Category: Summer

For our last day, we ended up changing our plans. We were going to go to Lewis & Clark Caverns on the way home but decided to go to Virginia City / Nevada City. These are old mining towns, basically ghost towns now, that are about 1.5 miles apart.

A lot of the buildings were preserved and some were turned into businesses, like a candy shop, ice cream parlor, some restaurants, gift shops, etc. So we stopped and got some food for a picnic, then after eating, explored the town a bit.

We then rode an old train from one city back to the other, which the kids really enjoyed (William fell asleep for a bit). Then we went and panned for gold, which Lucas was really excited for. We found lots of gems, like garnets, and Lucas actually found a little speck of gold. The professional came over and checked his pan out when he got to the bottom and showed him the gold. Unfortunately it was so small you couldn’t pick it up, but we was excited that he found some.

Then we went to a living history museum that’s in Nevada City. Basically an old town that they have actors in lots of the buildings that you can interact with. The kids got to make lemonade, see a blacksmith, talk to a geologist, see a sheriff, etc.

There was more we could have seen but we had a 3 hour drive home so we left earlier then we would have wanted. It was a lot of fun though. We’ll have to make a trip back at some point to spend some more time and go to the Caverns.

We also went and checked out the Cathedral of St. Helena. I wanted to look around inside but all the doors were locked. It’s a huge cathedral and very pretty from the outside but doesn’t have anywhere near the same spirit as you’d feel walking around Temple grounds.

We then drove to Helena, the capital of Montana. We did various things here but the first, after getting lunch, was to go check out the capital building.

We next drove to Butte and spent the night. The next morning we went to checkout the World Museum of Mining. It was kind of like an old preserved town, lots of buildings to look at. Also had a mineral exhibit and an old doll collection. Also had an actual mine tour but they don’t let kids under 5 do it so we had to pass on that.

We went on a little trip up to Montana for a few days. The first place we stopped was a ghost town that’s now Bannack State Park. There were lots of preserved buildings still here that we could walk through and it was fun to get a glimpse back in time.