Day 6: Sparks, NV to Austin, NV and Day 7: Austin, NV to Ely, NV

For our last night at Sparks UMC I decided to sleep outside in an enclosed courtyard. The guy from the church told us that the sprinklers would be off because it was Thursday. Around 1:15 AM we found out that he was a LIAR and I was absolutely soaked, along with all my gear. There’s video of me walking in soaking wet but my mom would be disappointed in me if I posted a video with such foul language on my blog.

Thankfully all of my stuff dried out by 5AM wake-up and all’s well that ends well. We did a lot more running on Route 50—the Loneliest Highway in America—and there’s not a whole lot to say about that. I ran with Emily, Jackie, and Evan. It was a solid group. Our first leg was really uphill and after that it was pretty much pancake flat. On the last leg, Evan and I paced Jackie and Emily to a ~8:00 mile after they asked us to.

How could we not stop for a picture with THE historic Middlegate

Speaking of pacing, this is a great, natural transition to one of the first things we did after arriving in Austin, NV (population 192!!). Evan, Luke, Rob, and I all paced Ryan for a 1 mile time trial. I’m going to write a separate post on Project: Return shortly, because I have a lot of thoughts on the matter. The short version for today is that Ryan was diagnosed with cancer in high school shortly after running his 1 mile PR, 5:30, and that he wants to run close to 5:30 again now that he’s a few years removed from treatment. This part of Ryan’s story really resonated with me, after I was sick with Crohn’s Disease in high school it felt so good to beat my pre-Crohn’s times. So I told Ryan that by the time we get to Boston he would run a fast mile and, thus, Project: Return was born. I’ll go more into detail about everything later but Ryan ran a 6:17 mile after a 10 mile day, on a windy dirt track, at ~6,500 ft of elevation. Definitely a great starting point for the summer!

Ryan after his 6:17

After dinner a large group of us decided that we needed to decompress and see what life was like in such a small Nevada town. What better way to do that than by visiting the local bar? It was called the Owl Club and it was a TIME! I tried a few local beers and they were great. My favorite was called the Icthyosaur IPA and it had one of the coolest labels I’ve ever seen. The Icthyosaur was an ancient fish/dinosaur and the label was a full-skeleton fossil of an Icthyosaur. We played some pool, sang some bad karaokee, pet the BEAUTIFUL dog that came in, and mingled with locals. I think we probably saw the entire town in the bar. Unfortunately, the shirt I wore still smells like cigs because the bar allows smokers, despite not being part of a theatrical production.

After going back to Austin HS (home of the Broncos and the Fillies!), we looked up and couldn’t believe the stars. I’ve never seen so many stars! I always think we can see a lot when Cait and I go camping in the Poconos but holy cow, this was something else. Once we determined there were no sprinklers, I convinced a group of 4 or 5 to sleep outside under the stars, even though it got down to like 35 degrees. My bag is rated for 15 degrees so no worries! Woke up with the beautiful sunrise and I was ready for another day.

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On day 7 we were traveling from Austin to Ely, NV. It’s pronounced « eelie, » not « Eli. » Seems wrong to me but ok. Day 7 was our first day running over 10 miles (11) and it felt… basically the same. I ran with Luke all day, Rob hopped in for our first leg which was by far the hardest. Our first mile was entirely uphill and I think we wound up at like 7200 ft of elevation. The air felt incredibly thin. We met this guy named Dan from Denver who was driving cross country and camping out along the way, just him and his German Shepherd. So wholesome. Dan was really cool and he told us that his father, Anthony, had died of cancer, so some of us will dedicate miles to Anthony. Our second mile of this leg was downhill and thus, much more fun!

The rest of my miles with Luke were pretty uneventful. We talked a lot about running, life, and roller coasters. We got moving throughout the day, our last 3 mile leg averaged 7:00 per mile and that was pretty fun.

The excitement of the day was actually my need to use the bathroom on the side of the road. This may come as a surprise to some but on the loneliest highway, in the high desert, there aren’t many places to, uh, GO. I was looking around for some cover and I found this one rock that perfectly hid my squatting body. The picture speaks for itself!

When we arrived at St. Bartholomew’s Episcopal Church in Ely, we were greeted by a friendly congregation and a magnificent spread. Burgers, brats, portabellos, salad, desert, every kind of juice. This congregation went HARD! Everyone was so kind. I met an older woman who was a cancer survivor who used to teach the history of the English language at UNLV and she was pretty impressed that I knew what and when the Battle of Hastings was. Thanks, Mr. Connelly! Anyway she was really interesting and now owns 11 tortoises of 4 different species. Learned a lot about tortoises and it was fascinating.

I really can’t say enough about the good people of Ely, NV. They’ve been hosting 4K teams for something like 10 years now and it was pretty clear that what we’re doing really matters to them. Overall, a pretty good experience in Ely. It got down to 31 degrees at night! Glad I opted to stay inside… this morning we’re crossing another state line as we’re off to Delta, UT. Schoch out!