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Sarcobatus
Flat
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Where to ride:
g ost rails
By Don Lemaster
Want to know what it feels like to
ride the route where once hundreds of millions of dollars in gold
traveled on its way to the U.S.
Mint in San Francisco ? Such a
pla ce exists in the wild, un settled
Ama rgosa De sert on th e Nevada
side of Death Va lley. It's wide
22
t rai lb ikers w ho ar e loo kin g for
something di fferen t in rid ing fa re .
. l\V e
co nsis ted of me. m y
15-year-o ld son Larry an d Ro n
' Peterson . We too k off from Los Ange les
open terri tory , free of bike critics and
beckon s th e adventuro us tr ailrider to
the go ld b onanza country th at teem ed
wi th fortune see ke rs aro un d the tum of
the century. No w, it's all bu t deserted .
There 's lo ts to see and m ile up o n mile
of so lita ry r i d i n g fo r u s
get -away-fr o m-it-al l motorcyclis ts.
What I'm de scribing is th e lonely ,
gh ost ly remains o f an ambitious railroad
project t hat brought life to the Nevada
desert boom towns. Now the abandoned
route makes an ex citing ride for the _
drive to Rh yolit e, Nev. an d ride from
there over to the mi ning co un try in the
Bullfrog Hills.
Rh yo lite was qu ite a se t tlement in it s
day . It was the term inus of three
railroads an d bragged that it had the
finest depot west of Chi cago . Bu t,
Rhyolite is almost a ghos t to wn now.
We set up cam p in t he afte rn oon
after towi ng o ur bikes through Dea th
Valle y. Our camp was on the sun ny
slope at Buck Springs. An old wooden
H
on a winter we ek en d. Our plans were to
evada's
