The Southwestern Sojourn - Day 33: Wickenburg and Vulture City

Mellow day today, Martha and I rode Scarlett about 60 miles to the tourist town of Wickenburg.

Temperatures were in the high 40s as we wandered about for a bit, checking the shops that interested Martha and some of the sights.  Alas, not much picture taking was done, but I did get one of the Jail Tree:

The Jail Tree

Wickenburg was one of the towns I visited a little over a year ago while I was in Arizona to help take care of my FIL:  LINK

We had lunch at a Chinese restaurant and then headed the almost 12 miles south of town to Vulture City.  This is the site of a collection of buildings and mining equipment that sprung up in support of the Vulture Mine.

The Vulture Mine's gold played a large part in the formation of Phoenix apparently and the development of Arizona as well.  

Now, it's a collection of ramshackle buildings and many assorted rusted pieces of mining equipment laying about in a sometimes seemingly random fashion.  You've really got to love mining equipment and old time buildings to get your $15 entry fee's worth I think.

According to one sign I read somewhere today, Henry Wickenburg, the one who discovered the gold initially, found the rich vein protruding from the ground when he went to retrieve a vulture he'd just shot down.  Talk about luck!

 Water tank and hoist machinery

 Martha poses at the clerk's window of the Wells Fargo Post

 Weekly Weigh-in

 Lots of rusting machinery, this one caught my eye to

to its name: Hit or Miss Motor.

 You can view the insides of the Assayer's building and

the location where the gold and silver bars were stored.

 That's Henry Wickenburg's house and in front of it is

the Hanging Tree which served as punishment for several.

 I wonder, if back in the day, they actually

had a sign at the brothel....?

 The brothel's front room...it was the only building in

the site that had painted wall paneling....

 Hoist

 Seen at the Blacksmith Shop, this item reminded

me of a Ural's transmission input splines.

 The job of the blacksmith was to produce the drill bits

used to bore holes for explosives.  I believe this is the 

machine where the tips were formed.

Back we went retracing our route back to the URRV.  Temperatures had soared into the mid 50s by this point so it felt warmer in the sun.

Seemingly unnamed rock formation just before

Saddle Mountain

As sunset approached, I got a picture of Scarlett with the sun in just the right position.  I'd dropped the phone here you see, taking the previous picture and once I realized it, had hurried back.....found the phone OK and got the picture.