One day while sitting around doing nothing, we decided to go for a drive. We quickly googled "Utah Ghost Towns" and did some speed reading. We printed out a poor excuse for a map and hit the road in search of some accessible northern utah ghost towns. Here is the trip report.

On an afternoon during the summer of 2007 we took a family day trip to check out some ghost towns. We really were just going for a drive and were pretty cautious that we would really find anything.

We drove south on Redwood road past Saratoga Springs, and kept going until we hit Elberta. During the drive we passed many hillsides to the west that were engulfed in visible flame. Traffic was diverted in places to allow for the firefighting effort and helicopters were dumping fire retardant. It was interesting to observe, and was little hinderance to our traveling.

Right at the southern tip of Utah Lake we came to a pretty obvious intersection. There was a cool old gas station and some small houses and farms in Elberta, it was a pretty nice little place.

We stopped at the main street and took a few pictures of the old gas station. It was boarded up and broken down, but had a history that couldn't be hidden. The DINO gas pump was particularly cool.

From the intersection in Elberta we headed west on the highway. We drove for a short time through rolling hills, eventually leading over a small pass. When we cam upon Eureka we were surprised that some of the web sites we had checked out prior to out trip had declared it a ghost. It was certainly near dead, but had a population and wasn't unlike other small towns in the west. We checked out the city and it certainly had a large number of mining and mill sites.

We drove through the city towards Mammoth and stopped at the Eureka graveyard to keep the kids interested. There were some old graves, but it wasn't the big attraction. We headed back to the highway and drove until we rounded a large ridge. There was a pretty obvious dirt road turnoff to the left and we took that, Mammoth was visible set up in a canyon.

We checked out an old building foundation and scattered 80 year old garbage, and cruised around on the dirt roads a bit before heading to the actual Mammoth town site.

We drove as close as we dare to the main mine in Mammoth, but there were tons of signs so we didn't get too close. The town was really interesting and had many good sights to see. It seems a few scattered people live up here, and there was exploration or some other small mining operation going as well. We took pictures and checked it out before heading back towards Eureka.

Past Eureka - on the way back to Elberta we turned off at a road junction leading to a cutoff. The road started out paved as I recall, and quickly turned gravel. We came upon an old cement building covered in graffiti. There was a dead animal inside and the whole area was scattered with empty beer containers. Now that I think of it, the roadsides in the whole area are scattered with beer bottles and beer cans. I would guess not a safe place to drive at night...

We kept on the road until we passed large timber mining ruins. The town of dividend appeared and had many foundations and old building sites. We stopped here farther into town and checked out an old building foundation. There were lots of brick scattered about and the soil looked alien. There was some serious seepage from the tailings and it ran in a pretty nice stream in some spots off into the surroundings.

The town had a sign that looked like it had taken a few gunshots, amongst other things. This spot was good for me to stretch my legs but the kids were dozed off by now - thankfully, it was the last stop on the trip. It seems like we drove 99% of the trip, so it was unfriendly to the environment, but with our ghetto 94 geo prizm we used very little fuel. It was worth it for the family drive and exploration.

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Mountains near Utah Ghost Towns and Mining Ruins.

Gas station in Elberta, UT.

Old Dino gas pump at a boarded up gas station.

Abandoned building foundation outside Mammoth.

The large mine in Utah ghost town Mammoth.

Site of the Tinitc Hospital 1902-1933.

Concrete building near Dividend, UT.

Mining Ruins in Dividend Utah.

Sign in Dividend Utah .