Elvis Christ

Elvis and Christ can both be seen in Ridgecrest, off Highway 395, on the corner of West Ridgecrest Blvd., 300 block, and South Warner Street, 100 block. They are there, side by side, unifying forces for an Art Attack. There they are, on the wall of an opaque stucco building with dark paper over the window and a locked door.

Pittsburgh Plate Glass Company

South of Lone Pine, on the shores of dusty Owens Lake, are the remains of a Pittsburgh Plate Glass plant. The caretakers live in the Administration Building, and they are happy to receive visitors. In fact, the ruins are so picturesque that photographers come regularly from everywhere, including from the prestigious Brooks Institute in Santa Barbara. If no one is there to let you in the imposing fence, just walk around to the east side, where no fence exists, and old rundown mobile homes add a nostalgic aroma to the deserted air. The plant is in Inyo County, and "Inyo” means Dwelling Place of the Great Spirit.

PHOENIX RTWORKS

In the town of Independence, on Highway 395, is PHOENIX RTWORKS. It is an art gallery, just the kind you would hope to find in B-West towns, funky and funny, far out and far in, and above all, enthusiastic. It is Exhibit A of the architectural dictum, "Outside equals inside." (Compare blog photos with graphics on www.phoenixrtworks.com.) Jack Pound, the artist, is a veritable "phoenix of creativity," choosing styles to suit his meaning and his mood. "Moonlight" is realistic. "Deliverance," "Magic," and "Divine" are abstract. "Phoenix" and "Awakening" are stylistic hybrids. Fine fun!

Twin Elevators, Big Pine

Big Pine is where, a turn east goes to the Bristlecone Pine Forest in the White Mountains. And where a west turn leads to the Palisade Glaciers. Either way is glorious, of course, but neither way is any better than staying right in town and, behind an old motel, hiking out to the Twin Grain Elevators, covered with graffiti and positioned just right to squeeze the sun before it sets behind the 14,000-foot peaks of the Sierra Nevada.

BofA becomes Calvary Chapel

On the main street of Bishop, just past the main part of downtown, on the west side of the street, is Calvary Chapel. It's used to be Bank of America. The letters B-A-N-K -o-f-A-M-E-R-I-C-A are just visible on the fading red stucco. The Chapel hosts the Presidential Prayer Team.

Bishop Christian Center

They say all religions intend to go where people are. The Bishop Christian Center is certainly doing its small part in the total scheme of things. No doubt, Americans these days are at the shopping mall. So that's where Bishop Christians put their Center, right at the corner of a giant rectangle formed by stores and parking lot, not far from Rite-Aid and just down from Domino's.

Nicely's Restaurant

The stars are bright on Highway 395. If you look up, you will look back into the past. If you stop at Nicely's Restaurant in Lee Vining, you will eat your way into the past. Want good old fashioned 1950s food nicely served--fried chicken, French fries, and baked apple pie a la mode? Nicely's is your kind of place. And here's a bit of nostalgia for you: participants in the Ansel Adams Yosemite Workshops used to spent one night on the east side around Mono Lake. The whole group would gather for a convivial Nicely's evening meal. Maybe the next morning for breakfast too, after shooting the sunrise.

Big Box

Just north of Topaz Lake, still in the state of Nevada, is an abandoned trailer. Actually it is the universe turned on its side, complete with black hole. The dark side is the past, the light side, with its graffiti predictions, is the future. Or is it just the opposite? In any case, once inside you are in the present. You will note that there are few windows that open in either direction.

Chocolate Nugget

Outside Chocolate Nugget in Washoe Valley on Highway 395 is something very peculiar. A gunslinger looks up the hill at a miner. The gunslinger is clearly male. You can tell. The miner looks male too. He is stocky. He wears a beard. He has on women's pants, however! An artistic fence runs close by.

Wind Drift Farm

Imagine a northern California Disneyland gone to ruin. No, better, imagine that everybody just walked away from Knott's Berry Farm in 1955, never to return, except for the occasional curiosity seeker. Now, stop imagining and go to Wind Drift Farm just north (actually east) of Standish, which in turn is north (actually east) of Susanville, on Highway 395. Several signs say, "Don't Hurt the Nature," but they should read, "Don't Hurt the Culture," for nature here is doing fine. Wind Drift Farm is where nature planted the human imagination and let it go to seed. Seeds, as everyone knows, are quite nourishing.

