✈️ Travel With The Honeys #6 : The Clown Motel Tonapah, NV - The Weird Side Of The Track

It clowns aren't horrific enough, how about a clown motel with an actual graveyard right outside the front door of the hotel? Yep! This is totally terrifying. And though we haven't been brave enough to stay there (though the quality of the hotel doesn't look like somewhere I'd stay anyways), a trip in the day time is frightening enough.







When we drove through the dusty old town for the first time, we pulled up to the clown motel looking for something to eat, but, I had to know more about this! Though Jamie wasn't super excited by the this creepy motel in the middle of the tumbleweeds, I was intrigued by the hand made signs. And $42.50 a night? Why? I always want to know why. And I'm always fascinated with the history........... AND there was a graveyard!







Jamie parked the car, rolled his eyes at me, and we got out and headed towards the front door of the hotel. Anyone who thought grown up adults dressed in bright colors, oversized shoes, and more make up than a drag queen would be fun for kids are insane. And who ever thought up a clown themed hotel dawning over 600 crazed and smiling creepy clowns in the lobby needs to see a therapist pronto! Clearly, I'm not a huge fan of clowns.

Jamie began laughing at me as I felt the hair on my arms raise, and I'm pulling out my camera. The gal in the front lobby was certainly nice. She seemed happy to have the company, and she also seemed super used to the gawkers. We asked if we could use the bathroom, and as I made my way into the run down laundry room, I felt I needed to use my feet to close doors and flush toilets. The hotel is clearly old and slightly run down, except for the clowns. The clowns seem to get well dusted and taken care of. What particularly creeped me out about this clown that greeted us in the lobby was the hand. The hand looked so real ............... (whispers ....... look at the hand .........)







And that smile ........... come on!!! It's SOOOOO freaky!!













Apparently, Ronald McDonald is the Grand Marshall of this crazy place! Walking out the front door, we looked to our left and saw a vast graveyard, home to about 300 corpses that are probably all rolling over in their graves at the thought of a clown motel. Rumor has it, for $900,000 this hotel could be yours! Though there aren't a lot of haunting stories, other than seeing clown shadows, this town has a ton of history. Including the Lady In Red from the Mizpah hotel. I'll tell you about her in a minute. However, I did feel nostalgic walking through the graveyard. From 1901 to 1911, these are the residents that pioneered this bustling and hustling mining town. I learned about Charles Smith, who was murdered in his cabin behind the midway mine at age 33, in 1906. I wondered what his life was like as an ore sorter for the mine. Why would someone want to kill him? Then there was George and Felemir buried side by side. No real explanation. I met Mike Scobally who died in a fire. The town had a big plague that swept through it, and large fire, and a sheriff that died in a shoot out in a bordello.

The graves are quite primitive. Headstones made of wood with metal plates that looked like they were tapped into by an actual hammer and nail for names. There are rocks that line where the bodies lie. One grave actually looked like it was fenced with an old wooden baby cradle.























































After we left the cemetery, we were still looking for a place to eat and found ourselves down the road by a few blocks at the Mizpah hotel, which was built in 1907 and boarded up in 1999. They recently re-opened the doors after some major renovations in 2011. There are all sorts of fun stuff in this hotel, including a wall of checks signed by famous stars. I have a bunch of photos of this, but, I will save that for another post!! In the meantime, I'm off to fly to Los Angeles!!
See you all soon!