HE BOUGHT AN ABANDONED GHOST TOWN (full tour)

All right, welcome to my crib.

This is our new friend, Brent.

What I'm really interested to know is what you were doing before this and how you ended up buying an abandoned mining town in the middle of nowhere.

I asked myself that question quite often.

Two years ago, he purchased the entire ghost town of Cerro Gorda.

It was $1.4 million, which is way, way, way more than my life savings.

He's been living here for full time, miles away from civilization by himself for the last 10 months.

In this video, we're going to give you a tour around this incredible ghost town. I can't believe I'm holding a ghost. And we're excited to share Brent's story with you.

And look at what we have here.

How he ended up here, what his goals are, all the stuff we had been wondering ourselves.

Silver mine.

Wow. Missed it.

Okay, just don't move.

For your chance to win an epic trip and support an awesome organization, just go to omaze.com kn after a very.

Interesting week in Las Vegas.

We rented.

A car ready to go to California for the first time.

Yes. Received two negative Covid tests and drove four hours west into the middle of nowhere California to meet the man behind one of our favorite new channels on YouTube. We spent 30 minutes climbing to 8,500ft in elevation before we finally laid eyes on the small town of Cerro Gordo.

We do not call 911.

Oh.

We'Re.

We're here.

I don't even know which house this is.

It's so quiet. Not really in like a creepy or eerie way. At least not yet.

What's up, man?

Thanks for coming.

Hi, Bridge.

Hey, how's it going?

I was like, is this what they do in the old days? I don't have cell phone service. I was like knocking on do think about this.

In the olden days, they used mules to get up the road.

That's so crazy. It was worth the journey out here just to get to drive up the road. It's so beautiful.

Glad you guys made it. Not everybody makes up the road, unfortunately.

Yeah, thanks for the tip on the four wheel drive.

What do you want to do? Take a little tour or settle in or. What are you thinking?

Do you want to show us where we're staying?

Sure.

Yeah.

From there I got you guys set up in the only potentially haunted.

Oh, no.

I'll be honest with you. I don't really love the bunk house. I have my one and only ghost story from in here. Originally, it was a bunk house for some of the miners Here.

Yeah.

It was built in 1900. Generally avoided at night. This is the kitchen. Sweet. Cast iron soap. You got this microwave, refrigerator. This is not the haunted room. Haunted room. Back. This was one of the projects over the summer. Because this building originally had, like, carpet in it.

Yeah. The floor is great.

I sanded it myself, so I'm pretty proud of it. Yes.

So what's the ghost story with the bunkhouse?

So. So we'll go back into the kitchen. So one of my favorite places to watch the sunset is just above us on the ridge there.

Yeah.

So I was walking up one night, and this is back when the caretaker was staying here. I was walking by, and I saw somebody look out this window. There used to be, like, these lace curtains there. Very, you know, like, horror movie. So the lace curtains opened up. Somebody looked at me for sure, and they closed it. And I wasn't super blown away at first because we had contractors up here helping work on the property.

Yeah.

This was, like, a year ago. And so I figured, oh, it's a contractor's. You know, I'll forget about it. So I watched the sunset, came back next morning. I went to Robert, who's the caretaker. I was like, hey, Robert, how long are the caretakers staying here? And he kind of, like, looked at me. He's like, they left two weeks ago. And then, like, immediately. I'm a very rational person, right. So I'm like a very, like. I was like, all right, there's a draft. You know, this was. You started rationalizing it away. So I was like, all right. So I came back over here. This is like a twist light like this. So you have to twist it, right?

Yeah.

So it was on. So I twisted it off, and then I left. I put a padlock on the door. See, like the padlock thing? And I was like, no one is getting in here. And I was the only one in the world with a key. So I forgot about it. I went about my day that night. I went to go watch the sunset again. And as I went back, the light was back on, and I was like, I know, I know. I was the only human being in the world with a key. And so, yeah, avoid this house.

This is where we're sleeping.

This town doesn't have running water.

I think she's the ghost.

This is so cute. All right, we're all settled in. Brent's about to show us the entire town. But first, we're going to give you a tour of the bunk house where we're staying. So he's already showed Us around the kitchen. I'm really excited to try to cook a meal on this thing. And this hallway is pretty much just six bedrooms. This is our bedroom where we're staying. This is another bedroom with a twin bed and some scary looking dolls. I love this bedroom. It has these beautiful doors and this super cool fireplace. Smells like a fireplace in here. This is a storage room. This is another bedroom, a really cool.

Dresser.

And bedroom number six.

It's a pretty sweet setup.

Yeah. And that's it. I don't know if you've noticed or not, but in this home, whole house, there is not a bathroom. Let me show you where it is.

That's our outhouse.

Ooh, this is gonna be a cold walk in the middle of the night.

The ghost left a little note on here that says, please latch the door.

Oh, wow. Doesn't look too bad.

