One of the off the beaten path adventures that I took lead me to a quite little ghost with no tourists in it called Lake Valley. When I rolled up the gates were getting ready to close, but the caretakers were incredibly nice and let me hang out for a while. Lake Valley has an interesting history that goes back a long time (1887) when there was a population in the town of 4000+ people. It hit it off originally as a Silver mining town but then Manganese was discovered an they mined it there right up through WWII. At this time it is in the process of being part of an archaeological study, so there were a lot of neat things just laying around that you might not often see.
First up the Cattle Rustler’s house. Funny thing about this shot. The brick work in the foreground was part of what was left of the town jailhouse. Funny story behind it is this. Even though cattle rustling was illegal in those times the rustler never saw the inside of the jailhouse, because he was the source of fresh meat in the town. What’s that old saying “you don’t bite the hand that feeds you?”
Some of the old water storage tanks that supplied the town with water and supported the mines.
Back of the Cattle Rustler’s house with doors that have almost blending into the walls.
Ok, so this may not be the quintessential ghost town shot with lazy-e-boy barcaloungers, but for some reason I had to take this shot. One of the care takers was telling me the story of this abandoned house and it was pretty amazing. Not because of the house, but its former owner. Not to go into a long story but the owner lived hear for close to 94 years is memory server me, and came to the camp when he was 2 and was a valuable source of information about the town and its going on.
Lake Valley is well off the path only getting about 1000 visitors a year. So if you are in the area look it up and stop by. The place is great and the caretakers are very nice and are fountains of information.
Captured with 1D Mark IIN 16-35 f2.8 II on Lexar digital media
