CALIFORNIA GOLD RUSH TOWNS: Jackson

About 50 miles southeast of Sacramento, Jackson sits in the heart of California's Motherlode. Founded in 1848 by miners panning the numerous creeks in the area, the town is named after Colonel Alden Jackson. The town became the county seat of Amador County in 1853, an honor it still holds today.

Coming over the Argonaut Grade on Highway 49, you'll see a tall headframe to your left. It's the remains of a famed mine.

Reaching over a mile underground...and over 4,000 feet below sea level...the deepest mine shaft in the United States belonged to the Kennedy Mine. The mine closed early in World War II, the pumps were shut off, and...while the tunnels are still there...the shafts flooded.

Nextdoor, the Argonaut Mine's shaft reaches nearly 5,000 feet down. In 1922, 47 miners were trapped deep in the mine. A tunnel was dug from the Kennedy's shaft to try to rescue them but for naught...they all perished.

It was California's worst mine disaster.

While the Argonaut is now a Superfund site and off-limits, on weekends you can take a surface tour of the Kennedy Mine and see the giant tailing wheels that swept mining debris into a canyon over the hill.

Placerville and Sutter Creek to the north and Muphys, Sonora, and Columbia to the south attract more tourists but there's still a lot of history to see and experience here at the crossroads of highways 49 and 88.

If you're hungry, you can get a nice Italian meal at the city's oldest restaurant, Teresa's Place, which has been operating on Jackson Gate Road a couple miles west of downtown for over 100 years. 

Wander to the back of the parking lot to the creek and notice the rock outcropping on each side. This is the historic Jackson Gate where so many miners descended on the creek that water sold for a dollar an inch...back in 1850.

Today, the reward is a dinner fit for a king in Teresa's homey dining room or bar.

Follow Jackson Gate Road east where you can take a break at the Tailing Wheels Park where you can see a couple of the giant wheels that would take the waste rock from Kennedy Mine up over the hill the the basin where it was dumped. One wheel is preserved in a weather-proof enclosure while another is laying on its side, deteriorating in the elements.

Continuing on, past the Serbian and Public Cemeteries, Jackson Gate turns into Main Street and you'll find yourself in the heart of Jackson's old downtown. Sitting proudly at the other end of Main Street is the National Hotel, founded in 1852, where the current building dates back to 1860.

The hotel was brought up to modern standards a few years ago by former owner Stanley Lukowicz, including an elevator and accessible rooms so that wheelchairs have access to the entire building.

The area was settled in large part by many Serbian immigrants. In celebration of Serbian Christmas each January, many of their descendants gather in front of the hotel, firing shotguns (loaded with blanks) into the sky. It's loud and racous but one of the many local traditional celebrations here.

Across from the hotel, between the excellent Serbian Blue Door bakery (try the sourdough and morning rolls) and Rosebud's Cafe, look for the historic plaque in the sidewalk noting the former location of the hanging tree.

Like many Gold Rush towns, Jackson was home to not only many saloons and taverns but hosted many brothels and gambling halls. In fact, those vices clung stubbornly here with casinos and "houses of comfort" operating pretty openly with the blessings of the business and political communities until well into the 1950's  when the laws of the state finally caught up to the city and shut them down.

Most of those buildings still adorn Main Street. That quaint little antique shop may have hosted a roulette wheel or that jewelry store might of hosted some ladies of the night less that 70 years ago.

Some gambling continued, including a legendary game of poker featuring John Wayne that ended up with the western star down tens of thousands of dollars at the National Hotel in 1963. It's also rumored that the actor settled up with a check that bounced...although some say he eventually made good.

Now, gambling is legal again...at least on tribal lands...and the Jackson Rancheria Band of Miwuk Indians runs the Jackson Rancheria Casino and Resort just north of town off of highway 88.

Other pastimes here are sampling wines from the several dozen wineries in the area, particularly in Shenandoah Valley to the north (although Avio Winery is located on the north edge of town on Ridge Road), skiing at the world-class mountains of Kirkwood 60 miles east on highway 88, playing and fishing along the Mokulomne River which delineates the separation of the counties to the south of town, or fishing and boating on local lakes such as Pardee, Camanche, and Tabaud.

Lake Tahoe is only 90 minutes away.

