Ovens in the Desert

 

On the second afternoon of our trip to the Southwest last December we arrived in Ely, NV. Since we had booked our hotel while on the road we decided to go to the Ward Charcoal Ovens first as long as we still had some daylight.

Why charcoal ovens in the desert?

Lots of charcoal is needed for smelting ore. It takes 30 to 50 bushels to reduce one ton of ore.

Beehive-shaped ovens are a more efficient way of reducing pinyon pine and juniper to charcoal than the earlier method of piling wood in an open pit and lighting it on fire. The ovens allow control over how hot and how long the fire burns which is important when producing quality charcoal.

Building the ovens here, close to the source of building materials, the timber needed to make charcoal, and within three miles of the smelters, was a matter of convenience and efficiency.

After only three years of operation (1876-1879), the silver boom waned, the trees were gone, and the need for charcoal ended. People found other uses for the Ward Charcoal Ovens. For prospectors and stockmen, they were shelters in harsh weather. It is also said  that one or two stagecoach bandits hid from the law in these ovens.

(from the information plate of Ward Charcoal Ovens State Park)

We could easily picture the "harsh weather". It was quite cold, there was snow on the ground and the little creek was covered with ice.

On the plus side, we were the only people there and could explore to our hearts' desire. Then the afternoon light started to change.

The sky changed color in a rather dramatic way. It seemed the yellows and oranges got more and more intense by the minute.

We finally left when the sky turned red. By that time, I was already half frozen (the ovens didn't help).

Since this is for Bleubeard and Elizabeth's T Tuesday, I need a drink. Last Friday our friends invited us over for a pizza dinner and some delicious wine. Can you see their sweet dog in the background?

Maybe you remember that a few weeks ago I wrote that I had made a raspberry-almond clafoutis. A that time I thought the recipe was asking for too little flour and too much half-and-half which needed a much longer baking time than mentioned. So this time I added another quarter cup of the almond flour and reduced the half-and-half by a quarter cup, scattered some sliced almonds on top and voilà - it turned out perfectly! I was also able to reduce the baking time by ten minutes. I'm glad that I was experimenting with the recipe a bit. This was our contribution to the pizza dinner.

Have a good week, everyone!

Along the Loneliest Highway

 

Last December when I was asking the Geek whether we should invite some friends over for New Year's Eve he responded "What about if we take a road trip - to the Southwest?". I was completely surprised since we had just come back from Germany a few weeks before, but then I quickly became very excited. We used to go to the Southwest fairly often, mostly in the winter or early spring. We hadn't been there since 2019 and we were both eager to see one of our most favorite parts of the US again.

We left on a Saturday late in the morning because our first destination - Fallon in Nevada - is only a five to six hours drive away and we figured we would still arive by daylight. I had had a very annoying cough, but was pretty sure that I didn't have COVID. However, I decided to do a test just to be on the safe side and as I expected it was negative. 

Once we had passed Sacramento, traffic became significantly lighter. The drive on I-80 over the Sierra is always beautiful, no matter the season. The rain eventually turned into snow once we were at almost 5000 ft (~1520 m) altitude. Driving down to Reno is simply spectacular. We arrived in Fallon in the early evening, checked into our hotel and found a Vietnamese restaurant where we had some delicious Pho.

The following day was spent driving NV highway 50, the supposedly "loneliest highway in the US". It sure is pretty lonely, but that is something we like a lot. No tailgaiting cars - there's enough space for passing. It's very relaxed driving. The weather wasn't so wonderful, though - we had rain, snow and very low clouds. Sometimes the sky was rather dramatic. But who is looking for gorgeous weather in December?

Even though we had often taken this highway, there were still places we hadn't seen before. Our first stop was at Sand Mountain.

Sand Mountain is not a mountain but an enormous sand dune that unfortunately showed a lot of ATV traces. It is so sad that everything needs to be accessed by people in obnoxiously loud vehicles. Thankfully at this time of year no one was here, the RV campground was deserted, but there was still a lot of garbage lying around. It is so sad that you find trash almost everywhere in this country. What is so difficult about putting it in a trash can or taking it home again?

In the distance we could see a salt lake.

Then it was back on the highway again, an endless line to the horizon.

Whenever we stopped - either for nature's call or just to enjoy the view - I was delighted by all the desert plants.

On the side of the road we came upon a shoe tree. Now I admit that I don't understand the sense or meaning of a shoe tree. Can someone help me out? Why toss shoes in a tree? Or let them rot at the base of the tree together with lots of garbage? Ugh!

However, the area near it was quite nice with beautiful views to the mountains in the distance.

On we went toward these snow covered mountains.

A few hours later, these mountains were in our rear view mirror. Oh, there's even another car on the road!

We arrived in Ely in the late afternoon, checked into our hotel and then drove out to a site that I will write about in my next post.

Now I need a drink for Bleubeard and Elizabeth's T Tuesday. We enjoyed a Hefeweizen yesterday with dinner. Now that we're getting closer to Oktoberfest, Costco is carrying Bavarian Weißbier again. We bought several cases...

Prost!