Side Trip to Castle Dome Ghost Town

 A life spent making mistakes is not only more honorable but more useful than a life spent doing nothing.

We have a little white board that keeps track of activities for our group.  On the white board we had scheduled a group photo.  Our professional photographer lined us all up and did a great job.  That was originally going to be the photo of the day.  But now we have about ten new faces that have arrived since or will be arriving.  We need a picture of them before we post the other photo.  So, we'll just have to wait for that one.

Another scheduled activity on the white board was the Friday trip  to the ghost town of Castle Dome.  It is an old mining town about 45 miles south.  The town first produced silver and then produced lead.  Instead of copying what is already available online, you can Google it if interested. 

We pulled out about 10:30 and returned about 5 hours later.    Not all of our group went but a good portion of us were also interested as well as curious enough to see what was there.

Castle Dome City

Fill'er up at 18.9 cents a gallon.

Outhouses over mining shaft

Leave your weapons at the bar

More bottles

Windows made from bottles

The settlement was old and many of the buildings had been reconstructed.  It was first established in about 1863 and partially existed until about 1988.  The town was extremely interesting to walk through.  We even discovered that Castle Dome was on the list of the Japanese to bomb during WWII should the war spread to US soil.  So much lead was produced (9,000,000 pounds) during that time period that it was considered one of their primary targets to destroy.

Mine shaft

We are continuing to play muscial RVs.  Friday morning we had two RVs move out.  Kimberly and Jerry moved closer to town so they could work at the Big Tent starting on Saturday.  Dave and Nancy moved a couple miles south of town to a new group.  We got them a few days and the other group gets them a few days.  We want them back!!

Church

We also had three new rigs move in ………….. including the returning rig of Jim and Sandie.  Sandie just couldn’t stand being in Apache Junction with all of us in Quartzsite.  Even though Jim has surgery scheduled later this month she convinced him that they needed to spend a few more days with us.  We were all happy about that too.

When Jim and Sandie headed back to Apache Junction a week or so ago the crowds weren’t quite here yet.  Well, they are now.

Check out the lines at the dump now!!  Terry emptied our tanks a little by using our little blue boy.

Today it’s off to the Desert Bar. That’s actually just about the last event this little group has planned for January. When the crowds grow parking places become harder to find.  The Big Tent becomes the entertainment and it’s just about time for everyone to think about moving on.

Activity on Kuehn -- hardly a parking spot available

The Big Tent opens today.  It'll run for nine days.  Toni, Doug and Lyn will be working with the vendors at the Big Tent.  The Big Tent is what many of these RV'ers come to town for.   They come to check it out and then they start going elsewhere.  That’s not so good for the town but really good for the RV'ers left  behind.  Once they are gone it’s easier to find a place to sit at in a restaurant and the lines aren’t so long every place else.


‘Tis life on the road.