Today, after a rough start and much discussion, Mom, Dad, and I decided to take a road trip up to Sierraville and places beyond. So we drove to Truckee and across the overpass - I’m against overpasses in principle because they kill the economies of small towns, but in the case of Truckee, that’s not a problem - and continued north.
When we reached Sierraville, a small town once prospering from the cattle industry and now dying, the diners and the Moonie-owned hotel were still in business. The guy from old Hacienda del Lago had in fact moved to Sierraville and started a Mexican restaurant upstairs from the old café. That, however, was not where we ate, but rather we crossed the street to a different café, Crossroads Café, which served the best onion rings I have ever consumed - and I don’t normally eat onion rings! The one depressing thing we learned was that the Sierraville Rodeo was no more, since the sponsors and organizers, who were always the same, had grown weary of the flashier Truckee Rodeo’s sapping of sponsorship. I enjoyed the more true to its roots rodeo!
While visiting the bathroom, we discovered that there was a store in the back of the building. We bought a few presents, and then we hit a bonanza. Dad spotted a rack of doggie treats and bought a “chew hoof” for Puff the American Eskimo. He’s still chewing it as I write this.
Then Dad led us on a tour of regional golf courses, including one at which some of his friends had bought a house recently. On the return trip, we turned in to Hobart Mills, and were surprised immensely to see that the area was being developed. We went down the remnants of old Highway 89, which was incredibly rutted and in disrepair, and hit Prosser Lake. On the way back, ever so slowly, we came across the Emigrant Trail, where we stopped to step in the tracks of pioneers and their wagons.
