After a late lunch I was back on the road, headed east for a Saturday night in Vegas. Word was the traffic on I-15 was stop and go most of the time on the weekends, so my plan was to RON (remain overnight) near Barstow and drive in Saturday morning. Some friends had seen some great wildflowers along Shell Creek road a few days before, so I modified my route slightly to the north so I could take a look. This area, east of Santa Margarita and just north of the Los Padres National Forest, experiences frequent wildfires. Most of them are small, hundreds of acres, but the terrain is rugged, rolling coastal hills compressed and twisted by shifting tectonic plates which makes fires in the area difficult to fight. The road, one lane each way with occasional ripples from the fault, was closed in 2012 during the Calf Fire, which burned for three days and forced mandatory evacuation of residents, their pets and livestock (The county has designated horse evacuation shelters. Our high schools also have rodeo teams.) and took 35 crews, three helicopters, 73 engines and one bulldozer to contain. Despite the spring grass and foliage, fire damage was still evident along the the way.
I had neglected to check the location of Shell Creek on a map before I left. After about twenty miles, I had resigned myself to the thought that I had missed the tail end of the wildflower season. Then after a series of hills with the bare earth, 
blackened tree trunks and charred fenceposts evidence of an earlier fire, I turned the corner to a valley blanketed with white and amber flowers. I stopped at a turnout (there were many, I was clearly not the first) and began to snap photos. As I walked along the barbed wire fence I suddenly realized why I look down on trail: I caught myself checking the ground under my girly shoes for rattlesnakes before each step.
blackened tree trunks and charred fenceposts evidence of an earlier fire, I turned the corner to a valley blanketed with white and amber flowers. I stopped at a turnout (there were many, I was clearly not the first) and began to snap photos. As I walked along the barbed wire fence I suddenly realized why I look down on trail: I caught myself checking the ground under my girly shoes for rattlesnakes before each step.
Ten miles later I encountered another pleasant surprise. One of the requirements for an Instrument Flight rating is fifty hours of cross-country time. The FAA defines a cross-country as flight to an airport at least fifty miles from your point of departure. I did my initial flight training at Santa Maria Airport (KSMX), one of six youngsters of similar age at the same flight school. One frequent cross-country location was California Valley. On weekends we would rent every aircraft we could get our hands on and fly out together, a gaggle of single-engine aircraft, land on a rancher’s airstrip and walk down the road to the cafe for a burger and curly fries. (This is referred to as a ‘$100 hamburger’.) Halfway across Carrizo Plain I passed a green sign pointing down a side road: California Valley 1 mile. I could not resist the turn.
The cafe is closed now, and the small motel across the street is now private lodging for men working at the nearby solar farms. The gas station was closed too, at least the pumps, with the gravel lot filled with vintage muscle cars in various stages of reconstruction. The rancher’s hanger was gone, but the runway is still there, now clumpy green grass with a well-maintained windsock (photo). Next door is a new Cal Fire station, with a bay housing two engines attached to offices and living quarters. On the other end of a well-tended picnic area was the new Community Center (new since I had been there in the late 80s) consisting of a meeting hall and a one-room library. I went inside and got to talking with the librarian. She had been the waitress at the cafe and remembered us well.The drive in to Vegas was smooth. I lived in Vegas on and off for ten years. It was my first duty station, and I stayed on after I got out. The Strip is fine, it is fun to have a place to go play when you feel like it or when friends come to town, but for me the best part was the hiking. Las Vegas was originally a First Nations settlement, at a desert oasis. In the 1800s they were joined by Spanish explorers (Las Vegas translates to ‘the meadows’); later came cattle rustlers, Mormon missionaries, and, as transcontinental rail expanded, railwaymen. Construction of the Boulder Dam (now Hoover Dam) began in 1930, part of the huge publics works initiatives designed to help the nation recover from the Depression. Casinos and showgirl revues soon followed. While Strip and downtown proper have experienced tremendous growth over the years, the surrounding desert is for the most part undeveloped. The trails outside of town are fabulous, with stunning views from the mountains and petroglyphs along the walls of the canyons. I arrived at lunchtime, dropped my bags at the hotel and headed out for a harrier trail.
I had run with this particular group for about five years in the late 1990s. They are an adventuresome bunch, and the runs had been fantastic. Often they are set in the desert edges of town, but they can also explore unique features of the urban environment. Today would be one of the latter. It was a birthday trail, to honor one gentleman’s 68th. We met at a bar next to a motel on the south side of town. When I lived here, this particular area was relatively isolated, home to a small locals casino away from the bustle of the city. I was amazed to find it was now nestled among other casinos and hotels (but the other side of the highway), and that the Strip now extended several miles further south from here. After ‘how ya beens’ (there were five or so runners I knew from before) a pack of about thirty set off on trail. The birthday boy has a certain claim to fame: in the early 2000s he went down to the City Planners office, purchased the (then printed) GIS maps, and had set a course that wound in and out of the water runoff channels under the Strip. This trail was a tribute, we were in and out of the tunnels adjacent to and under I-15, with the one long stretch of pavement along Las Vegas Boulevard. This seems to have become a tradition; it was clear that during scouting the organizer had coordinated with the citizens living in the tunnels (we were given a safe word, the names of the residents and their dogs, and encouraged to tread lightly). After trail we sang songs and toasted each others’ bravery and foolishness. As before, there were kilts.
This was the last of my scheduled stops. I had three days to fill before I was to arrive in Santa Fe, and the desert southwest before me. Decisions, decisions!