Walker Lake stroll
Walker Lake Recreation Area, Stillwater BLM
(map link)
After driving far too late into the night, I finally found myself a spot at Tamarack Beach Campground along Walker Lake. This is one of a pair of free Bureau of Land Management campgrounds along the lake. It looks small, but tent campers are allowed to drive down to the lake to find a site as they like. I kept to a pull in site rather than risk getting mired in the sand. A walk beside the lake seemed a sensible thing to do while I was there, so that's what I did.
I headed off first to see what the danger signs I'd passed in the dark were about. They simply warn that the south shores are off limits and may contain unexploded munitions. The south shores are part of the Hawthorne Army Depot, which lays claim to being the largest munitions storage area in the world. Not a problem for me as I was headed north. I followed the generally compacted road down to the shore and followed it north. There were only a few soft spots that could easily be avoided.
Walker Lake is currently shrinking. It was one stocked with fish, but they can now the salt has become too concentrated and it can no longer sustain the fish. It is not entirely dead, though. Clearly there is an algae that can survive and I saw other little movements once I started looking.
I continued around, enjoying the variations on shoreline that came up and the colorful mountains across the way.
As I got near to the north end of the lake, there was a road up to the highway, or at least that's what my map said. I headed for it and found it without much difficulty. There was a bit more life on the land as I got away from the lake.
I let the geocachers before me dictate my route back a little. Had I not done that, I'd likely have taken the old highway back. It climbs a little across from where I met the highway and has a connection down to the campground where I started. Instead, I stopped by one side, then crossed over and walked behind the guard rail to poke around on the other side, then found my way down to Twentymile Beach Campground.
Twentymile Beach Campground has two bathrooms, one on each long arm with a loop at the end, but is missing the pull in spots. It is also free now, but had a box to collect fees. I decided I was in the better campground for me before finding a way to wander cross country back to it.
*photo album*
©2022 Valerie Norton
Written 14 Mar 2022
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