One good place to get your bearings and see what the area has to offer is the gas station at the intersection of highways 88 and 49...where 88 splits off on its journey over the mountains to Nevada. Tresslers offers some of the lowest gas prices in the county and also is home to a giant mural by artist Rand Huggett, which is a giant map of Amador County highlighting points of interest and history of the region.

Jackson is a great place to spend the day, maybe even longer. It makes a great base to explore Amador County and the Gold Country beyond. The aforementioned National Hotel has plush, accessible accomodations for the travel while the Jackson Rancheria Casino and Resort offers excellent affordable rooms with resort amenities making this a very comfortable place to call home while you explore the area.

Darryl Musick
Copyright 2022 - All Rights Reserved

Sacramento and the Gold Country, California

 

(Please read our Covid 19 Statement first - Ed)  When traveling, the question is “fly or drive?”  Today, we are traveling to Sacramento from the Pasadena, California area…a distance of 407 miles.  Flying time would be an hour.  Arriving at the airport, an hour before takeoff.  Being with a wheelchair, add another hour to that to make sure airline and airport staff can get you on the plane and seated together.  Another 40 minutes to an hour to drive to the airport, then a half hour to collect your baggage and another to get to the hotel…if it is nearby.  You might also need to rent a car if public transit options are not suitable (but in Sacramento, they are pretty good).

Watch the Video of This Trip!

So, we’re talking about an investment of five hours…at least…and around $350 for three people flying.  The drive is six hours…not counting food, fuel, and bathroom stops…plus you can easily take your power chair and have your car with you when you get there.  Gas would be about $150.  Road trip it is!

Today’s drive is uneventful with stops in Bakersfield for the delectable tacos at Los Tacos de Huicho and then again at the Love’s gas station in Ripon for fuel, bathroom, and snacks.  I have credit for a free night at Marriott, so we cash them in at the Springhill Suites just north of downtown Sacramento.

We have an accessible room, which here means a bathtub with shower bench.  Roll-in showers are available but you give up the living room of the suite to get one.  With the bench, I can easily transfer Tim, give him a shower, keep the living room space, and save the roll-in for someone who needs it more.  A roll-in would be a little more convenient, but…for me…I give up too much for the trade off here.

But…there’s no bench in the shower.  I bring this up to the front desk’s attention.  There is another room with a shower bench and they want to move us there.  I ask, “why don’t you just bring to bench to our room?”  The manager says it has to go into an accessible room only.  I tell her that we are in an accessible room but she still insists we need to move.  Some back and forth, including taking her up to our accessible room to prove it, and she finally relents.  It turns out our room had a bench but whoever had the room before us took it with them.

Please, people…leave the stuff in the room.  Someone, maybe you someday, is going to be in a situation where you need it and it won’t be there because you were selfish.

Once that’s settled, we have a nice room and have dinner before bedding down for the night.

The next day, we head over to West Sacramento and Raley Field, home of the River Cats.  The River Cats are the AAA minor league team affiliated with the Oakland A’s that play here.  Being baseball fans, we take in games at new stadiums a lot on our travels (see our Fields of Dreams page for reviews).

We park the van behind the home plate entrance and the happy parking attendant gives us several little packages of Jelly Bellies to take in with us.  We get here early because we don’t have tickets yet and want to get the best seats we can.  Unfortunately, there are not too many wheelchair accessible seats left so we have to settle for seats on the first base side but out a bit in right field.

Since we’re early, we walk over the nearby Tower Bridge.  This shimmering, golden bridge has an accessible walkway on its south side.  Just as we start to cross, a siren erupts and lights flash.  The drawbridge is about to be raised.

We get as close as we can get and watch the deck go up.  No boats are in view, so I guess that they just raise the bridge every morning at 10:00.  I’ve seen other drawbridges where this is the case…if you’re in a boat, you just want to make sure you’re there at that time.

Just a few minutes later, the deck comes down and we complete the crossing. 

On the other side is Old Sacramento State Park, a preserved neighborhood of historic buildings on the edge of the Sacramento River.  We spend some time eating the free samples at Candy Heaven, a large candy store on the edge of the area that has just about any candy you can think of.  Letty buys some candy to take with us and we take just a quick walk through this end of the park before walking back.

