Applegate trail

    We arrived at Lovelock NV at about 2:50pm, filled our fuel tanks and stomachs and headed out North of town to meet up with one of the major roads the settlers used in the mid 1800’s the Applegate Trail. The Pavement ended after about an hour, this would be the last time we would see the pavement for the next 3 days. We traveled a gravel road through a valley and had our first sighting of antelope, it was about 2 hours before we reached our first trail marker for the Applegate trail and turned west toward Rabbit Hole Spring. The trail ran near a green gassy area fed by the spring and then headed through a canyon where we saw colorful canyon walls. We passed a camp ground with a few campers who were the only people we saw this since leaving the pavement. We pushed through to the valley where we stopped to barbeque for dinner and watched a storm brewing to the east hoping that it would not reach us. From there we headed north to Sulphur which is a large mine. Crossing over the train tracks then back west along the train tracks to meet up with the trail again. The Applegate Trail continues on to the Playa to Black Rock Spring there is one big obstacle, the Quinn River. The Quinn River didn’t have water flowing above ground but there was about 25 feet of very soft clay mud. It was now about 10:00pm and we decided to camp and assess the crossing in the morning. After setting up camp we watched the lightening show to the east and the stars above us.
    In the morning rather than spending the good part of a day trying to cross the Quinn we headed back to the train tracks and followed them south west toward Trego Hot Springs. We followed a power / telephone line that ran parallel the tracks and did find several of the old glass insulators intact on the ground.  It seems Nevada has received some rain recently and we came across another large soft clay area with the best option being to cross the tracks again and follow a trail on the other side. We crossed back over the tracks again at Trego Hot Springs and started our trek across the Playa into yet another soft spot. This one was not as soft as the others so we kept on the gas but before we were back to dry ground we had mud on the roof of the Jeep and trailer. Because of the recent rains the Playa didn’t seem as dusty as I have seen it in the past but we still kept our speed down to look for more wet spots. We traveled North West to a main road on the Playa and then turned North East toward Black Rock Hot Spring. It was very quiet on the playa; we only saw one other vehicle in this distance. We arrived at Black Rock Hot Spring at about 12:15pm with only a few soft spots that didn’t really slow us down. There is an abandoned wagon, a 125° f water hot spring and a trail marker to let us know we are back on the Applegate Trail. We headed north toward Double Hot Springs with a brief stop over for lunch on the way, and we were lucky to have a badger sighting, though he was moving to fast for pictures. The road was very rough with many wash outs which made for slow travel times, but not technically challenging and could be done in 2 wheel drive. Double Hot Springs was fenced with many warnings, one spring is 175° f and the other is 185° f the clear water was still steaming on a 90° f day. We traveled slowly for the next 4 ½ hours on the rough roads, not seeing another vehicle, only more antelope. We stopped to visit Hardin City, the Lassen-Clapper Murder Site, Mud Meadows Reservoir and Soldier Meadows Ranch. After taking pictures and visiting with the folks at Soldier Meadows Ranch (which has camping, shower, lodging and meals available but you should contact them in advance if you plan on taking advantage of these) we headed to High Rock Canyon.  Slowly climbing out of the valley through the rocky terrain we thought of how hard the trail must have been in a wagon with no suspension. Near the top we found another Applegate Trail sign, this one telling of how they had to lower the wagons down by ropes into the creek bed. We reached our next nights camping just inside of the start of High Rock Canyon at about 8:30pm. We spent time again amazing at the amount of stars you can see with no other lights, through binoculars you can actually see them flicker different colors.
    Saturday morning we slept in a little and after packing up, fueling up and some pictures, we hit the road at about 10:40am. The road in High rock was the most difficult road on the trip but still didn’t require 4 wheel drive, though we did use low range because of the slow pace. There were many rocks and small ledges witch made high clearance a plus if not a necessity. We stopped for many pictures and to help change a tire on a Range Rover, plus plug the flat so he would have a spare (the only other vehicle we saw in the canyon except for a few quads and motorcycles).  We stopped for lunch on top of a rock hill where we could see the grooves left in the rock from many wagon crossings. The road seemed to get narrower and with sharper corners but still not much trouble for the jeep and trailer but may have been a challenge in a full size truck. There were great rock walls with the caves and holes witch seemed to be perfect for the many birds to nest in. It was surprising how much water was still remaining through the canyon. As we continued through the canyon we once again came upon the Range Rover this time he had 2 torn side walls that were beyond repair. The only way he was going to make out was with new tires. We set up camp only 6 ½ miles from our last camp leaving the trailer and my wife behind we loaded the flat tires and wheels on the Jeep roof rack then headed to the nearest town. Cedarville CA was about 55 miles away but it took over 2 hours due to the rough road remaining to get out of the canyon. Cedarville didn’t have a tire store but did have cell phone service and the nearest tire store that was open was in Susanville CA another 130 miles away. Due to the odd tire size (255/55-19) they didn’t have the tires but were wiling to drive to Reno NV and pick them up and meet us back in Susanville to mount them. We arrived in Susanville just after the tires at about 9:00pm had the tires mounted, grabbed a quick dinner and started the 5 hour plus trek back. We made it back to camp at about 3:15am Sunday morning. I think the Range Rover must have thought of us as their guardian angel, as no other vehicles came through the canyon that day, and with the miles to hike out to people there was no way to carry enough water to make it out.
    Sunday we packed up letting the Range Rover leave first, we took our time exploring the remainder of the canyon. Finding an abandoned building and yellow rocked cliffs, the trail turned to rolling sage covered hills were you can see for miles, giving us glimpses of our trail miles ahead. As we made it back to gravel roads there is a site called Stevens Camp that is a first come first serve home with a stove, full kitchen, 2 bedrooms that can sleep 6 and you can hook up your generator for power.  A large spring rang thru the camp providing plenty of water for showers. It also had paddocks set up to keeps horses. Since it was not yet lunch time we continued on. We passed 2 vehicles on their way in, the first vehicles other than the Land Rover we have seen since the prior morning. We made it to Vya NV about 12:30 and headed South East on SR 34 to Gerlach NV. This was wide graded gravel road making it easy to travel, we stopped for lunch. A short time later we came across several small groups of wild horses totaling about 45.  For years we have always looked for wild horses on our travels and here right next to the road at a spring there they were! We spent at least an hour taking pictures and watching the groups interact with each other. This was the highlight of the visit for my wife as she clicked off about 300 photos. As we realized how late it was getting (since we lost about 12 hours from the Land Rover incident) we reluctantly pushed on toward home. The gravel road continued to the town of Gerlach where we arrived at about 5:00pm. We stopped at Bruno’s Country Club for a soda and ice cream to cool down, this was a very hot day and with no air conditioner it made for a long and exhausting day. We fueled up the Jeep and us in Fernley NV and started back up the Sierra’s only to have Spooner pass take out our drive shaft. We were able to remove it and drive in front wheel drive to the top of the pass and then pull out the spare drive shaft we keep in the trailer, installing it didn’t take very long and the cool night air at 7,000 feet felt great.  We made it home just after midnight and looking back, thought that our 4 day trip back into the time of the wagon train days was a great adventure.