Oatman,
Arizona
A Real Old
Ghost Town
Route 66
December 11, 2000
Our last 
adventure was
again into Arizona to the ghost town of Oatman. This historic
gold mining town born in 1906 as a tent camp for miners is
located in the Black Mountains some 18 miles east of Bullhead
City located along historic Route 66. The town offers visitors
quaint shops, restaurants and saloons with live entertainment. A
town landmark is the "wild" burros that roam the street
looking for hand-outs and friendly pats. Millions of dollars
worth of gold was taken out of the mountain, and can still be
found in small quantities. The road out is desolate but paved.
All along the approach, someone one had decorated the brush
growing along the side of the road with all kinds of Christmas 
decorations.
In addition to the manmade decorations Mother nature herself
managed some very pretty decorations in the form of flowering
cactus. They were all a strange sight to see, against the harsh
mountain backdrop. As you pull into town the wild burros are
immediately evident. The ones we saw appeared to be the town's
mascots and as such have the rule of the roost. There were 12 of
them wandering the main street in town. Carrots are the specialty
they prefer. They range from a baby which was not yet weaned to a
mother who was expecting any day now. We wandered the streets and
shops. Since I knew that there were going to be burros there 
I armed
myself with a bag of carrots. Bob and I fed this one and that one
and finally found ourselves at the end of the street. I made the
mistake of turning my back on a "very pregnant" female
to feed a small one. From some 15 feet away Bob watched the
female walk up behind me and not-so-patiently stand waiting for
her carrot. When I bent over to pet the baby, the pregnant female
gently but firmly bumped me in the butt, sufficiently to cause me
to lose my balance and have to step forward. Now that's a picture
you won't see on the website in the near future. (Only because
Bob was laughing so hard he couldn't get the camera still in
time). When we talked with one of the local merchants he told us
that this was the in-town herd made up of all adult females. The
only exceptions were the juveniles. It seems that the
"macho" male had his in-town herd and his out-of-town
herd that he 
managed to keep separated. The local told us
that the ones out of town were hard to get to see because they
were a little more skittish than the ones in town. I did find out
from a friend of mine, Suzi Ashby, that several years ago she was
a tour guide and had brought a busload of tourists up for a
look-see of Oatman. Well, one of the tourists had fed the burros
and it followed her onto the bus. Seems it required several
carrots and a lot of coaxing to convince the burro that she
really wasn't interested in going to Laughlin to continue the
tour with the group. After we finished checking out the burros we
looked at several of the shops in town that featured items by
local Arizona artists. Then we headed up to the Oatman Hotel to
find out more about their resident ghost. According to the hotel
manager the ghost, nicknamed Oatie, is friendly and thought to be
the spirit of a cowboy who died behind the hotel over half a
century ago. Employees of the hotel claimed to have had several
encounters with Oatie, however, he must have taken the day off
when we were there because there was nary a groan to be heard
from him. The hotel today is a combination hotel-bar-coffee shop
and museum. You can even rent a room there for the night
if you're
brave enough. Fortunately (ah I meant unfortunately) we had to
return to our trailer in Laughlin NV or we would have stayed. In
addition to their ghost another of the hotel's claim to fame is
that Clark Gable and Carole Lombard spent their honeymoon there.
We didn't leave without a souvenir though. It seems that when we
had stopped to photograph the Christmas decorations in the
desert, I picked up several pretty rocks as is my custom. When we
got them back and washed them up, lo and behold flakes of bright
gold shone out from several depressions in one of the rocks. What
a great ending to an interesting day. Oatman is definitely a
"must-see" if you get out that way. If you would like
some more information on Oatman and the surrounding area check
out this website: Oatman, AZ.