USA
Awe-inspiring Nevada
Article and photography by Michael Morcos
My thoughts through a tour of southern Nevada’s landscape made me feel like I was in some kind of epic western movie. With our big Chrysler sedan, we would take in the best of this region, including magnificent state and national parks, ghost towns, lonely desert highways, quite villages, a bizarre hotel, massive outdoor art, the mighty Hoover Dam, taste delicious American cuisine, and incredible scenery all along the way.
The Nevada tourism authority has done an excellent job at highlighting tourist friendly routes that bring you across the whole state. This was a helpful tool for us to decide where to visit the best parts of this incredibly large state. With so many choices, we would include portions of the many suggested routes and combine them to make a loop that started and ended in Las Vegas.
Road trip on
We had a fairly good idea of what to expect, after all, we were in the desert. From high in our Las Vegas hotel room, we could see mountains (Nevada has some three hundred mountain chains) and the dry arid desert in every direction, as far as the eye could see.
On our first full day, we would leave Las Vegas on the Great Basin Highway before heading onto a smaller route. The metropolitan traffic slowly dissipated to where we would find long stretches with little to no vehicles. On a less traveled road along the way to a state park, we would drive for 15 minutes without seeing an oncoming car and no one in my rearview mirror. We were blissfully alone to enjoy the fantastic scenery and experience the wide-open spaces of the American West.
A park like no other
Heaven or Hell, Earth or Mars? The Cathedral Gorge State Park was out of this world! This part of the world is truly astounding. Heavenly skies competed with Mars-like, bone-dry jagged hilly formations that dominated the scenery. This was a wonderful place for beautifully unusual pictures and for snacks, lunch, and refreshments in the shaded areas with an amazing view. Practically alone in this unbelievable landscape, travelers can hike along designated paths and venture into the landscape itself.
Great Basin National Park
A short drive away we would be in the town of Pioche and discover its historic buildings and have lunch. Our guide suggested to go to Gunslingers (love that name, appropriate for the west), but found the establishment closed and opted for an old school bus converted to a mobile restaurant that served massive portions of American’s most popular foods.
Onwards, we would be in contrasting landscapes throughout our drive and continuously moving upwards to reach our destination. The Great Basin National Park is a gem, much cooler, and full of healthy, mature trees.
Just imagine, in the hot Nevada summer our guides encouraged us to wear jackets as we would head below ground to visit the Lehman Caves. The story behind the discovery of the caves involves a rancher who found one of his cows in a deep hole and after rescuing the beast, he would be surprised to find he was in an extensive cave system and went on to making it a tourist attraction. With our knowledgeable guide, our group would discover the amazing and elaborate lighted network with paved paths and solid stairs to make it safer and tourist friendly.
Shortly afterwards, we would take the Wheeler Peak Scenic Drive upwards and enjoy the parks’ fantastic scenery. Along the twisting and cliff hanging ride, there were many rest areas and entrances to some sixty miles of hiking trails. The vistas were jaw-dropping, and it was as if we were in a colorful glossy postcard. Here again was a part of the fantastic American West experience.
Ely
After a long day of driving and a wonderful day of discovery, we reached the town of Ely. Having driven over 10 hours, we were as far north as we would go and now would start heading back towards Las Vegas at a more leisurely pace.
After a wonderful meal at Margarita’s Mexican Restaurant, we would have a refreshing night of sleep to then check out the city and attractions at the Ely Mural Tour and Nevada Northern Railway Museum before heading back on the open road.
Tonopah
What an absolute delight to visit the town of Tonopah. This would be an unusual day in an unusual place, and we would love every waking moment while there.
We will start with our stay at the Mizpah hotel, a building that is over a century old and richly decorated to honor its historic past. The longest staying guest is the friendly ‘Lady in Black’ as this hotel is known as the number one haunted hotel in America, unfortunately, (or fortunately), she never visited our room.
Speaking of hotels, the ultra-bizarre Clown Motel is world famous as ‘America’s scariest motel.’ And I see why. Having always hated clowns, I still appreciated the visit to the eerie but incredibly well presented and decorated clown shop filled with anything and everything associated with clowns. And wouldn’t you know it, right next to the motel was a historic cemetery.
To add to our Tonpah day of discovery was the historic Tonopah Historic Mining Park. Here we learned of the struggles and riches this site brought to the region and town. Now an outdoor museum, the area has remained true to its roots with massive original buildings and deep, dark tunnels.
Across the street from our hotel was a store more tailored for Cowboys than urbanites, we enjoyed and chuckled at the apparel and souvenirs. On the same block was the Tonopah Brewing Company, a western style eatery, where the menu featured tasty homemade brews and a wide selection of cornucopias size meals.
Outdoor art to the heart’s content
Wonderfully bizarre is the best way to describe the drive along the Free-Range Art Highway. First came the International Car Forest of the Last Church, where cars and buses are buried headfirst into the ground with the back wheels sticking out. Next was the Goldwell Open Air Museum, a large and unusual piece of art depicting ghostly figures from the last supper and close by was the historic and popular ghost town of Rhyolite, with unbelievable centuries old empty stone buildings. Later in the trip we would also appreciate yet another outdoor masterpiece by visiting the Seven Magic Mountains, modern art at its best.
Death Valley
If the scenery at the Cathedral Gorge was Mars like, then that of Death Valley National Park was its much bigger cousin on steroids. We were in awe and speechless while discovering only a small portion of this well-designed and meticulously kept treasure. On this very hot day and in the comfort of our air conditioned sedan, we would drive along the network of smooth and some dirt roads to discover some of the best recommended visiting areas for spectacular views and short walks including the Dante’s View, the Artist’s Palette, Badwater Basin, and Zabrinskie’s Point. This is a park to enjoy, reflect, and remember as a masterpiece of natural history and our beautiful planet.
Spring Mountain Ranch
After a wonderful meal at the Artisan Cellars restaurant and winery, and a good night’s sleep in the city of Pahrump, we were off to yet another dimension of amazing Nevada. This time we would find ourselves in a completely different climate zone as the Spring Mountain Ranch State Park was lush and green, and totally contrasted most of what was seen so far. The small microclimate was due to underground springs and pioneers settled this beautiful area and enjoyed its rich soil for farming and ranching. The famous American millionaire Howard Hughes also appreciated the area, bought the land, and made it a part-time home for living and entertaining. Having spent a brief time here and loving the tranquility and harmonious setting, I could understand his obsession.
Hoover Dam
Last, and certainly not least, we would head to Boulder City and discover the imposing Hoover Dam complex which was at the time the largest construction project in the world and broke new engineering feats. Straddling both the states of Nevada and Arizona, the power-plant generated lots of electricity and the water reserve in Lake Mead met the needs of many southwestern states. A guided tour started with a projected short movie of its history before we went both deep underground to see the humongous generators and high above to get a birds-eye view of the dam’s massive surroundings. Understandably, this is an extremely popular attraction, and most visitors can appreciate its significance and complexity.
Nevada is the seventh largest state in the union, and on this tour, we would only see a small fraction of this enormous state. We were thrilled, entertained, in bliss, in awe and spectacular Nevada touched all our senses! Now I wonder, what does the rest of the state hold for the traveler. I guess we will have to return and discover more hidden treasures.
