A Road Trip

On Sunday the 10th of January, a good friend of Lizzie was having a show in Apple Valley, she asked me if I wanted to go, and Lulu and I said  yes!

Apple Valley is near the town of Victorville about 1 1/2 hour drive from home, on the way to Vegas. We decided to go a little farther to Barstow and stop at the Calico Ghost town.

I had been there a couple of times and really there was not much to it. In 1881 silver was discovered and Calico became one of the riches mines in the State it produced $86 million in silver and another $45 million in Borax, at its peak it had a population of 1,200 people, with 22 saloons and a red light district. Around 1907 when the price of silver dropped, Calico became a ghost town . Nowadays thanks to Mr Walter Knott (founder of Knottsberry Farm) Calico once again is alive and well with many building restored and is not a Regional Historic Place. It has changed a lot since I first visited.

The School

Old Fire Truck (restored)

It was a fun visit. After Calico we drove back to Victorville and stopped on the way to see "Elmer's Bottle Ranch", a forest of over 200 bottle trees on Route 66.  https://californiathroughmylens.com/elmers-bottletree-ranch

It was interesting!

We then went on to Apple Valley where we stayed at the Hilltop Tavern and Inn, which was also the venue for the show we came to see. We stayed in room 10 and rested for a while, later we went to have dinner at the restaurant and watched the show.

The Inn

CalAmity band and line dancing

Lizzie's friend Cathryn is the leader of CalAmity a band of 5 women. Her mother (81) and her aunt  (in her 70's) were there too. It was fun because they were drinking beer and wine and they got up to dance, they asked some guys to dance too.  It was inspirational! :)

Then we went back to the room and went to sleep. I want to mention that Lulu was a very well behaved dog the whole trip, I think she enjoyed the road trip as much as we did. we did :)

View from our room

Thanks Lizzie for a fun trip!