Highway 49
California State Highway 49, the “Mother Lode Highway,” can truly take you back to the days of ’49. The road connects gold rush mining camps, ghost towns and historic sites from Oakhurst in the south, to Sierra City in the north. It’s three hundred miles of beautiful country along the foothills of the Sierra Mountains. Twisting mountain roads, sheer granite walls, precipitous drops to swiftly moving rivers. Old buildings, gold mines, forgotten cemeteries. Let’s go see what we can find.
Agua Fria - California
Discovered by Sonoran miners in the early summer of 1849, Agua Fria was one of the earliest settlements on Colonel John C. Frémont's Las Mariposas grant.
Oakhurst - California
A stagecoach holdup around the turn of the century is reported by some to be the cause of 'Fresno Flats' becoming 'Oakhurst.' As the story goes….
The California Gold Country - A Prefatory
In a peaceful, gentle valley surrounded by fine stands of tall timber, James W. Marshall served as the construction superintendent of a sawmill being built for Captain John Sutter. As work on the mill neared completion….