I enjoy this mornings sleep-in. The Big news on ESPN, a sports channel, is the controversial move of Brett Favre, legendary quarterback of the Green Bay Packers, to the New York Jets. This story has been headlining for a month now. Favre had decided to retire at the end of last season. His third such decision in 3yrs. This summer he decides again to come back again but on this occasion the club, or franchise, decide they want to go with Favre's young understudy Quarterback Aaron Rodgers. The story has twisted and turned throughout July with Favre wanting to stay at Green Bay but not wanting to be no.2 to Rodgers. At one point Green Bay offer Favre 20 million to stay retired. Finally this bizarre but fascinating saga appears to have been resolved.
At 9am I go over to the hardware store and come away not with a hand pump but a shiny new foot pump. I'm happy enough with this as the foot pump is compact andwill allow me to get sufficient pressure into the tyres. Back in the room I'm not looking forward to hitting the road. I'm still smarting after yesterday's travails and I don't really want to do the 70 miles to Austin.
Rather than set out resentful of the journey ahead which, I reason, would spoil the memory of the experience I decide to stay on in Eureka. Its a curious wee town and oddly pretty. Like its counterpart in Utah and so many of the towns in the mountains of Nevada this was a mining town.
Established in 1864 in the lee of a high ridge which overlooks the town. Eureka became the birthplace of the slver-lead smelting industry in the U.S. For just over a decade to 1879 it was a major producer of pig lead. Once the mines began to yield profitable quantities of ore the boom was on. Very quickly the town had 250 buildings and a population of 700 people. By the mid-1870's the population rose to over 9,000. Most of the early citizens of Eureka were Irish and Cornish miners. They were joined German, Italian, Chinese and Jewish settlers. There were 16 furnaces and ore refineries in the town belching out vast quantities of noxious fumes and creating two massive slag heaps of waste at either end of the town. By the mid-1880's every tree within 50 miles of the town had been consumed to feed the furnaces. Today the slag heaps remain today, long after the refineries which produced them have disappeared.
By 1885 the ore rich seams had been exhausted. The boom was over. Today its obvious the town has seen better days. There are a number of vacant lots on the main street. A few of the buildings look rundown. But the town has the feel of a lively place. A number of the buildings built at the height of the boom have been restored and look really impressive. There is a ubiquitous casino, seemingly a compulsory feature of even the smallest village in Nevada. There are a couple of diners, a bar and, among other institutions, a library and even a museum.
I spent the day keeping an eye on the opening round of the U.S. PGA golf tournament where Padraig Harrington features prominently early on. In the middle of the day Brenda, the lady who runs the motel, called in to see if I needed anything. Earlier she had reserved a room for me at a motel in Austin where she knows someone. I was grateful as I wasn't even sure Austin had any motels as it appears as a small settlement on the map. We ended up chatting for a while. Brenda would like to visit 3 countries in Europe. Ireland, Scotland and Switzerland. A few years ago she and a friend had planned to visit Ireland but, sadly, the friend was diagnosed with cancer and died before the trip could be made. She asked if I'd send her a postcard from Ireland when I get back and I'll be happy to oblige. She loves horse racing and likes to watch the big horse race held 'over there'. Which, to be honest, I think she means the Aintree Grand national.
We were joined a portly Mexican lad who stays at the motel. He's heard of Belfast, "a rocking town man!!" (Mmmm, it certainly rocked through the 70's and 80's) and really liked U2 back in the 80s "when they were good". He reckons they were the best thing to come out of Ireland but he also liked the Cranberries.
In the afternoon I strolled around town. A brief shower of hail suddenly fell. There I was strolling up the middle of the main street in my t-shirt and shorts through a hailstorm and yet, not one hailstone landed on me - bizarre. I had a look into the local museum which was actually quite good. Leaving that I bumped into three girls of the Bike and Build I'd met on the way to Ely on Tuesday. I said hello and found out they'd stayed on in Ely yesterday. Today on the way up here they'd been caught in a big storm. The earlier hailstorm had been a remnant of this.
