Beneath a desert sky

[U2Kitten]

Here are some cool shots of the Bodie ghost town and U2 is included!

http://www.bodie.net/album/album.asp?type=ls

 

[Dorian Gray]

is that the town where the Red Hill Mining Town video was filmed?

 

[bonosloveslave]

Nice

 

[FallingStar]

cool

 

[martha]

Bitchin'.

 

[SoBe]

groovy

 

[Reggie Thee Dog]

is that the town where the Red Hill Mining Town video was filmed?

No I believe that was filmed in Ireland...or England. I'm not sure, but I know it was filmed in Bodie.

 

[Tabby]

Looks like some of those are things just frozen in time. The band looks frozen too, it was so cold, they said later. Bono won't look at the camera, I wonder what that means? Did they tell him not to or what? He looks fine in that coat

 

[martha]

Bodie was freezing cold when I was there one Thanksgiving. Freezing. There was no snow yet, but the wind chill was in the 20s.

Everything is frozen in time; that how it's maintained there. The rangers keep everything in the state it was in when the town was abandoned.

 

[Ace Rimmer]

excellent photos

 

[SamanthaPuff]

How long has the town been abandoned? Looks cool. I want to go there!

 

[martha]

It was completely abandoned in the 1950s sometime, I think, but it was a mining town in the late part of the 19th century. It's a state park now, and it's very cool.

 

[U2Kitten]

Have you ever been there Martha?

 

[martha]

Yeah, check a few posts up. ^

 

[U2Kitten]

<---is lame

Tell us more!

 

[martha]

A friend of ours used to be a ranger there, and we saw her there by accident on either Thanksgiving Day or the day after, I don't remember. (This was several years ago, before I knew those pix were of Bodie.) Our friend wasn't a ranger still, but she was visiting her ranger friends. We got invited to stay after the park closed and spend some time with the rangers who live there. Yes, they live in some of the old houses, with reasonably updated facilities. She and another ranger dug out their keys and took us into some of the buildings that are normally closed to the public. It was very dark and colder than hell, lemme tell ya. It was even extremely cold that day during the day. We could have spent the night, but I didn't want to. We had a room in Bridgeport for the night, and I wanted some time alone with my baby, although I think he really wanted to stay!

The town was occupied as late as the 1950s, so there are electrical lines still there; that's why there are cars in some of the pictures. I think the town had 10000 inhabitants at one point early in the 1900s. It's kept in a state of "arrested decay" now, meaning that it's kept how it appeared in the 1950s. Any repairs are done only to restore it to its appearance 50 years ago.

So there you go. It's worth a side trip if anyone happens to be traveling on Highway 395. I think it may be completely closed in winter due to snow, but I'm not sure. It's only about 150 miles or so from the Tree.

 

[U2Kitten]

You were lucky to experience that, Martha! It would have been interesting, if not creepy, to spend the night there. So you didn't know then that U2 had been there or you'd have posed in front of the building, right? It sounds like an interesting U2 pilgrimage, the tree and the town. Maybe we can all meet there one day and you can lead the way!

 

[Tabby]

Groovy story Martha