Day 67

Day 67: Left Poverty Flats, near Overton NV to head back to Mesquite, NV for their annual Hot Air Balloon Festival. Went via the Valley of Fire state park and picked up an annual pass for the Nevada State Park system. A lot more money than Idaho, which only charges you $10 (for residents, not sure for non residents). $75 for annual pass, $200 for dry camping added on. We went for the more expensive one since it will pay for itself after 13 nights. For only $10 per night, we can upgrade to full hookups, in parks that offer it. And if we visit 15 state parks we will get a free pass for next year, so make sure you get a ‘passport’ and stamp it at every park you visit. The best thing about the park pass (besides the natural beauty) is free dump, water and trash any time we want. We didnt take a lot of photos, as we are planning on returning their soon to spend some actual time and explore.
We also checked in to National park pass. For $80 per year you can get an America the Beautiful pass that gives you unlimited National park entrance, plus access to camping on BLM land as well. We just need to wait for the government shutdown to end before we can get this pass.
Bristol, the cat, usually hides under the back seat, but comes out for a pet every hour or so. This trip, though, she became really brave and came up front and road on my lap for 20 miles or so. She has come a long way from being a wild homeless cat in my back yard to #1 navigator in the front seat of the truck as it is heading down the highway.
There were no laundromats anywhere near Overton, the closest is here in Mesquite (something like 50 miles away), so needless to say we are going to be busy today catching up on the laundry. We also bought some items that we needed at Walmart.com and had it shipped to the store. This is one of the things that I miss about not living in a house anymore. The ability to order things on line and have them sent to you. We did talk to one of the Poverty Flat locals and he told us that there is a place in Overton that will let you ship stuff to them for a slight fee. We will be checking into this if we go back there.