Nevada

Spent Sunday night at the Nevada Hotel & Gambling Hall in Ely. It's a historic building, from 1929 and full of interesting artifacts and western history. As rooms go, it's good value for money. On the other hand it's first and foremost a casino, full of gaudy, noisy tackiness. I shudder just walking past one of those gambling machines and wonder how mentally retarded one must be to spend hour after hour sitting in front of one, feeding it quarters or tokens or little pieces of your soul, what do I know...?

Ely has some nice old buildings and is especially known for the many murals on the walls of both private homes and business. If you're in the area it's worth spending some time looking at them - on the other hand, Ely is in a part of the world where very few people are simply "in the area". It takes something of an effort to get this far from civilization, and I was making this effort now, to get back to California again. Monday morning I set out on what is known as "The loneliest road in America", US 50 from Ely to Carson.

For some unfathomable reason this whole 300+ mile stretch of land is marked as "scenic", while in truth most of it is repetitive and horribly dull. Additionally there are few radio stations and the few you can find are sometimes disturbed by static noise. B-O-R-E-D-O-M. Fortunately I reached Carson, which is quite a nice place, in less than five hours instead of the estimated seven +. I quickly decided to make haste a priority on this drive. I wasn't overtaken once in 300 miles, hehe...

Some of the interior of Hotel Nevada.




My room. Not bad for $45.


Ely murals. Notice how building elements are sometimes incorporated into the paintings.


So... so... so... gaaaah... mile upon mile of nuffin'.


Salt Mountain and the dry lake next to it.


More Ely murals and desolate landscape pics here.