18 October ‘06
This morning we headed down Highway 95 again. The scenery was much more exciting on this leg. Still lots of straight highway punctuated with a few mountain passes. The sun was warming but the wind was cooling. We pulled into a large graveled area along side of the road to have lunch and as we settled down we noticed that we had pulled into a truck parking lot for the local “Brothel”. Now you don’t see this just anywhere… In today’s travel we have now encountered 4…that’s in the last 180 miles…most be money in this business… Tonight we have pulled into a campground in Beatty Nevada. It’s called Beatty’s Hot Springs RV Park, and with the camping fees of $18 it includes your enjoyment in their “Natural Artesian Hot Spring Pools”. They have 3 pool houses which house a large private pool. Each pool has a different temperature range, with the lowest range running from 98-101 and the hottest from 105-109. The water comes in directly from the ground and exits out through a large pipe to a small river that flows away from the campground. This operation was originally built to supply water for the steam engines of the Tonopah & Tidewater Railroad in 1906. The fresh clear sulfur free water worked best for the engines and now it works well for me…we both really enjoyed a long dip. The room and pool are about 20 feet square. The pool is down 5 steps from the door area and the floor of the water is small rocks. The water comes up through the rocks and then exits out a pipe under the stairs. I was amazed at how clear and clean the water was and the rocks on the bottom, absolutely without any trace of slime. Then it was out to see a little bit of Death Valley…well not quite, we just entered the roadway heading there. We went to see Rhyolite, the town that went from boom to bust like a lot of other towns that got their start about 1900. Rhyolite reached its peak in 1907 with about 10,000 residents. It had gained the attention of investors in New York and San Francisco, but the gold was not to appear to anyone but the first mine. Even that one, the Montgomery wasn’t profitable…well we saw a few of the remaining buildings and what’s left of their cemetery. Both were posted with “WATCH OUT FOR RATTLESNAKES !!!”, but none were found. To get to the cemetery we had to drive a gravel/dirt road for a couple of miles and then swing into the sage for about 100 yards. Most of the graves were nothing but a wooden board sticking up from the ground and unfortunately nothing was left to tell us who it was that was buried there. Seeing as how we are here in Beatty, and the signs tell us that this is the “Gateway to Death Valley”, we are going to stay one more day. Tomorrow….DEATH VALLEY or at least a part of it…
This morning we headed down Highway 95 again. The scenery was much more exciting on this leg. Still lots of straight highway punctuated with a few mountain passes. The sun was warming but the wind was cooling. We pulled into a large graveled area along side of the road to have lunch and as we settled down we noticed that we had pulled into a truck parking lot for the local “Brothel”. Now you don’t see this just anywhere… In today’s travel we have now encountered 4…that’s in the last 180 miles…most be money in this business… Tonight we have pulled into a campground in Beatty Nevada. It’s called Beatty’s Hot Springs RV Park, and with the camping fees of $18 it includes your enjoyment in their “Natural Artesian Hot Spring Pools”. They have 3 pool houses which house a large private pool. Each pool has a different temperature range, with the lowest range running from 98-101 and the hottest from 105-109. The water comes in directly from the ground and exits out through a large pipe to a small river that flows away from the campground. This operation was originally built to supply water for the steam engines of the Tonopah & Tidewater Railroad in 1906. The fresh clear sulfur free water worked best for the engines and now it works well for me…we both really enjoyed a long dip. The room and pool are about 20 feet square. The pool is down 5 steps from the door area and the floor of the water is small rocks. The water comes up through the rocks and then exits out a pipe under the stairs. I was amazed at how clear and clean the water was and the rocks on the bottom, absolutely without any trace of slime. Then it was out to see a little bit of Death Valley…well not quite, we just entered the roadway heading there. We went to see Rhyolite, the town that went from boom to bust like a lot of other towns that got their start about 1900. Rhyolite reached its peak in 1907 with about 10,000 residents. It had gained the attention of investors in New York and San Francisco, but the gold was not to appear to anyone but the first mine. Even that one, the Montgomery wasn’t profitable…well we saw a few of the remaining buildings and what’s left of their cemetery. Both were posted with “WATCH OUT FOR RATTLESNAKES !!!”, but none were found. To get to the cemetery we had to drive a gravel/dirt road for a couple of miles and then swing into the sage for about 100 yards. Most of the graves were nothing but a wooden board sticking up from the ground and unfortunately nothing was left to tell us who it was that was buried there. Seeing as how we are here in Beatty, and the signs tell us that this is the “Gateway to Death Valley”, we are going to stay one more day. Tomorrow….DEATH VALLEY or at least a part of it…