The game is a lot of fun and our seats are next to a lemonade and churro stand.  I make use of it to get Tim a drink and a bag of their kettle corn without having to leave our seats.  Letty and I later go to get some regular food and beer.

The food here is among the best we’ve had at a baseball game and the beer selection is incredible but the prices are pretty high for a minor league game.  Tim and I split the ½ pound Dinger Dog you see above.  It was very good.  Letty had a chef’s salad that was also delicious.  That Blue Moon I’m holding costs $11 though.   That’s more expensive than the same beer I bought at Angel Stadium earlier this month.

Prices aside, it’s a great game in a great park.  We even got to see a true baseball legend, Hall of Famer Rickey Henderson, coaching first base.  He was also very nice…especially to the ladies who wanted to take pictures with him between innings.

After the game, we were done with this very quick trip to our state’s capitol.  Now, we’re heading up to the Motherlode. 

It’s not a long drive up highway 50 where we turn off on highway 49 in Placerville and head south.  Highway 49 is the ribbon of road that connects all of the Gold Rush towns of the Motherlode.  Highway 49…forty-niner…get it? 

About 40 miles south of Placerville, we pull past Amador City and then into the small town of Sutter Creek, which will be our base of operations for the next few days.  Our hotel will be the Days Inn at the north end of town.  We get a suite, which was probably a waste of extra money, because the layout has the living room way off to the side, with no TV, and is not really conducive to using for anything other than an extra sleeping area for Tim.

The sofabed is lumpy…Tim says it’s comfortable, which is fortunate because it sure didn’t look or feel that way when I sat on the edge.  No sheets were provided for it and when I asked the front desk for a set, they brought it but didn’t want to provide a pillow for it.   When I insisted, the manager borrowed a couple of pillows from a vacant room.  We only needed one, they didn’t want to provide it, and when I complained, they brought two?

There’s a slight mildew smell to the room but other than that, the room is adequate and will give us a reason to not be there more than we have to.

After settling in, we head to downtown for dinner.  It’s about a 4 block walk from the hotel, but the sidewalks look iffy for wheelchair access, so we drive.  Upon further inspection, it was accessible for a wheelchair, if a bit bumpy, but there are many sections in the Gold Rush era downtown that are not and would require wheelers to detour into the street.  A good place to start would be to park by City Hall at the north end and walk from there…it’s the most accessible of the routes.

Looking on Yelp.com before the trip, I made up a list of restaurants that looked interesting to try.  Tonight, we’re going to J&D’s Steakhouse, right in the middle of downtown Sutter Creek.  It’s happy hour when we arrive so we order some of the delicious red wine they’re pouring tonight for just $3.  Next, it’s on to an appetizer of jalapeno chips that remind us a bit of fried pickles.  The peppers are sliced up, battered, and deep fried.  They’re served on a heaping plate with ranch dressing and are very good.    Tim has a burger and Letty has the pasta primavera.  I’m not really hungry, so I just subsist on the jalapenos, wine, bread, and Tim’s leftovers.  It’s all very good and we want to come back here again if we have time.
NOTE: J and D's has closed since this 2010 visit

The next morning, we head over to nearby Jackson, the county seat.  Breakfast is a delicious spread of waffles, pancakes, eggs, bacon, and sausage at the Waffle Shop on the south end of town on highway 49.

After breakfast, we take a stroll around downtown.  One of Letty’s favorite kitchen shops is located here, the Home and Farm Supply store.  Don’t let the name fool you, it’s just a really nice kitchen shop, no farm implements are to be seen.

After years in a tiny building with almost no parking by the fire station, the owners bought this vintage building up the block and have turned it into something worthy of Williams Sonoma.  Well worth a stop if you’re into cooking and the gadgets that go with it.

Walking around town afterward though reveals an old town getting ravaged by the recession.  Many storefronts are empty with “For Lease” signs on them.  Even the old Jackson Hotel, built in 1862, has a for sale sign on it.  Closer inspection reveals that the ABC has revoked their liquor license for an infraction, so that could have something to do with it as well.

The two busy businesses here today are the pawn shop and the liquor store.  Hardly a great scene.  It’s a bit depressing but luckily things will pick up once we leave Jackson behind.