I went back to the room to check up on Padraig Harrington's progress before heading back up town around 5pm to get food. The supermarket here wasn't great so I decided to eat in a diner where I ordered a burger and chips..... I mean fries. All the staff here were Mexican and when I went to pay for the meal a loud "Hey, Belfast!!!" rang out from the kitchen. I looked up and saw the lad I'd been chatting to earlier. He was the chef. I laughed as he played air guitar to some unknown U2 song.
At 9am I go over to the hardware store and come away not with a hand pump but a shiny new foot pump. I'm happy enough with this as the foot pump is compact andwill allow me to get sufficient pressure into the tyres. Back in the room I'm not looking forward to hitting the road. I'm still smarting after yesterday's travails and I don't really want to do the 70 miles to Austin.
Rather than set out resentful of the journey ahead which, I reason, would spoil the memory of the experience I decide to stay on in Eureka. Its a curious wee town and oddly pretty. Like its counterpart in Utah and so many of the towns in the mountains of Nevada this was a mining town.
Established in 1864 in the lee of a high ridge which overlooks the town. Eureka became the birthplace of the slver-lead smelting industry in the U.S. For just over a decade to 1879 it was a major producer of pig lead. Once the mines began to yield profitable quantities of ore the boom was on. Very quickly the town had 250 buildings and a population of 700 people. By the mid-1870's the population rose to over 9,000. Most of the early citizens of Eureka were Irish and Cornish miners. They were joined German, Italian, Chinese and Jewish settlers. There were 16 furnaces and ore refineries in the town belching out vast quantities of noxious fumes and creating two massive slag heaps of waste at either end of the town. By the mid-1880's every tree within 50 miles of the town had been consumed to feed the furnaces. Today the slag heaps remain today, long after the refineries which produced them have disappeared.
By 1885 the ore rich seams had been exhausted. The boom was over. Today its obvious the town has seen better days. There are a number of vacant lots on the main street. A few of the buildings look rundown. But the town has the feel of a lively place. A number of the buildings built at the height of the boom have been restored and look really impressive. There is a ubiquitous casino, seemingly a compulsory feature of even the smallest village in Nevada. There are a couple of diners, a bar and, among other institutions, a library and even a museum.
I spent the day keeping an eye on the opening round of the U.S. PGA golf tournament where Padraig Harrington features prominently early on. In the middle of the day Brenda, the lady who runs the motel, called in to see if I needed anything. Earlier she had reserved a room for me at a motel in Austin where she knows someone. I was grateful as I wasn't even sure Austin had any motels as it appears as a small settlement on the map. We ended up chatting for a while. Brenda would like to visit 3 countries in Europe. Ireland, Scotland and Switzerland. A few years ago she and a friend had planned to visit Ireland but, sadly, the friend was diagnosed with cancer and died before the trip could be made. She asked if I'd send her a postcard from Ireland when I get back and I'll be happy to oblige. She loves horse racing and likes to watch the big horse race held 'over there'. Which, to be honest, I think she means the Aintree Grand national.
We were joined a portly Mexican lad who stays at the motel. He's heard of Belfast, "a rocking town man!!" (Mmmm, it certainly rocked through the 70's and 80's) and really liked U2 back in the 80s "when they were good". He reckons they were the best thing to come out of Ireland but he also liked the Cranberries.
In the afternoon I strolled around town. A brief shower of hail suddenly fell. There I was strolling up the middle of the main street in my t-shirt and shorts through a hailstorm and yet, not one hailstone landed on me - bizarre. I had a look into the local museum which was actually quite good. Leaving that I bumped into three girls of the Bike and Build I'd met on the way to Ely on Tuesday. I said hello and found out they'd stayed on in Ely yesterday. Today on the way up here they'd been caught in a big storm. The earlier hailstorm had been a remnant of this.
I went back to the room to check up on Padraig Harrington's progress before heading back up town around 5pm to get food. The supermarket here wasn't great so I decided to eat in a diner where I ordered a burger and chips..... I mean fries. All the staff here were Mexican and when I went to pay for the meal a loud "Hey, Belfast!!!" rang out from the kitchen. I looked up and saw the lad I'd been chatting to earlier. He was the chef. I laughed as he played air guitar to some unknown U2 song.
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