Today we were supposed to rest and relax. Well, that's exactly what I did. Jim and Kathe hung around this morning doing chores. Then they decided to go out and explore the historic town of Truckee and have lunch. After a little shopping in the town, they headed for Jax at the Trax. Jax is a 1948 aluminium diner which was brought to Truckee from Pennsylvania. It was featured on the program Diners and Dives, so of course they had to eat there.
Kathe talked Jim into going to the Donner Memorial State Park where they watched a film about the fate of the Donner Party. There were also several interesting short videos about travel on the Donner road in the early days of automobile travel, and the building of the railroad tracks through the pass. 12,000 Chinese immigrants worked on the construction of the snow tunnels and a granite wall. The China Wall of the Sierras, as it was called, was built to support the train tracks.
The forest service built a bridge over the roughest parts of the summit road originally for the lumber industry. That road brought more automobiles to the Donner Summit Road. This bridge is called the Rainbow Bridge and was completed in the 1920's. It was quite a drive up to the 7,057 foot summit and they really enjoyed the day.
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