Road Trip To The Eastern Sierras

[goody90q45]

I've owned my Q for over 3 years now and with every road trip I expand my distance away from home. Two injector lower o-ring failures early in ownership tend to make this Q owner a bit leery about traveling too far from home but after 3 years and 30,000 miles I think I'll be OK.

I'm at the start of an 8 day vacation driving about 1000 miles total and thought you all would enjoy some pictures of the Eastern Sierra Nevada area. Yesterday started with a drive from Sacramento to Crowley Lake near Mammoth Lakes, CA. Before the summit there's a couple of resort lakes at about the 7500' level. This is Silver Lake and there's still quite a bit of snow at lake level even though it was mid-June and 75 degrees.

Just over the summit (Monitor Pass, 8500') is this great view of the Carson Valley (I think) on the east side of the Sierras. A lot of what you're seeing is in Nevada. It was a little bit smokey yesterday from a couple of fires.

Another nice view along the way was of Mono Lake. It was drained by the people of L.A. many decades ago and turned salty but has been gradually refilling. In another 20-30 years it might return to normal.

The wife has the look of anxiousness that a wife gets when you stop to take too many times to take pictures. She complains when I smoke in the car also so I was thinking the photo ops were a win-win. She's not into cars and nature quite as much as me.

A really nice (and clean) rest area near Mammoth Lakes. The state of Calfornia out did themselves on this one.

We arrived at the campground the in-laws are staying at in their RV. The wife's entire family is here (15 people) and it gets a little cowded during meal time. Nice view of the lake and the Sierras though.

Fortunately for the wife and I as an incentive to drive 300 miles to visit in laws, her parents put us up in this nice lodge with an even nicer view of the lake and the Sierras. Better than camping and in-room coffee and a warm bed has its benefits.

Crowley Lake. At 6500' elevation you would think this lake would have ice around it but the water is green with lots of moss floating around and the fish are big. Anchored in the middle of the lake and fishing off the bottom my sister-in-law and I caught our limit this morning in a few hours with the smallest trout being 12" and the largest 17". All had big girths from eating all the bugs that feed on the algae. If you fish in CA you know that you're lucky to catch a trout much less one larger than 8" long.

I got 22 mpg on the first day drive and the Q ran great. Lots of power over the 8500' passes and the Q puts just about all cars to shame while climbing at that altitude. We're off to Mammoth Lakes tomorrow for some more fishing and I'll post up some more pics. We'll be driving through Yosemite on Wednesday.

[maxnix]

Congratulations for restoring a G50 and using it properly as Nissan and your chosen deity intended!

[greenwar]

Lots of power over the 8500' passes and the Q puts just about all cars to shame while climbing at that altitude.

Nice pictures. I know exactly what you mean in terms of passing power at high altitude. I was in the sierras few weeks ago driving a friend's 02 I35 (it's got enough power for a v6). A 540i BMW was behind us. When it started climbing the hills, I35 was no match for it. Made me miss my Q45.

BTW, your Q looks great.

[Razi]

Wow what a cool trip. Me and my dad should take one in his Q45.

[unknown007]

Hope you have lots of fun and the car keeps doing it's great job that it's doing.Hit me back when your back home.

[goody90q45]

Monday- All 12 of us went to June Lake this morning. At an elevation of 7600' it was pretty chilly at 7am. The Q performed admirably climbing over the 8500' Deadman summit and had no problem doing 70mph the entire climb and could have easily given more. The lake is stocked with pan sized trout and I caught my limit for the second day in a row. It's been a good vacation so far.

Some old f@rt with sunburned legs who thinks he can fish. We rented a small 4 person fishing boat and a 10 person pontoon (party) boat and stayed on the lake until about 1pm.

On the return trip the wife and I took a short drive to Convict Lake at about 7900' elevation. The fishing is not as good but the scenery can't be beat. The Q needs a wash bad after 3 days in the dirt but I haven't seen a car wash anywhere. It may have to wait a couple of days until we're closer to civilization.

On a side note I phoned a old friend today looking for a phone # of an old classmate that lives up this way. Russ lives in L.A. and works as a locomotive engineer for the Southern Pacific Railroad. He relayed a story about a load of 3 rail cars carrying 72 Infinitis that flipped over on a curve and destroyed every one of the cars. It cost the engineer his job (too fast on the curve) and the railroad $1.2 million for the damages.
Modified by goody94q45 at 5:44 PM 6/16/2008

[elwesso]

Fabulous pics goody!!! The last pic in your last post is AWESOME!

This is what the Q was built to do! Mr Myiagi would be happy!

[maxnix]

Why fly when you can travel Q class?

[Dabizzo1]

Dood, your Q looks great even dirty. Wonderful scenery. Even my wife who could not care less about our car forum loved the pics. I'm taking my Q to Ray Brandt Infiniti to get my valve cover gaskets redone (107k on the clock), replace the valley coolant line of doom, and to replace the only remaining white top injector(#4) for my road trip to Navarre Beach, FLA. in August. I just don't have the time to do it, but I'm stoked about a road trip in the Q...Yvette sleeps the whole way in the Q whenever we go anywhere. Can't wait to see more pics. Have a great time. Boris

[MinisterofDOOM]

Great pics! Enjoy the vacation!

