History and nature beckon during laid-back trip to Pioche

PIOCHE — If summer in Las Vegas is getting you down, consider a trip to this more-than-a-mile-high city for a cool, new outlook on life.

The Lincoln County seat is filled with interesting old buildings and other ghosts from the gritty glory days. And this town of about 800 residents is less than 30 miles away from four very different state parks, each worthy of a visit.

Best of all, the community’s perch high in the Pioche Hills — 6,060 feet above sea level and a full 4,000 feet higher than Las Vegas — means average summertime temperatures stay safely below the 90-degree mark. You can see it all in one long, inexpensive weekend, and lower your core temperature in the process.

The 180-mile drive from Las Vegas takes about three hours, most of it on U.S. Highway 93.

History greets you the moment you roll into town. The highway crosses directly beneath the cables that once carried buckets of rock from the mines on the hill to the mill and smelter in the valley below. Rusted ore cars still dangle from the aerial tramway, which was built in 1920 and operated until the early 1930s, when the Great Depression snuffed out the town’s second big mining boom.

Pioche’s first boom came with the discovery of silver in the 1860s. By 1876, the population had swelled to as much as 10,000 even while the town weathered a host of calamities, including floods, a massive fire, a mining crash and a murder rate higher, some say, than such infamous camps as Dodge City or Tombstone.

This bloody history is well-preserved at the so-called Million Dollar Courthouse, which was built in 1871 and now houses a museum.

Even the building’s nickname serves up a thick slice of Nevada lore. The courthouse and the jail out back were originally expected to cost $26,400, but design changes, construction errors and outright graft pushed the price to $75,000. To cover the cost, the county issued scrips at an unusually high interest rate, then piled on more scrips and more debt when the mines — and the county’s tax revenue — fell on hard times. The building wasn’t fully paid off until the 1930s, several years after it was condemned. By then, it had cost roughly $800,000, with 60 percent of the money coming from taxpayers in Clark County as part of the agreement that allowed Clark to separate from Lincoln County in 1909.

STEP BACK IN TIME

While you tour the museum, strike up a conversation with one of the people working there for tips on other places to see in the area. Museum employee and longtime area resident Louis Benezet, for example, suggested a drive to Caselton on the 20-mile road that loops around the far side of the Pioche Hills and past two major mining operations, both closed.

Just remember to be cautious and respectful in your wanderings. There are people living near the old mines, and the properties still have owners who don’t want uninvited guests collecting souvenirs, ignoring gates and warning signs, and getting hurt on their land.

During your visit to Pioche, you should also make time to wander through the Lincoln County Museum, peek inside the renovated Thompson Opera House and pay your respects at the old Boot Hill Cemetery. You can see all those places in just a few hours by taking the walking tour of Pioche outlined in a slick brochure available at lincolncountynevada.com and at many businesses and public facilities in the area.

Or, if you’re looking for a place to escape the past for a bit, the town is home to an inviting central park and even a golf course of sorts — nine holes of packed dirt fairways and fake-grass greens and tee boxes for the unbeatable price of $5 a round.

Like other small towns across rural Nevada, the dining and lodging options in Pioche are limited, but you can find large — if strangely partitioned — rooms for less than $100 a night at the historic Overland Hotel & Saloon and standard diner fare at the Historic Silver Cafe just across Main Street.

If you prefer to take your meals in a rustic gallery, the Ghost Town Art & Coffee Co. — Pioche’s only other restaurant at the moment — offers fancy coffee drinks and a small but well-prepared menu of burgers and sandwiches in a 19th-century workshop. Try the Philly Burger, then pick out an original photograph or piece of found-object artwork by Kelly Garni, a founding member of the rock band Quiet Riot, and his longtime companion and business partner, Sheri Moore.

Just keep an eye on the time. When the restaurants close in Pioche, your menu options shrink to whatever you can find at the convenience store or nothing at all.

AMPLE PARKING DAY OR NIGHT

There’s always a third option, of course: You could break out the camp stove and cook for yourself.

Summer is the perfect time to pitch a tent at Spring Valley State Park, about 20 miles east of Pioche. The park surrounds Eagle Valley Reservoir, 65 acres of water stocked regularly with several varieties of trout. The main campground features flush toilets, showers and quiet, well-appointed sites with shaded picnic tables and dark, star-filled skies.

Fishing is also the main attraction at Echo Canyon State Park, eight miles southwest of Spring Valley, where you’ll find another reservoir stocked with trout in a more wide-open, high-desert setting.

The two other state parks within an easy, half-hour drive of Pioche provide starkly contrasting examples of the power of water in the desert.

At Kershaw-Ryan State Park — just outside the town of Caliente, 29 miles south of Pioche — natural springs sustain a lush, garden oasis in a narrow offshoot of Rainbow Canyon. It’s a popular spot for family picnics, but on a weekday in summer, you might find yourself all alone with the trees and the grass and the crystal blue wading pool for kids.

Water is also responsible for the signature feature at Cathedral Gorge State Park, just nine miles south of Pioche on U.S. 93. There, erosion has carved deep, twisting fissures through hills of bentonite clay, leaving behind a maze of buff-colored spires and cavelike slots just wide enough to walk through, though not in a wide-brimmed hat.

The air inside the shaded fissures is cool and damp, and you have to crane your neck just to see the sky. It’s the perfect place to duck out of the summer sun, if only for a little while.

Contact Henry Brean at hbrean@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0350. Find @RefriedBrean on Twitter.