Adventure from Bouse to Historic SWANSEA | The Ghost Towns of LA PAZ COUNTY, Arizona
Вставка
- Опубліковано 24 лип 2024
- Armed with our new vehicle, we finally made the popular offroad route from Bouse to Swansea, Arizona - an abandoned copper mining town from the early 1900s. The historic remains of this ghost town are some of Arizona's best!
Located in La Paz County in Arizona is the ghost town of Swansea. Prospecting in this area started in the 1860s, but it wouldn't be until around 1909 before Arizona would gain statehood, that Swansea saw an uptick in activity. With railroad lines connecting the town to nearby Bouse, Arizona, a smelter in place, and numerous shafts with operating hoists, productivity grew the town to a population of about 300 residents.
At its peak, Swansea had a saloon, auto dealer, theaters, barbershop, restaurants, and two cemeteries.
Today, what is left of Swansea continues to crumble away. Visitors can see the remains of structures with exposed adobe walls including an old mess hall, offices, worker cottages, railroad depot, and smelting facility. As the site is now on BLM land, numerous signage is available to educate and inform.
In addition to buildings, there are a great number of mine shafts for one to peer in or down into that really fill out the experience.
VIDEO FILMED: 10/14/2022
▬▬ R E L A T E D V I D E O S ▬▬
⚪ Remnants of the TONOPAH & GOLDFIELD RAILROAD, Goldfield Cemetery & More! | Seeking Seldom Seen Slim - • Remnants of the TONOPA...
⚪ Exploring the Historic Desert Ghost Town of RHYOLITE | Nevada - • Exploring the Historic...
▬▬ L O C A T I O N I N F O ▬▬
⚪ SWANSEA HISTORIC GHOST TOWN - www.blm.gov/visit/swansea-his...
⚪ Directions to SWANSEA - goo.gl/maps/ktbqP3C5FhjYSfps7
▬▬ T I M E S T A M P S ▬▬
00:00 Bouse Museum and Camp Bouse Relics
06:12 The Offroad Adventure to Swansea
11:53 The Remnants of Swansea, Arizona
▬▬ L I N K S ▬▬
⚪ Gear we use - www.amazon.com/shop/thecactus...
⚪ See where we've been - www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mi...
⚪ Music from Epidemic Sound - www.epidemicsound.com/referra...
(As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases.)
_____________________________________________________________
✅ Find us on Instagram, Twitter & Facebook - @cactusatlas.
✅ Check out our website - cactusatlas.com
Welcome to the Cactus Atlas! We are Glenn and Amy and invite you to join us as we visit all sorts of locations across the American West. We tour both natural and man-made attractions.
Our base of operations is in the Phoenix, AZ area. We do a lot of hiking and day trips as well as campground reviews and hope that we will be a great resource if you are planning a trip to the American West. We also hope to delight you with our exciting adventures!
If you get in deep sand drop the tire pressure to 15 PSI and use 4 hi
the rail infrastructure around there is fascinating! there are several abandoned railbeds snaking through the area that you can see from Google Earth, including an area with railroad ties, it looks like it would be difficult to reach. washed out ballast where the trestles crossed stream beds. very interesting, I never knew it was so intricate. must’ve been a hopping place at one time.
Great video as always. I've always wanted to check this area out after reading about it in the Arizona Ghost Towns book. Its amazing the lives people chose for some rocks in the ground.
Thank you. 😊 It wasn't an easy life that's for sure. Lots of moving around too I imagine.
Glad you are enjoying your new 4x4, as we are enjoying where it takes you. Liked the drone shots. And I agree about wearing long pants and sturdy boots.
Much appreciated! 😄
Thank you for the amazing one heartfelt story you’re a great storyteller FYI that Rock is chryscolla and the reason I began rock hounding many years ago I just came back from planet mine yesterday can’t get enough! Again thank you for your amazing video!
Thanks so much! Glad that you enjoyed the video we made. And thank you for the information about the rock! I know Glenn is interested in rock hounding in the future so lots to learn in the meantime. Thanks again! 😊
I've just added Swansea to my list for my April trip. Thanks !
Great to hear! Hope you enjoy it. 😄
Really enjoying your adventures!!!