[BadQ45t]

Great shots, I love the eastern sierra's, totally under-rated.

I lived in Mammoth Lakes for a year and pretty much grew up there with the folks owning a condo during my youth. Point of record, Mono Lake is a natural salt lake, for sure the DWP of LA did take lots of the water, but the salt levels are natural. They have grown brine shrimp in the lake since the 30's before LA started really stealing lots of water.

Crowley Lake looked like levels were okay, at one point that Lake nearly disappeared and they lost 10's of miles of the Lake due to LA Department of Water & Power. Refresher courses can be had by watching "China Town".

BTW, no car wash in Mammoth but there used to be a you-wash it sprayer place. Eat at Whiskey Creek when you there to reward your wife for all those miles, great food.

[Q45man1]

Nice pics Mike. I took the Sequioa and Yosemite trip 2 years ago and enjoyed that a lot.

Enjoy your vacation.

[goody90q45]

Great shots, I love the eastern sierra's, totally under-rated.

Since you guys seem to be enjoying the pics I'll add a few more showing today's journeys. Thanks for all the nice words. The Q and I (and the wife) are having a great time so far. Sorry about the mixup with Crowley and Mono Lakes. I was close though.

Today we took a drive up to Mammoth Lakes and Devil's Postpile (DP)National Monument. We had to take a shuttle bus 10 miles down into the valley so no pics of the Q at DP but I got some nice shots even without a Q45 in it. It was an easy 1/4 mile hike from the shuttle drop-off to DP. Nice rocks. Same old f@rt that was in a previous pic showed up here too. Small world.

We decided to take an easy 2 1/2 mile hike downstream along the river to a pack station and general store and verified that it was an easy hike (at 8500' elevation). "All the trails in this park are downhill" one of the experienced hikers on the trail told us so we took his word and headed down the path. The trail turned out to be 20% downhill and 80% uphill. We were beat at the end. Along the way though was another DP turned 90 degrees on its side. Nice rocks.

Along the way we walked through a forest devastated by a fire in 1992. It's a shame that at this elevation this area will probably not recover in any of our lifetimes.

On the way out of the park we went to the Minarets overlook. They're the jagged peaks in the middle of the pic. On the far right are some peaks inside Yosemite National Park. It was quite a bit smokey today since there was a forest fire on the western slopes about 50 miles away. A beautiful view regardless from 9100' elevation.

I forgot to mention that I brought Nissan Data Scan and my laptop with me to show my nephew who just bought the 90 Supra Turbo from his brother who bought it from me. This is the road that starts at the Lodge and ends at the Sheriff's Station, about 2 1/2 miles straight as an arrow. I was living large last night and we had some fun at about 7pm doing 0-100 mph speed runs since I was trying to get some baseline data on a couple of items. I think most of the Popo were on their dinner break.

We're leaving the eastern Sierras tomorrow morning, driving over the 10,000'+ Tioga Pass, and touring through Yosemite valley tomorrow. If I have internet service at the motel I should be able to post up some great shots of the Q (and Yosemite) tomorrow night. Happy Trails.

[goody90q45]

We left Crowley Lake on the eastern side of the Sierras this morning and drove about 200 miles through Yosemite National Park ending up in Merced in the San Jouquin Valley. We're only about 120 miles from home but need to go to Monterey on the coast tomorrow morning and with the price of gas it's cheaper to stay in a motel overnight.

Along the way today I got some great pics of Yosemite and the Q. Since we entered on the east side of the park there's a lot of different scenery other than Half Dome, El Capitan and Yosemite Falls.

This is a lake just outside the entrance to the park.

Half Dome from the east side.

I'm not sure where this was but it was worth a picture.

A nice meadow in the Toulemne Meadows area above the valley floor.

An old, bald man standing next to the Q.

The Q and the Mrs. at Yosemite Falls.

This is probably the last installment of this thread since the next four days will be spent in Monterey with a girlfriend of the wife. The Q ran great during the entire trip but did need a top off off radiator fluid at the top of Tioga Pass at 10,000' elevation. I pushed her pretty hard up the hill. There's no water up there and after I used the gallon of 50/50 mix in my trunk the ranger gave me a gallon of clean dishwater from their breakroom. I'm very happy with the way the Q performed and the gas mileage (18-22 mpg) was on par with most other 6 cylinder cars. All in all it's been a great vacation and I hope everyone has enjoyed the pics.

[maxnix]

You added the spoiler to a standard, right?

What's the paint code?

[3Q Jay]

KK0

Goody-great road trip!!

[Peterofdevon]

Love this color. I worked for the Franklin Templeton Group in the 90s and my boss, (the owner's son) had a grey one. At the time I had my first one too and I boasted it up. Of course I couldn't buy the $2M condo my boss did in Palisades.

Speaking about NV drives, I was in reno this week and the best road I've ever driven on for sweeping big turns and great surfaces is between Trucke and Reno, Rt 80. I had a rental and wished I had one of my Q ships.

peter