Calico, Ca - Ghost Town

You cannot get all the way to the West without stopping in a ghost town. I mean, at least for water or gas!

So - twist our arm, we did. We stopped in Calico, Ca - an old West mining town that has been around since 1881; during the largest silver strike in California.

It use to have 500 mines and produced over $20 million in silver ore over a 12-year span! Unfortunately, silver lost its value in the mid-1890's, and Calico lost its population. The miner's packed up, loaded their mules and moved away. Abandoning the town that once gave them a good living. It became a "ghost town."

Walter Knott, yep of Knott's Berry farms, purchased Calico in the 1950's and restored all but the five original buildings-which stand as they were- to look as they did in the 1880's. Calico received State Historical Landmark 782 and in 2005 was proclaimed by then Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger to be California's Silver Rush Ghost Town.

Today Calico is part of the San Bernardino County Regional Parks system visited by people from around the country and all over the world. We are glad we stopped, now we can say in casual conversation, 'yes, yes we have stayed in a ghost town'.