Las Vegas, Northern California

Friday morning, and it's time for Ant, Vicks and I to say goodbye to Tris and Liz, and to Vegas, and set off on our road trip through Northern California. First up, pick up the car from the airport. I arrive and am told to pick my poison. There's a row of 'luxury' cars I can choose from. There's nothing in the big V8 US sedan end of things, so end up with an Audi SUV, on the basis that it'll be big and comfortable enough for us, and the controls will be similar to the A5 we had a few years back.

We're on the road by 09:30, safe in the knowledge that it's going to be a long day to make it up to Mammoth lakes by this evening. The drive up to Pahrump is very easy - cruising through the desert and scrubland at a fast 80mph in a single lane highway.

After Pahrump, we start to encounter some, um, 'difficulties.'

Our Sat Nav (Google Maps - I WILL name and shame....) suggests we need to take an hour long detour from Death Valley Junction to Dante's View, as there's a road closure on the 190. We blindly trust the tech, and head off in that direction. When we're directed to turn off the blacktop and onto a gravel road, we become suspicious. We backtrack to DVJ, take the 190, and trust that the other folks heading down that road know better than we do.

At this point, we lose cell service, which will prove to be problematic.

We make it as far as Stovepipe Wells, which is a small collection of lodgings, a store and a saloon - right in the heart of Death Valley. The heat is stifling. We briefly hook up to the WiFi service in the Saloon (that's honestly the only reason we stopped in there - nothing to do with the locally made cider, lovely Californian Chardonnay, or urgent Bombay and tonic requirement) and discover that the 190 DOES have closures, but much further towards the West of the Death Valley National Park - basically, the route we need to take to get to Mammoth lakes. The suggested detour is faintly ludicrous, taking us an extra 3 hours, and taking us some 150 miles out of our way.

We decide to get on the road ASAP, and hightail it towards our final destination, in the hope that we might still arrive before nightfall.

Several miles down the road, we're advised that there is a detour from our detour, for another road closure. We begin to think someone is playing a trick on us. The detour of the detour takes us down some frankly stunning mountain roads, and through some of the most amazing scenery I can ever recall seeing. We're following some other cars that are taking (we assume) the same detour, and follow this circuitous route for perhaps an hour.

Suddenly - confusion. A sign that says the road we are on ends in 9 miles. A road to the right that looks like something the World Rally Car drivers would relish driving over. The cars we have been following are in disarray. We have no cell service to see where we are. The sat nav 'memory' thinks we are no longer even ON a road, as the detail of Google Maps (name, shame) doesn't extend to these smaller roads through the backwaters of the park. We bravely (naively? blindly?) take the gravel track. Maybe a couple of miles ahead of us, we can see a dust cloud of another vehicle. I knew the 4WD Audi would come in handy. Would NOT have fancied this in a big V8 sedan... We set off after the dust cloud, and I have to admit I find the off-road driving pretty fun. Maybe I'm just kidding myself that we're not all doomed to die. Put the hammer down, and soon, we catch up to something of a convoy - an SUV, 2 trucks and an RV. Some ten miles later, we hit tarmac again, which we take to be a good sign. Some 15 miles after that, we finally rejoin the road we'd been detoured from. We've spent nearly 2 hours, and have travelled 20 miles as the crow flies.

The next 2 hours are FAR more fruitful. It feels like there's a lawlessness to this part of Southern California. We stay in convoy with the two trucks for about 100 miles, travelling at upwards of 80mph most of the way. We pass through a ghost town called Trona. Google Maps (name/shame) tries to send us off course a couple of times, just out of spite. We're wise to the little fucker's antics now though, and just blithely follow our new convoy friends, who are doubtless communicating over some kind of walkie-talkie type device about how and where to brutally murder us.

We come to a town called Ridge Crest, which offers:

1) A gas station
2) Cell coverage
3) The merest hint of civilization.

We fill up with gas, grab some snacks and drinks for the car, and use the phone signal to work out how far we've come, and how much further we've to go.

There's good news and bad news. We've still got 180 miles to drive, which G Maps infers will take us around 3 hours. BUT - it's basically a straight shot on the 395, straight up the eastern side of the stunning Sierra Nevada mountains.

As we near Lone Pine, we see a sign for the 190 back towards Death Valley - a drive that would/should/could have taken us around an hour, and realise how much time we've lost, and how much additional distance we've travelled. We stop at Jake's Saloon in Lone Pine for a much needed refresher, before getting back on the road for the final leg of our mammoth journey to Mammoth Lakes.

As we approach the high Sierra, it's dusk. We're driving towards the most beautiful sunset, and rapidly tiring. Finally, FINALLY we arrive into Mammoth Lakes around 19:15. We've done something approaching 500 miles, and been in the car for at least 8 hours. Knackered doesn't come close.

We check into our accommodation and start to think about some dinner. We've existed on car snacks today, and need a decent feed before bed. It transpires that:

a) I have miscalculated how far our lodging is from the bars and restaurants of Mammoth Lakes, and
b) They all close in ten minutes anyway.

Dejected, we pile back into the car, and head for the local supermarket to pick up some picnic supplies, before a hasty and tasty dinner of bread, cheese and charcuterie back at our apartment.

Tomorrow's gotta be a better day, right?

All of this is not to diminish the bewitching scenery through which we have driven today - whether the harsh, arid climate of Death Valley, or the stunning foothills of the Sierra Nevada, or the rocky outcrops of the high Sierra - this part of the world is stunning. Yes - we've had several more hours than entirely necessary to look at it through the windscreen, but on another day, in another way, it really would have been breathtaking...Read more