MarkBC: Where are you going in central and eastern Nevada if you do not mind me asking?
Darryl
OK, you asked for it, my long-winded answer:
For me, "Eastern Nevada" traditionally means Great Basin National Park...I have "a thing" for GBNP, it seems.
I've been there lots of times -- more midwinter than during the warmer months....Maybe because my first trip there -- between Xmas and New Years 15 to 20 years ago -- was so freakin' incredible...I can't get over it.
I love everything along US 50 "the loneliest road in America" (once you get east of Fallon, anyway). When driving direct from Bend, OR (instead of from my folks house east of Redding, CA) I usually go Burns, OR to Winnemucca to Battle Mt. then head south on NV 305 to Austin, then head east on US 50...maybe stop at, maybe spend the night at, Spenser Hot Springs (if snowy-roads permit), then continue east on 50 through Eureka and then Ely, the last real town before GBNP. (I usually stop and do whatever serious web-surfing, photo-uploading, I need to do using the WiFi connection that leaks out of the county library, just off main street. Also stock up on whatever other provisions I need.)
Then 60 miles more to GBNP, where I've frequently been the only person camped that Xmas-NY week -- at least for a night or two of that week. At the NV/UT border -- literally straddling the border -- is the somewhat-funky-but-I-like-it Border Inn: Bar/restaurant/micro-casino on the NV side and motel on the UT side. (I've always wondered how they do their taxes...??) I've spent nights there when I got tired of camping/cold, and they have vehicle fuel and a micro-mart, too.
There's a lot more great stuff (for me, being empty enhances the greatness of otherwise non-spectacular places) in central NV, but in the winter there's snow to consider...even desert areas get snow when they're cold, and I don't like getting stuck.
Anyway, if I joined a WTW group in DV it would work out best for me if it was immediately after Xmas (like 26, 27-ish), so after heading east/south from my folks in Redding, when I got to Reno I'd head south on 395 instead of east on 80/50...and then after a day or two at DV head east/north-east into NV -- on my pilgrimage.