Pahrump: Surprising Desert Finds on the Road Less Traveled
Working ham radio station and sugar cane fields an hour west of Vegas
One-hour west of Las Vegas is the fast-growing town of Pahrump, NV (from 20K to 50K folks in recent times). Find it on your way to or from Death Valley or on a side trip as you head to Reno.
Driving between Vegas and Death Valley? Pahrump offers wine & rum tastings, off-road and ghost town adventures, spectacular camping & friendly folk. Share on XTour: Pahrump Museum
We’ve noticed in our travels that families in small towns realize the history they hold in objects and it is often their local support energizes fund-raising. Many small museums also have rooms for local meetings, filling the quiet space with life. The Pahrump Museum is one of those and holds collections from families in the area as well as a history of the Yucca Mountain project.
A desk with radio equipment that looks like a display is really a working ham radio set made available to any licensed radio operator dropping by for a visit. Marilyn Davis, the Museum Director, told the story of a gentleman who used the set on his birthday to call home in Asia. The museum is free to enter, but donations are requested. View a talk given at the museum about ham radios here.
Tastings: A Rum Distillery – in Pahrump?
Yup. Free tasting of some wonderful rums and yes, they grow sugar cane in Pahrump! We grabbed Dark Rum and Coconut Lime after a tour of the tasting room and visit with Debbie Dahlman. She mixed up the coffee rum with some Bailey’s for a delicious concoction. We learned how they ferment the Jamaican way in open air and turned a hobby into a business. Every flavor was delicious and we really enjoyed our visit.
We headed to The Place to Go next to Desert Cane for really good fish tacos, based on Debbie’s recommendation.
Visit Pahrump Valley Winery’s restaurant (by reservation). Get a free wine tasting at the Sanders Family Winery (below). There’s another one called Artesian Cellars to check out on the main drag.
More Things to Do in Pahrump
Debbie also told us that she had taken an interesting, free tour of one of the two legal brothels in town: The Chicken Ranch and Sheri’s Ranch, situated right next to each other.
The casinos offer gambling, of course, music events and dining, but the Pahrump Nugget has a bowling alley. So lace up!
Performance drivers join a class at the Spring Mountain Motorsports Ranch and Country Club. Looks like a great place to stay while you train to race Corvettes.
Mountain Falls Golf Club is a lovely green course in a growing desert community of homes, but open to visiting and local golfers.
Take a Drive and Explore the High Desert
Head east, up the west side of snow-capped Mt. Charleston on highway 52. Even though it turns into an unpaved road, it’s quite passable for cars. The view looking back west over Pahrump’s valley is pretty spectacular. In summer, it’s a terrific getaway as the temperatures drop several degrees. The view below is looking east to Mt. Charleston.
Or take off north out of Pahrump on Hwy 160, turn west on Hwy 95, then look on your map for Big Dune, a small mark “point of interest,” but a spectacular one. Big Dune Recreation Area is on Bureau of Land Management property. ATVs are welcome to cruise around the giant sand dune.
Across the way you might notice Lathrop Wells Cone, a cinder or ash outcropping derived from a volcano.
A Little History of the Old West
Continue north to Beatty and stop at the local museum (free entry; donations accepted). Locals have donated family belongings and a treasure trove of photos of mining, stage coaches and times gone by. As fans of Deadwood TV series on HBO, it was cool to discover the jacket of the real Charlie Utter, Wild Bill Hickok’s friend, preserved with a photo of him wearing it at Hickok’s grave. There’s a little more about the story of Hickok’s death; his poker hand at the time was a full house.
Rhyolite, a ghost town, is just a few miles west where you’ll see not only remains of a train station, homes, the Cook Bank building and jail, but signs to tell you about the town in its heyday. There’s a one-room museum manned by a photographer. Stop by the remarkable house made of bottles. You’ll learn about the red-light district and how often trains came through at the town’s peak.
Photos below: the drive to Rhyolite from Beatty, bent bars in a jailhouse window, and the train depot ruins today. Black and white photos, from the Beatty Museum, show a stage coach arriving in 1906 at the Southern Hotel in Rhyolite and cars at the train depot in 1926.
Places to Camp 🏕
Traveling in an RV, you can pay for full hook-ups at the Wine Ridge RV Resort and Cottages next to the Pahrump Valley Winery or at the Lakeside RV Park with its pretty pond next to the Lakeside Casino. Below: view of Mt. Charleston from Lakeside RV park, sunset through the park’s pine trees and the Lakeside Cafe in the casino.
Wild camping, called boondocking or dry camping, is simply a self-contained rig that doesn’t need hookups to water, electric or sewer. Some of our favorites are in these special places. Around Pahrump, you can wild camp at Wheeler Pass, up highway 52 east of town. Dry camp overnight at Big Dune Recreation Area and take in the wonder of a mountain of sand. Or check with any casino to see about overnighting in their lot; sometimes a perfect choice when you are en route. As a bonus, you can catch a meal near your rig too.
Harvest Hosts, an annual membership club, maps locations of farms, wineries, breweries and attractions that offer an overnight stay for free. They just ask that you patronize the establishment and follow some common sense rules, requesting permission to stay in advance and the like. Sanders Family Winery, a Harvest Host, even let us stay a second night for free. It was nice to discover their light Serenity wine. It’s a pretty location by day with snowy mountains in your view as well as lovely at night in the winery’s lighting. Its walking distance to a popular pizza place. Rigs park overnight on the left near trees in the photo below. RVers enjoy serenity of a beautiful location all to yourselves ~ for free.
If you are interested in Harvest Hosts, use my link to get 15% off the membership. This is an affiliate link where I make $15 for referrals. You can get your own referral link when you sign up!
Wherever you are, chat up the locals and other travelers. We’ve found some real treasures that way. Surprisingly, many times we’ll ask locals what they know about certain place and they’ll say they’ve lived their entire lives there, but not seen what we are asking about. Then there are times, like our Pahrump visit, when we learned about the Highway 52 drive towards Mt. Charleston, restaurants, tours and working ham radio stations.
Take the advice of my 104-year-old cousin, who on her death bed, told me to “go everywhere; see everything, and join Thousand Trails” (an RV club). Well, the best of her advice anyway. Remembering that moment always makes me smile.😍
