Ellen decided that she would just walk around and look beautiful. She did a great job of that as seen in the next photo. The weather this morning was so nice, but we did need to head out by noon for our drive!
We were planning on heading to Elko today which meant that we had about 320 miles to go. We were not sure where we were going to stop, but we had a few towns in mind. However, once we saw a sign for LoveLock, NV, Ellen wanted to stop. I guess the name sounded interesting to her! So, here we are in front of the town which had a few small shops and a city hall. We strolled around the town a little bit, but the 100 degree temperature made us want to get on our way.
For those of you that never drove across the United States, there's a whole lot of nothing out there! Most of the ride between towns look like a long straight road with no sites in between. Here's a shot or two from the drive, which could have been anywhere along the way.
The most interesting part to me was the amount of huge road-work projects that go on in the middle of nowhere. You will first see a sign that says "Road-work Ahead". Then shortly after they will reduce the speed from 75 mph to 55 mph and set up literally miles and miles of orange and white barrels on the road. The amazing part is that these barrels, which are spaced about 10 feet apart go on for 10 miles! They must have huge warehouses somewhere in the middle of nowhere just to store all of these barrels. Plus, these projects are huge. They have indusrial bulldozers doing something along the road, which quite frankly is in better shape than the roads in Silicon Valley. I wonder where all this funding comes from!
It was time for lunch, and the biggest town near us was Winnemucca, NV. Plus it had a cool name, so we stopped. Well, after visiting the visitor center and getting pointed to "the mexican restaurant across the street or the coffee shop" which we never found, we opted for Subway. No need to describe that, as I'm sure they taste the same no matter where you are. We took a vote and no one wanted to stroll around the town, so we headed off to Elko. As we were heading out of town I saw something that was funny to me (although the kids didn't seem to find any humor in it). We passed by the Route 66 Diner, and directly under it in a temporary sign stated "Mexican Food". Now, correct me if I'm wrong, but I always thought that Route 66 symbolized the heart of our country. Times are changing!Upon arriving into Elko, NV, we quickly noticed that the town was much bigger than Winnemucca and seemed pretty nice. No wonder it is a popular stopping point by many. We checked into our hotel and looked up where we could find good Basque food. This entire part of the country apparently was home to a large Basque population and their food seems to be a big deal in all of the information you read. There are three big Basque restaurants in the town and the top one is the Star Hotel. The Star Hotel was established in 1910 to cater to the local Basque population who were typically herders. Since it was the number-one choice, we decided to give it a try. For a Monday night, the wait was about 20-30 minutes and the place was filled with people.
What can we say about Basque food? What we understand is that it is not just the food, but the way it is served. Everything in Basque restaurants seems to be served family-style with big bowls of all the common food placed in the middle of the table (and lots of it). Your main course (which is usually meat, chicken or fish) is served separately. You can even opt to have no main course and just have the common food. Ellen did this, and it is more than enough food since the common food that comes with all meals consists of vegetable soup, bread, salad, green beans, baked beans, pasta (with red sauce), and french fries. On top of all this food, you then get your huge steak. Needless to say the people in this restaurant are quite large and we ended up with tons of left-overs. If there are any homeless people in Elko, I highly recommend that you go stand outside of this restaurant and you will eat like a king.
As we finished dinner at 9:00, this pretty much ended our day. Tomorrow we're going to get up and go to the best museum in the area and head off to Salt Lake City where we'll spend three days.Hotel: Hilton Garden Inn - We rate these hotels a 10. Breakfast is free. Wi-fi is free. Rooms are nice, clean, and big.
