Bodie State Park

The ghost town of Bodie is a very well preserved mining town that had it's peak around 1879, but has been around far longer than that. Today, it's a State Historic Park. It's off of a little road, State Highway 270 which branches from route 395 a few miles south of Bridgeport.

The top of an old 6 cylinder engine, sitting in front of a building. There are countless old artifacts to photograph in this town. Be sure to start travelling to Bodie early...the road is long and partially unpaved and it's nice to spend the best sunlight hours photographing and walking instead of driving.

The standard mill is in the background. Clear 85 degree days are only found in the middle of the summer, the weather is usually very harsh here. The air is thin, the elevation is about 8600 feet and you sunburn very quickly if you have no protection.

The "standard mill", the grey building pictured above, is off-limits. So are all of the hills behind the mill where most of the mines were. The picture to the left is one of the warning signs.

One excellent book i've found on the history of Bodie, and an adjacent mining town called Aurora, is "Gunfighters, Highwaymen and Vigilantes". The book's exciting name belies the fact that it's actually very academic in nature and contains hundreds of anecdotal stories of the people that lived in the town.

The safe is still there inside of a brick structure, behind some bars. You can't get inside because of the bars, and it's very dark, but the camera meter has no problem finding accurate exposure and the bars are handy to steady the camera on.

The church, located on main street. The standard mill is visible as a grey speck just to the right of the church.

Some of the houses had metal sides. This one had a stamped pattern. Another small shack in the town looks like it was sided with well flattened coffee cans.