Stay tuned for that part of the trip.

-Darryl

Copyright 2010 – Darryl Musick

All Rights Reserved

Celebrating Weeds and Country Music on St. Patrick's Day: Dandelion Days in Jackson, California

It's a vile weed. Sure, it has some pretty flowers and kids like to blow the seeds to the wind, where they will easily germinate. They'll take over your well cared-for lawn and destroy it, if it has it's way.

Why are we celebrating it today?

From what I can tell, it was a way of getting unwanted stuff out of your life...a community flea market to get rid of unwanted things, the "dandelions" of your life...turning lemons into lemonade.

At least that's what I can surmise, there's not a lot of data on the origins of the Dandelion Days Festival, celebrated each St. Patrick's Day weekend in Jackson, California.

In an area full of celebrations, get-togethers, fairs, and festivals, this is one of the many events happening in the region this weekend. We're going to make a full day of it.

When the crowds hit, parking is scarce in downtown Jackson. While there is a bit of parking reserved for handicapped placard and license holders at the police department, those go quickly. We have to park at one of the remote lots. We choose the lot at the county administration building a half mile away.

The accessible buses of Amador Transit are providing free, wheelchair accessible rides from the lot to the festival every half hour during the day. We get there just in the nick of time to catch one.

Main Street is closed for the event. A quarter mile of narrow, minimally accessible pavement dating back to the Gold Rush is where we need to be.

Since the street's closed, we just roll along down the middle to the other end where we'll work our way back. The sidewalks here are mainly accessible from one end of the block or the other, meaning you have to do a lot of doubling back to get off and keep moving along.

Our first stop, though, is for some food. Brunch at Rosebud's Cafe will do. A sausage and egg sandwich for me, while my wife had a delicious vegetarian curry risotto, and Tim had a grilled cheese and onion sandwich to fortify us for the journey ahead.

At the other end of Main Street, at the old fire station, the firefighters are cooking up some delicious looking tri tip.

Since we just ate, we're not hungry for it but I do make a note of their cooking rigs, which are steel drums with a fire inside. Rebar across the top makes for a handy place to hang the hooks holding the meat. A lid is put on to keep the heat down and the smoke in.

Kids and adults take their picture on an adjacent antique fire truck...

...while diners set up at tables inside the cleared station to eat.

Heading back, it's a mishmash of booths selling the usual stuff...incense, woodworkings, clothes, bags, etc...while musicians here and there busk for change.

Next to the historic National Hotel, a beer garden is set up.

A few very good cover bands serenade while we sip the local suds and wine next to Jackson Creek.

On the other side of the hotel is the actual flea market...a group of about a half dozen tables...whereas most of the other booths are professional flea market businesses.

The local Lions Club, sponsors of the event, have a dessert and coffee table here and a few carnival rides beckon the kids.

Tim tells us his battery is running low so we look for a place to exit and wait while I hike back up the hill to retrieve our van. The local American Legion let's me use their lot to load up Tim and we're off.

We take a few hours to relax and plug Tim's chair into it's charger before we're off for our next adventure. It's up to the town of Sutter Creek for an evening of dining and music.

At Cavana's Pub, we take the opportunity to have some cheap Irish whiskey and wine while dining on soup and sandwiches.

Next, we walk three doors down to the Sutter Creek Theater. I had contacted the owner earlier who assured me he'd hold a wheelchair space for Tim for the general admission show there tonight.

He's good to his word and Tim sits next to him as he operates the soundboard for the show. Letty and I sit directly in front of him.

Tonight, Sophia, Helda, and Grace...the Quebe Sisters...are playing a concert here. The sisters are a group of champion fiddle players from Texas who have evolved into an outstanding western swing band.

They're very good, popular, and well known...it's kind of surprising that they're playing this 200 seat theater up in the hills of the Motherlode...but, here they are.

The sold-out show is exceptional and, with the tiny theater and audience, the sisters have plenty of time to mingle with the fans after the show.

Sophia remarks on my Sriracha shirt and I regale her and her sisters of the day the owner of the factory gave me the shirt.

The trio happily poses for a picture as we bid them goodnight and travel home after our day of festivals and music.

Darryl Musick
Copyright 2019 - All Rights Reserved