I love the Motel Washoe sign. It’s located in Washoe City at the north end of the Washoe Valley, right on Hwy 395. There was a small motel here for years, and I imagine 40 years ago the sign was bright and clean and the neon shone all night. But now the motel has been demolished, and the sign is rusting, falling apart, it creaks in the wind, and many of the neon tubes are broken and gone. It really is a piece of Forgotten Nevada.

Last month I had some extra time so I stopped under a full moon to get some long-exposure photos of the sign. There was an awful orange glow over everything from the streetlight across the road, but I think I fixed a lot of that in Photoshop. I also have a 12V spotlight that I was able to shine and bring some extra illumination to the sign itself, to bring out the brilliant blues.

I think they turned out pretty well.

Here’s one from the daytime, a couple of years ago:

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