Bodie, California
Bodie
While many of the West’s ghost towns have been turned into tacky tourist traps, the former gold-mining town Bodie, California, has been allowed to die with dignity thanks to its state park status. The site has been kept in a state of “arrested decay,” meaning that its structures are not restored but rather stabilized against the elements and protected from vandalism. Walking around the town, over ground where 19th-century nails and mining tools still lay scattered about, it truly feels as though Bodie has not been touched since its inhabitants abandoned it. Its remote location off a dirt road in the Eastern Sierra Nevada keeps visitation levels down, and helps it maintain an appropriate atmosphere of loneliness. The park costs $3 per adult to visit and is well worth the trip.
(Photo: Molly Feltner)
California, Bodie, arrested decay, Sierra Nevada

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