ELY, NEVADA

Today we successfully escaped the excessive heat of the Las Vegas Valley and made our way north to the town of Ely which, as you can see below, is roughly even with Reno.

We had some concerns about a possible oil leak that developed in Larry's egnine on his way to Las Vegas from San Diego but there were no further leaks on today's trip so I think we found and resolved the problem.  After a earlier high here of 95 degrees at 8 pm the temperature here in Ely has cooled to 70 and continues to fall.  We are grateful for the cooler temps.

This is the view out our front windshield.  We are at 6,437 feet and there is still snow on some of the surrounding peaks.  Last year, from this same spot, we saw and elk making its way up the valley in this picture.  This evening, once again we saw some large animals grazing although we could not determine what they were - other then they looked bigger than deer.

Our original plan is to visit Great Basin National Park which is about 60 miles south of here.  There is a chance of rain tomorrow but no chance the next day so we may wait until Tuesday to make that trip.

So much for day one.  I think we will sleep very well tonight in the cooler temps with no AC's droning all night.