Today we went North on us 95 past Havassu City to I-40 and then on North to the old gold town of Oatman, AZ. It is located in the Black Mountain range about 20 miles SW of Kingman or 20 miles SE of Bullhead City, AZ on historic Rt 66. Gold had been found in the area and the town was established in 1906. By 1931 over 1 million lbs. of Gold had been taken from the mines in the area. By the mid 1930's the boom was over and in 1942 the last gold mine was closed. Burro's were used in the mines and were released into the wild as the mines closed. The burro's that came into town on a daily basis are descendants of the original burro's. We arrived in town about 11 AM and by 12 noon we had not seen a burro. I asked one of the shop keepers about them and he said they do come into town daily but at no set time. About 12:30 they just started showing up on the east end of main street. You can tell that certain ones have their favorite shop keepers as they seemed to hang out around certain shops. I think some of them feed them more than the carrots that the tourists feed them. When we left town around 2:30 the burro's were just standing around on main street sleeping. They were full and wouldn't eat any more when people tried to feed them carrots. I believe a burro is like a mule and stops eating when full, unlike a horse that will continue eating until they founder themselves. Today Oatman is a tourist town with tee shirt shops a couple of restaurants and other novelty shops. More pictures can be found on my web album site. www.picasaweb.google.com/millerkmtrue
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