Virginia City, NV

May 10, we crossed into the land of gambling, Nevada. Stopped in Winnemucca at the Model T hotel/casino/rv park for one night. Then went to Virginia City and stayed with Robert's funny and too cool Aunt Pat and Uncle George for a week, (Aunt Pat you can have your room back). It was nice to have a place to take a real shower and eat real food and not use a strange bathroom. Virginia City is so cool. Established in 1859 as a mining boomtown, it became the "richest place on earth" after the richest vein of silver the world has ever known, called the "Big Bonanza" was discovered there. Although there were two great fires that destroyed 2/3 of the city, many of the buildings are still from the 1860's. First, gold was discovered about 7 miles south. Following the gold up the canyon, gold mixed with high quality silver ore was known as the Comstock Lode. This gold and silver kept the Union solvent during the civil war. In 1865, Gold Hill (several miles down the mountain)and Virginia City mines produced over 1400 tons of ore daily. The Comstock Lode fueled the building of San Francisco. Virginia City had 30,000 population in the late 1800's and now has about 1500. It is at an elevation of 6200 ft. and a winding drive down the mountain takes you to Carson City, Reno, Lake Tahoe. While here we went on a short train ride to Gold City, a trolley ride around the city (two streets), went in an old mine that was inside a saloon (Robert hit his head first thing in), went to an old, old graveyard, and old school, saw the Mark Twain museum (he actually started his career here), saw his old press stuff, really old fire fighting equipment, radio museum with antique radios dating back to 1915, and several mine museums. We went to chalk hills hunting for fossils, and up a mountain to find rock crystals with amethyst. This town is so old and cute.