Full Gospel Lighthouse

They say that a photograph is worth a thousand words. If that is true, and if you want to see what rural religion is like in America,then drive north of Doyle on Highway 395 and look for the Pentecostal Church of God's Full Gospel Lighthouse on the right. White sign, white clapboard, dark windows, darkened door, strange sky.

Glory Temple Church

South of Carson City, south of where Highway 395 is no longer a freeway, is the Glory Temple Church. It is an old house, whitewashed, with a white picket fence. Coming from the north, just before the church, a sign reads, "Glory T. C. Slow Down." They want you to slow down because of traffic coming to church. And because they don't want you to miss their church. And because they want your presence at church.

Religious Conversion

The building that used to be a church in Constantia is now in Doyle, on Highway 395 south of Honey Lake. It is owned by a local historical society. In 2006 it was under rehabilitation. Surely, now, in 2008, it is as good as new. "It's 150 to 200 years old," the painter who was painting it said. This claim has not been verified. The town of Doyle plans to use it for civic events. This is a good example of how Americans handle the separation of church and state on the local level. [This article provides insufficient context for those unfamiliar with the subject. Please improve it.]

The Little Church by the 395 Way

A little green church sits on edge of California's Long Valley Caldera, where long ago a big explosion took take that scattered ash all across the American West. It's where Benton Crossing Road runs into Highway 395. This is just north of Lake Crowley. It's an almost picturesque little church. On a nice, white picket fence are two signs. One denotes ownership. The other forbids trespassing. Clearly, the Regency discourages entry. The question is, what kind of research goes on here?

Tom's Place

Tom's Place is trinitarian: a store, a bar, and a cafe. Tom's Place is on Highway 395 south of Mammoth Lakes and north of Bishop. Beer ads in neon light up the store. Bosoms and butts hang on the walls in the bar. Photos and TV fill the cafe. A history of the place is on the menu. Downstairs are the restrooms, "reserved" for those "with gas." Outside on the concrete deck people read on three wooden benches, one in front of each member of the trinity. A gazebo is attached, decorated with license plates and full of people communing. Beyond it Rock Creek flows by on its way to grace LA.

Doyle Grocery Hotel

Doyle is on U.S. Highway 395 south of Honey Lake. The Grocery Hotel is on the north side of the town park, a nice park with a gazebo and tepee and a dog who comes by to check you out and carefully marks the part that is his. The owner said, "The hotel is functional. It's old Grandma's house, with a living room, dining room, kitchen, and 7 bedrooms, all with double beds. We're a well-kept secret. You should know that the famous lizard races are the first week in August. The world champion just pulled into town. He did six feet in 0.9 seconds."

Hallelujah Junction

Where Highway 70 comes down from the Sierra Nevada and meets Highway 395 is Hallelujah Junction. Once it was a bar. A reverend on tour said, "Hallelujah ought to be a church, not a bar." Then, for a while it doubled as a terminal, when Highway 70 was closed. Pilots used the pavement for a runway. "I guess they thought it was the promised land," a local man once said. Now it's a Shell Station doubling as a lottery bar. All filling stations. It never was a church.

Bordertown

Humans like edges ... borders ... boundaries. We like to be on them, though we might fall off. We like to cross over them, into other humans' territory, though it may be strange. Misanthropes, remember this about us. Be thankful for the wander gene, that makes us cross from California into Nevada at Bordertown, where new vistas unfold and new ventures beckon. Go ahead, put money in the machine. It Pays to Play.

Just Stuff

The road from Surprise Valley over Fandango Pass lets you down gently in New Pine Creek, astraddle north-south Highway 395 running down the east side of the Cascades and the Sierra Nevada from Canada almost to Mexico, and astraddle the east-west running state line, more in Oregon than California. The town has collected existence and stored it everywhere, in whatnots and in roosters and ravens made of whatnot, in homes and front yards of whatnot. In the center of town is Just Stuff, where things used by the past to bring order are jammed up against one another, pots to pot and chair to chair, so the present can reach in, pick out, and buy to order the future.

The store is justly famous, for it was here early in the twenty-first century that the owner first proclaimed the Gospel According to Just Stuff. "I run this by myself, "just an old gal like me. Mom had it when she was a girl. You'd better believe I have a lot of stuff. I'd better have a lot of stuff if I'm going to make it in this business, and a lot for every different taste."