Holly's sister drove down for one last visit so we all went exploring. We went to Subway Tunnel which is an old lava tube. As you can see, it was a ways down to get into it. It was a good thing we were told to bring flashlights as it's not lighted. It's open on both ends but the sunlight doesn't go too far into it.
I took this picture with the flash. Now close your eyes...that's how it looked without the flash. There were places where I had to duck while walking due to the low ceiling and other places where it was 15 feet high. Nice little side trip, especially since none of us have ever seen a lava tube.
Further north we came to Burney State Park where there is Burney Falls. We had brought a picnic lunch and had the perfect day for our trip. The falls are 22 feet high and there is 100 million gallons of water that goes over the falls every day. There's a trail that goes down to the bottom of the falls and follows the river to Lake Britton.
This is the river that flows through the canyon and down to the lake. The water temperature is between 42 and 48 degrees...not real nice for swimming but fishing is good.
We followed the trail along the river for a little ways and then crossed over and went back up the canyon to the top of the falls. The canyon walk was nice; it was going back up that wore us out. Nothing fancy here...just a dirt trail to the top. This is Holly and Deb on the bridge over the river. The smiles were gone by the time we got to the top.
After Deb left for home Holly and I went to a wildlife park. They take care of abandoned and injured animals. If the animal is injured and can be released after healing they return it to the wild; if not they keep it at the park. They also have animals that need special care that the owners could not provide. They have wolves, coyotes, cheetahs, bears, mountain lions
and several others, not all native to the area. The nice thing is every animal has a little story about how they came to be at the park posted by their habitat. It was really interesting to read all the different stories.
We're looking out over Lake Tahoe in this picture. It was a beautiful day though quite windy. There were even white caps on the lake. We were surprised at how large the lake was. It is 22 miles long and 12 miles wide. There's even a Coast Guard Station there. What rough duty that must be.
This is just me relaxing after a hard 3 hours at work. That's the shop and garage where the owner keeps his other car (a black Corvette). I've offered to take it out for a spin every now and then just to keep everything oiled and running well but we all know his answer to that (can't say I blame him, knowing me).
This is a Mountain Blue Jay, not to be confused with a Steller's Jay which is also a type of blue jay which we have plenty of here at the park.
Yes that's right...we found another train museum. This is the Nevada State Railroad Museum in Carson City. They had some very nice restored equipment and nice displays.
This is a self-propelled passenger car. It will carry 72 passengers and was used around the Lake Tahoe and Truckee area. It's a cross between a bus and trolly on steroids. They have done a great job of restoring it as you can see in these two pictures and they do give rides on it around the grounds.
That's all for now. Time to start thinking about pulling this train back out on the main line. We leave the 1st of November for Schulenburg RV Park in Schulenburg Texas. That will be our winter home. We are going to try and sneak home some time this winter for a week but until then we will see ya all down the line. Toot- Toot.
