Monday August 20, 2012, Tonopah, NV

Monday August 20, 2012, Tonopah, NV
Our plan for today was to leave Las Vegas by 10 AM and drive as far as Tonopah. We planned to stay three nights at the Tonopah Station and then drive to Reno on Thursday.

Glenna on a cruise 2007

As my regular readers know, up until this year my mother, Glenna Wisnewski, has traveled with us most of the time. She hasn't been to Mexico since falling and breaking her hip there. She also didn't go with us on our last cruise. In April we had to place her in a memory care facility. She seemed to be doing pretty well there until a few weeks ago when she fell and was hospitalized. Nothing broken but on returning to the home she ate very little and eventually stopped eating altogether. Two weeks ago she was placed under hospice care. She continued to refuse to eat and would drink very little. Saturday the hospice put her in a hospital bed and on oxygen to try to ease her breathing. Yesterday I visited her with Gerri and her mother and our Minister from Church. She was having a hard time breathing and was asleep most of the time. She did seem to recognize us and would alternately hold my hand, hug me and sleep. I got a call that she passed away at 2:30 this morning.
We had already made arrangement with Palm Mortuary for cremation. We didn't plan on a memorial service or funeral here in Las Vegas. She will be interred with her husband of 46 years at the Riverside National Cemetery. We will arrange whatever graveside memorial that seems appropriate at that time
After a flurry of phone calls to make sure we really had all the bases covered, we left Las Vegas at 3:10 PM. We took Rainbow north to US95 to avoid a storm that seemed to be hovering over the route through Pahrump on SR-160. The way we went also eliminates a long hill out of the Las Vegas bowl and allows for more travel on four lane divided highway. It was windy most of the way with a lot of storm activity around the mountains on both sides of the road. In Indian Springs and several other places the road was wet where the storms had crossed. We got only a few sprinkles along the way and in spite of the wind we made good time, only having to slow below sixty a couple of times.

A Rainbow near Goldfield, NV

Just north of Beatty we got stuck in a construction zone with one way traffic, we had to wait about a half an hour. They are resurfacing the road, too bad they aren't making it four lanes. We got to Goldfield at about 6:30. There was beautiful rainbow in the east. Isn't a rainbow a reminder that God keeps his promises?
We got to the Tonopah Station Ramada Inn at 7:10 PM and found a pull through site, number 7. Our timing was good because while I was unhooking the Jeep two more units showed up taking the last unoccupied sites.

Sunset in Tonopah, NV

I got all hooked up, water, electric and sewer since we plan to stay three nights. The clouds we still hanging around in the distance, making for an awesome sunset. After registering and taking pictures of the sunset we had tacos for supper. The meat was leftovers that I froze a couple of weeks ago while Gerri was recuperating from her fall. In turn that meal was made from taco meat we had frozen after Chris and Cassie's going away party in March. Waste not, want not and leftovers get better each time they are served. BTW, we have more than enough left over for more than another meal.
I tried to return some of the condolence calls I got while driving, not too much luck. I will try again tomorrow to make the calls back and answer e-mails that came in today along with all the condolences on Facebook.
At about 10:30 I had to close the windows up because of heavy rain blowing in. It immediately got stuffy, so I had to turn on an air conditioner.
E-chores tonight, but I forgot the thump drive with my pack ups of the planned routes and other programs I use both at home and while traveling. No TV. For some reason the satellite wasn't locking on. I called DirecTV but we couldn't get it going. I may address it tomorrow or wait until we get to the RV Park in Reno.
It was a long day and after a shower I went to bed about midnight. Depending on the noise factor, I will sleep in tomorrow.