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1864 Tavern The Nevada pride flows—literally and figuratively—inside new California Avenue saloon in Reno. BY MATTHEW B. BROWN As Nevada preps for its sesquicentennial celebration of 2014, 1864 Tavern in […]

This double-whammy of a state park contains remains of a mining town—with 130-year-old buildings, including an impressive 30-stamp mill—standing just a bone’s throw from North America’s highest concentration of the largest ichthyosaur fossils ever found.

In the 1860s, Virginia City was a rough and tumble mining camp, with 24-hour hustle and bustle. Men swarmed the streets and saloons, while miners labored deep within the tunnels underneath the town. The loud, constant clanking metal of stamp mills and jarring explosions echoed throughout the valley and mountains. It was a dangerous place, where rope and cable sometimes broke, sending cages full of miners falling to their deaths. Many an accident or fire in the mines or city left children as orphans.  

Next time you approach the Imlay exit, take it, grab your camera, and follow the dirt road to Thunder Mountain Monument—the unconventional sculpture garden, artistic playground, and home meticulously created by the late Frank Van Zant, AKA Chief Rolling Mountain Thunder.

Where in the world can you still go to the movies—get your ticket, all the snacks you want including a full bar menu—and get out for less than $20 bucks? Ely is where, and it’s not just new releases, affordable prices and full-scale service that’s been keeping people coming back for decades.

The quiet campus of the Stewart Indian School stands as a memorial to a traumatic—and lingering—chapter in American history. But while the school’s early years were marked by cruelty and abuse, it ultimately transformed into a place of pride, community, and healing. Today, the Stewart Indian School Cultural Center & Museum archives the seldom-taught history behind Indian boarding schools. However, the center also lives in the present as a place of gathering that allows visitors to discover northern Nevada’s rich Native culture.

Spring break. The phrase conjures many thoughts, but for parents it’s one simple question— where should we take the kids? The weather can be mercurial, much like the kids’ moods, but staying home is just not an option. Across the Silver State, spring break can be celebrated indoors and out, with adventures both near and far. Here are just a few. 

Dean Martin serenades me through the stereo speakers as I drool over the menu at Papa’s Ranch House in Wadsworth. The table I’m seated at is surrounded by an eclectic collection of sports memorabilia, historical photographs, and paintings. Aromas of pan-seared artichoke hearts and fresh-baked pizza crust fill the room.

Oily indigo smoke billowed from a circular opening in the top of a strange beehive shrine, marking the near completion of a process as foreign as the 1800s Nevada frontier had ever seen. Weeks prior, cords of juniper and pinyon were lain into the rocky tomb, set ablaze, and cooked in the oxygen-starved environment, as observant eyes kept watch of the smoke, and attentive hands operated a series of flues. At first, the smoke burned white, then yellow for a couple days, then dark blue, marking the completion of the process. An uninformed Nevada frontiersman who witnessed these makeshift mausoleums may have attributed the colossal bulbous structures to the occult, maybe even gone as far as to believe they were a portal to the underworld.

If you’ve ever traveled east from Reno, Fernley, or Lovelock to Winnemucca, you’ve driven by it. You might not have thought twice to look, and if you didn’t, you could easily have missed it even though it abuts Interstate 80.