one day to find it - and this is it.  I should have known when they said it was the "site" of an old town.  This is now on private property and behind a gate and pretty much the only thing left.

The dirt road to get there was mostly one lane and turned out to be 10 miles long, although it seemed like much more.  One part was very steep.  Along the way, a few people are still living on this road.

 

Close to the other side, there was a field with about 60 wind generators.

 

The little cemetery is still being taken care of.

Back at the ranch, this little bird was building a nest.

 

 

Illipah Reservoir BLM Campground | Nevada

 

Bureau of Land Management does a great job with campgrounds.  This one is easy to find, just a mile or so off Route 50, which claims to be the "loneliest road in America". 

 

 

The campground is up on a plateau with hills all around.  There is some great scenery here, and the reservoir has great fishing.  Even with the dumpster available and the picnic tables with shelter, there is no charge for camping here. 

 

 

My campsite was up on a hill overlooking the reservoir.  They had shelters for the picnic table and you'll also notice that they have a fence type enclosure on two sides.  There's a really great reason for this - being up on the top of a hill in the mountains, this area gets lots of wind coming through and those fences block it if you want to sit outside.  However, the RV still gets the full strength of the wind and there were a few days with heavy winds that weren't much fun.  I might have stayed longer if it hadn't been for the wind, since it's a great campground.  I'm sure that there are times of the year that the wind is not as active. 

 

 

The campsites are large and nicely spaced.  Mine was a huge area that I thought I could do just a turn-around in, but it was a little short because of some rutted areas that were left from the rainy season.  In any case, it was easy for me to jockey it around to get set up.

 

There were cattle in the area, mostly on the far side of the lake, but we had some wandering through the camp one day.

 

You could tell that they had been drawing water out of the reservoir because there was a "low-tide" smell down at the lake.  This little rock outcropping was a spit of land out into the water where most of the people fished.  Obviously this was in the morning before the wind kicked up.

 

I don't know how old this, but it looked like a cute little house on Route 50 going to the reservoir.

 

It never rained while I was there, but there were some dark clouds one evening when the sun set.

 

 

 

Convict Lake | Crowley Lake | BLM | California

 

This was my first glimpse of Convict Lake in California.  Supposedly, the name was given to this lake when convicts were found hiding in the area.

Unfortunately, the weather was not cooperating and giving me blue skies for my photos, but I like this one.

 

This is where the lake runs downstream when the snow melts.

 

 

The Crowley Lake BLM Campground nearby is great - lots of spaces between the sites.  There weren't many people there, but it was rainy and windy every afternoon for the week I was there.  Mornings were best to get blue skies!  This campground had not only the vault toilets, but drinking water and a dump station.

 

 

 

On the road headed to the campground from the Lake, I came across this interesting house, which used to be a ranch, now abandoned.

 

 

Along Route 395 in California, you see many abandoned houses, and this one had space for me to park my truck and explore.

 

While I was taking photos around the outside, a woman stopped her truck and got out, heading toward the house.  I asked her if it was alright for me to take my photos.  There were no signs to keep out, so I figured I was OK.  She was the realtor and said I was fine - we started talking and she walked inside, so I followed.  Apparently she had a buyer who might be interested.  I can't imagine taking on a project this bad, but the shell was in great shape.

Goodale Creek Campground | BLM | California

This was a very scenic campground, snow dusting all the mountains.  Another nice BLM campground, but at least when I was there, not many campers. 

Snow was all over the mountain peaks, but down at land level, things were in bloom.

We had some windy days, but not too bad, so things were comfortable.  And the scenery was great.

 

Don't know if this was for a pet or what - but it was behind one of the campsites.

 

These little burros were hanging out on the road near the campground.

The town of Independence is nearby, but not very big.  It has a few impressive buildings like this old hotel which is now a B & B.

This was for sale, and looked very nice.

 

You'd think the town was massive, with this huge court house, but it's the county seat.

 

I took a drive up to the Ancient Bristlecone National Monument, but at 8,000 I was starting to get a bit of a headache because of the elevation. 

 

The scenery was great.

Gigantic trees - I think this is a Juniper.

 

 

I have never seen a lizard that was totally black and this one didn't really want to pose.

And a winding road all the way down.