Gus told me about Hwy 50 back in the 90’s, as he used to like driving that long empty high desert 2-lane highway (skinny road) across part of Utah and then Nevada into Northern California to get to the SF Bay Area. I drove it many times since then and visit it in my mind more times than I can count during any year.
I wrote the lyrics to this and began to hum the tune while driving my first 25 hour trek through blissful nowhere on Hwy 50 from SF to Boulder.
This version slightly predates its first released appearance on "Half An Hour Away" with Gary and Lisa in 2001. It was also recorded with an Intro from the live studio sessions in Boulder in 2002 as part of "The Window" SACD.
Here is the Hwy 50 path from SF (beginning outside Tahoe) to Boulder. It’s a 25 hour drive mostly across high desert in Nevada, then coming down to desert rock in Utah. Back then Hwy 50 was proud to proclaim itself "The Loneliest Highway In America" with tattered billboard signs here and there through Calif., Nevada, and Utah. I don’t know what it calls itself now.
Lyrics
Meet Me In Eureka
- by David Elias
My life has been a 2-lane road to nowhere
And now I wonder if I am the only traveler there
And did I drive it drunk or was I sober
An empty road leaves little room
For anyone to care
And when I came between those empty boundaries
Were there fence posts or some arrows
Telling me ways to go
Or did I hide inside a dream from those who found me
What’s the difference and then how the hell would I know
Come see me in Eureka
In Nevada on a Sunday
Eight hours from Blind Valley
On the loneliest highway
We’ll both sit down and never find
A single thing to say
That’s how it is in lonely towns
On lonely old highways
I finally found where friends of mine been hiding
Way out on lone highways
In their vehicles of sin
A single wave says howdy and goodbye then
As we pass each other
Without looking back again
Come see me in Eureka
In Nevada on a Sunday
Eight hours from Blind Valley
On the loneliest highway
We’ll both sit down and never find
A single thing to say
That’s how it is in lonely towns
On lonely old highways
