There's Gold in Them Hills!

Bill and Erica are excellent tour guides.  We went to their house to pick them up.  Ericka showed us her beautiful house and Bill showed Carol his gun collection.  We left for Cripple Creek about 9:30.  It was a beautiful drive up into the mountains.  The aspens were turning gold and red and were so pretty among the different shades of green on the pine trees.  Again, the weather was perfect.  Temperatures in the 70's (in the mountains) and big puffy, white clouds in the sky.  We arrived Cripple Creek around 11:00, found a parking spot and explored the little town.  The building were all rebuilt in 1886 after a fire leveled the town.

A view of Cripple Creek from the road above the city.

This overlook has been the scene of several auto accidents.  There were several crosses of various styles and shapes on the other side of this guardrail..

Above and below views of Cripple Creek.

Above and below are examples of the architectural style  of buildings in 1886.

The town has eight casinos.  The town has found that gambling is a way to bring visitors into the town.

No one in our group gambled but we did walk through this casino.  We discovered that these machines will take any bill from the lowly one dollar to a hundred dollar bill.

Carol made a new friend.

A view of the main street.  It was not busy but Bill said it would be hopping on the weekend.

We ate lunch at Maggie's Restaurant. It was very good.  We all had something different and it was all good.

After lunch we intended to go on a gold mine tour but when I found out it was $25 a person, I became an old scrooge and said "No way."  We did walk around the area and looked at some of the old mining equipment.

Bill and Erica showing us how big the wheels on this tractor was.

Carol was trying to decide whether he should make this his second truck.

One of the old gold mines that stand in silence now. During its heyday, there were nearly 500 gold mines in this area.

We did visit the Cripple Creek District Museum.

This is an old slot machine.

A telephone switchboard and below an old telephone booth.

Bill agreed to pose with Erica.

We drove to Victor which is another old gold mining town but now the town is home to a modern-day gold mine.  This mine is similar to the way a coal strip mine works.  The soil is sheered down a layer at a time.  The gold is removed from the dirt and the dirt is deposited  in another area.  That land will be reclaimed for wildlife habitat and grazing.  The mine operates 24-hours a day, 365 days a year.

This old church was in Victor.  I liked the style of the building.  Although the sign can't be read in this picture, this is the First Baptist Church.

Some of the buildings in Victor

After we left Victor was discovered more the the strip gold mine.

The overlook featured a CAT 793 Haul Truck Bed converted to an observation deck.  We could see the modern mining operations with a 360-degree view

A view of the mountains from the observation deck.

I had gone down from the deck to take a picture of Carol, Bill and Erica.  As I was getting ready to snap the picture a man pulled into the parking lot, got out of his truck and offered to take a picture of the four of us.

I think he did a great job.  After taking the pictures, we talked to him and discovered he is a professional photographer, retired Air Force Chaplain, and volunteers to take pictures for non-profit organizations.  He told us more about the mining operations.

Since the mine was operational, we watched this huge Caterpillar truck bring a load of discarded dirt.  Below the truck is dumping the dirt.

We did not see any wildlife on the roads but when we got back to Bill and Erica's street, these deer were across the street from their house.

We enjoyed spending the day with Bill and Erica.  They are excellent tour guides and told us many things we would not have known.  We got back to the camp around 6:00 so Sandy was very excited to see us.  Tomorrow we pack up and head south to a state park called Lathrup State Park.  We can't check in there until 1:00 p.m. and it is only 90 miles from here, so we will pack up leisurely and leave around 10:30. We have really enjoyed our three days here and getting reacquainted with Bill and Erica.  The last two days have been 10-hour days of sightseeing but we had so much to see and we didn't want to miss anything. Tomorrow will be a day of rest since we aren't driving too far.