Dayton Mill & Carson City Mint - NV

Dayton, Nevada
Dayton State Park 


We made such good time returning to California that we decided to head back over to Carson City for a few more days.  The weather was fantastic and we wanted to use the last of our 1 Year Nevada Parks Pass for free camping.

We could've stayed at Washoe Lake State Park again but decided to try the small state park in Dayton, just southeast of Carson City.  About 10 sites, central water and dump station with fresh water.  There are picnic tables, firepits and walking trails along the Carson River.  There are some very tall trees that were just glowing orange in the sunlight. It was just beautiful.

 

Dayton claims to be the oldest settlement in Nevada since 1849 although nearby Genoa disputes this.  It's a very small town with a cute historic district and only a 20 minute ride to nearby Virginia City.

 

 

The old cemetery made for great exploring.  We particularly found the grave and information on James Finney so interesting that we hid a geocache at the edge of the cemetery in his honor.  You need to collect info from James Finney's marker to find the cache itself. 

 

 Sounds like Mr. Finney was quite the drinker, but a very well respected man in the community.

 

The old wooden fences and markers really take a beating in this hot, dry climate.  They do have an organization that takes very good care of them and repairs and replaces the headstones as needed, preserving the historic value as much as possible.

 Dayton has a small park with a Veterans Memorial.

 

If you look at the bottom of the memorial you see a frame.  It contained a Certificate of Valor for a soldier signed by President Obama.  I'm sure it meant a lot to someone to leave it there.

 Insignia on the memorial.

The Pony Express also ran through this town and there are several markers along the trail, now street.

 Rock Point Mill was once a huge silver and gold mill, opening in 1861 at a cost of $200,000.

 

 

Several fires starting in 1882 and floods forced its closure and eventually in 1920 it was dismantled and moved to Silver City. Sadly it was then used as the local dump until 1954 when the NV Dept of Highways took it over.  Later in 1977 it was transferred to the Nevada State Parks.

With our back to the old mill you can see the campground across the road.  Our rig is the one on the far left.  One other interesting thing that happened here in Dayton was in 1961.  It was the setting for John Huston's film, The Misfits, which was the last movie appearances of Clark Gable and Marilyn Monroe.

We knew Harry and Vickie were working nearby so we got together for dinner one night and had a really great time catching up.  We hope to see them in Quartzsite as we have more of that Chocolate Port for them!

It had been many years since we had been back to Carson City and Steve really wanted to visit the Mint again.  It was much the same as I remember.  We really liked the displays and the "underground mine".

 This piece of machinery used to produce the coins.

 

 A nearly complete CC Coin display.

 They had several silver serving sets on display.  This one was my favorite.  The detail was amazing.

 

Besides coin memorabilia there were nice displays of the era.

 Two beautiful Indian Motorcycles.

 

 Shiny silver detail on the saddle.

 Beautiful Victrola.

 Some creepy dolls along with bottle, button and gun collections.

 There was a celebration for the Dias de los Muertos.  Lot's of dancing and hand on displays for the kids.

 

 

 Out front a cute Willy's Jeep.

 

We joined our son's girlfriends father, Sebastian, again for a yummy Mexican dinner and then went next door to try out a bar that I cannot remember the name of with a HUGE selection of beer on tap.  Below you can see just how many taps there are!  Always a good time with him!

Before we leave for Placerville and the holidays, we'll spend our last day in Virginia City.  But you'll have to read the next blog post for that!