Yay! Thank you! Glad you like them! 😄
Cool 😎 adventure
Thanks! 👍
awesome footage
Thank you kindly
Green minerals usually have copper. Have fun exploring!
Thanks so much! Fully plan to. 😄
great video,and i am so happy you filmed the road in,i have been to Bouse but i cannot go to Swansea bucause i have a small car
Thanks! Totally understand. Before when we both had small cars, we were constantly watching videos trying to eyeball road conditions to places too. 😅
Wow, that was pretty cool! You should start putting together a playlist of all these ghost towns you visit so we can binge them all! Not that I want to give Amy more work 😁
Playlist you say? (Heehee!) 😄
ua-cam.com/play/PL3Vf9y7OHsUD6VIt-Un0pvS5PdCLMsnKJ.html
There was a rail connection from Bouse to Midway, and on to Swansea, I was able through exhaustive searching to find the old railbed right of way, some of the ballast and railway cuts are still there as it comes into Swansea it goes past what was probably a ticket office and over what looks like an underground coal chute, where the train cars dropped their loads or maybe it was for some other thing like ore. I don’t know if there was a smelter in Swansea or not.
Very cool! Oh to see it back in the day! 😊👍
Adobe, coated in plaster. lots of old buildings on the reservation west of Tucson like that.
As you were saying "no train depot", you can see the train depot in the background.
Yeah, we totally missed out on where it was.
Howdy ran across your video and brought back memories of days when I ran around many hundreds of miles of Arizona deserts. A bit of advise as I have seen many people loose there lives out in those remote areas. Always carry more water than you think you would ever need, were boots and pants while walking around or snake guards, keep a small compressor and extra tools, don't touch your brakes or slow down when in sand. Let people know where you are going and if you abandoned your vehicle don't take short cuts, stick to dirt roads. Good luck.
Thanks! Definitely some good advice! 👍 Being residents of the desert we're well aware of bringing water and all the risks associated with it. Thankfully haven't run into any issues because of the precautions we take. 😄
Gaia... great for multiple devices and platforms. Long learning curve, imho, but well worth it. Some online content creators sell a package with all their GPS trails and camping for almost all of the aftermarket devices and software that uses gpx files.
Been seeing/hearing a lot of people using Gaia in other videos. Might have to fiddle around with it and see how it compares. 👍 Thanks for the recommendation!
I do enjoy your videos and they inspire me to go out and venture about! A minor correction for you, ie Swansea is in Wales, but not to far from England.
Glad that you find them inspiring to adventure yourself! And yeah, I noted Glenn said England and made the correction when I was editing by included the map and text overlay. 😅 If only one could rewind history. 😂
@@CactusAtlas good to go Amy😊
😎👍
I moved there (not by choice) but the experience was koo my Nana still lives there i learned too ranch there it has a pet cemetery bit creepy lol... I lived right behind the bar 🍻
Oh yeah that place is totally haunted! Its interesting how that area really wasn’t developed after all that activity here
Chances are a lot decayed or was repurposed. Seemed to have happened a lot in towns that built up quickly and disappeared just as fast. 😕
I use Gaia and paper BLM/Forest service maps.
We're starting to gather a lot of those paper maps ourselves. Sometimes old school is the best way. 😅
Also, I think this is part of the tract of land, including the desert bar that the BLM is about to outlaw offroading and save it from ourselves... your video might be one of the last.
!!! Was not aware of that. Very interesting to hear that. We'll have to keep an ear out about that. Appreciate the info!
Swansea is in WALES not England😮
We are aware. Glenn misspoke and I corrected it while editing - hence the map and text correction.
Keep this in mind, the things that you see, will be there for thousands of years, long after the collapse of the United States, however every thing you put on the internet will disappear, and vanish like the clouds in the sky never to be seen again, if you believe that the internet is something permanent you are living an illusion, like the heat waves in the desert 🏜 😂😂😂
Those miners’ cabins were fascinating. With all that land out there, why were they built so close together? No privacy in that workplace.
Glenn, I missed your hat and scarf.🧣 Haha! Glad you didn’t get stuck in the sand.
With all that open land, you would think the housing would be spaced out a bit more but I who can say. Would be interesting to see how the town was laid out back then. I'm sure there's pictures out there but I was having trouble finding any that gave me an indication of recognizable buildings still remaining (of sorts) today.