On the everlasting quest to find convenient places to take the dogs out for an open space run with few to no other people around, I was first intending to check out The Narrows, an off-roading trail that extends from Fernley up to Pyramid Lake. The whole trail wasn't the goal, but just some part I could get to and have the dogs run free.

Unfortunately, one old entrance to the trail system was cemented off at the end of a highway exit, and the other seemed to have a cop blocking the entrance, so I was not wanting to spend more time searching for the other paths to that trail. I proceeded up the I-80 another 15 miles and found a non-technical dirt road system that seems to serve an oil pipeline, solar farms, and some other industrial sites interspersed around 1000s of acres of open land.

Parked near a "do not enter" sign near a reclaimed mine.

I was thinking to myself when getting to this wide expanse of a valley, that it's so hard to really capture that essence of "freedom" that I see in the Northern Nevada deserts. I think it's not only the openness of the area, but the small dirt roads that move about; seeing those makes me know that people have just decided to go a certain direction, and pioneered their way into new parts of the desert.

I also understand that true freedom would simply mean this place would either be a landfill or another industrial plant extracting all it can from the natural landscape. It's a recreational freedom, I guess.

I do hope that someday my photos can bring about that feeling of "recreational freedom". It needs depth, texture, and clarity about the little opportunity one can have by being in a place that just lets you explore any which direction by foot.

The dogs had a lot of fun running around, and I enjoyed the relatively flatness so I could keep track of them a bit better today.

Lil D jumps to evade Princess' attack.

Lil D was jumping all around this area. She loves openness as much as I do, taking advantage by going full sprints in every direction, and soon enough at Princess or Tuesday, sometimes to their surprise.

Tuesday does his lone wolf routine and takes the edges of the group, always looking for something to hunt or chase. This time there wasn't anything.

I really enjoyed the area, but it's an enjoyment of quiet desolation that's hard to truly capture for others. It's only when I go to canyons and forests that people seem to engage more with the photos. But ah well, that still means I get to enjoy these tracts of land for myself—and for the dogs.