Oh, look, he even put a real toilet seat on the. On the wood bench. Toilet paper, hand sanitizer, we're good to go.

Fancy. I was expecting a hole in the ground, honestly. If you'll excuse me, I'm going to try it out. So as soon as you saw it, were you like, yes.

Oh, yeah. The whole ride up, you know, it's just like. I mean, it's a long road and so I remember being wow, wow. Like a kid.

It builds a lot of anticipation.

Yeah, exactly. And I like that. And then you go around the final turn and I remember the whole town presented and I was like, wow.

Yeah, that's exactly what just happened on.

And I remember I just came and they hand you like a set of 50 keys and they're like, good, lucky, like, aha. You know, you're excited. So I remember coming up and I had like three friends with me. We found an old bottle of whiskey in the saloon. Like we drank that and we're like, haha. And I remember waking up and I was like a little hungover. I was like, oh, well, now we gotta do something. You know, for the last two years, it's figuring out what to do that.

Is the best story.

The cats look like they run the show here.

Yeah, it's their house. I just get to inhabit it occasionally. No, we rescued them. A farmer called me one day.

You're very friendly.

Do you want some cats?

Good to have some company.

There's Gordo, star of the show.

Okay, so two questions. Yes. Before we start the tour.

Yep.

What I'm really interested to know is what you were doing before this and how you ended up buying an abandoned mining town in the middle of nowhere.

I asked myself that question quite often. But before this, I was running a backpacker hostel in Austin, Texas. And so, you know, like, bunk beds in the rooms, meeting travelers as my way of, like, traveling without going anywhere. I always liked, like, hospitality and especially, like, hospitality with history. And so the hospital was doing good. I was looking for a bigger project, and my buddy texted me this link to buy your own ghost town. And he texted me, like, two o' clock in the morning as a joke. He was like, I know you were looking for a bigger project. You know, is this what you had in mind? The next morning, I woke up and I started reading everything about Cerro Gord that I could. I just became obsessed, you know, it was just like, this is it. This is the one. Growing up, my grandfather watched Gunsmoke all the time. You know, the western show, like, on repeat. And so I used to wear, like, cowboy boots around while I was living in Florida.

Sounds like trouble. Well, that's the way you make a living, isn't it?

I think this, like, sparked something in me about that. And then here we are, living your childhood dream most days.

What's the vision five years from now?

I'd love for more people to be able to come up and experience the place. I think it's one thing to come up for the day and take a day tour and all that, but still something else to spend the night here, you know, see it in every hour of the day, how the sun hits the mountain at different hours. So I want to offer overnight accommodation. So the first step of that is we're rebuilding the American Hotel, which burned down in June, and so that'll have six rooms. So the first, hopefully by next summer, we have the hotel up and running. And then after that, who knows? I mean, it's one of those projects that, like, it's my life, you know, it's not one of these things where I can see in two years, I'll be done. There's 400 acres, so I could always add more little cabins out back and stuff like that. Yeah, I'm okay with that. I'm okay thinking that I'll be here kind of for the rest of my life, I guess.

Wow.

Yeah.

Something carriage made a new friend.

I love these cats. They have a lot of energy.

Yeah, they're spoiled. They live their best life.

The town established in 1865, and then they mined silver here primarily for about 20 years. And then by about 1880, 1885, the silver had ran out, so the town became a ghost town. This guy ld Gordon came up and he realized that they were just missing zinc. And so he mined Zinc for another 20 years. And then after he died, different independent owners owned it. And then the last people that lived here full time were a couple named Mike and Jody. We got it from their son. And so, yeah, they were the last ones that lived here full time.

And they just left everything.

Everything.

Gosh, so much history here.

That was the Gordon house. And this house across is the Belshaw house. It was owned by a guy named Mortimer Belshaw. And he's the one that really made Cerro Gordo what it is today. Kind of like Jeff Bezos back in the day or something. This is like his original house. And next to it he had a personal chef. So that was his cook's house. I hope to one day open this up so people can stay in, like, the house that the guy that founded the town stayed in.

He looks like a guy who would have a private chef.

Yeah. And own a mining town. He looks like he fits the part. I feel like I need to start dressing in three piece suits, you know.

Well, no, you've been here too long. When you start doing. Yeah, exactly.

Yeah, I think I've already been here a little too long. But right across the street was his general store. Was like the general store where they sold all the supplies. In the back was a butcher shop. And then one day I was digging by the back and I started finding, like, all sorts of bones. This is before I knew it was a butcher shop. And so you're like abandoned town with bones.

I like that you decorate it for Christmas.

Oh, yeah. How do you get into character? This was built in 1868.

Wow.

When we bought it, it was kind of just being used for storage. And so a lot of this has been kind of curating it and sorting through what was here. You never know what you're gonna get, you know, it's like from all different eras. So there's like a bunch of old dynamite boxes which I think are really. So this is what they're mining here. This is galena, which is like a silver lead ore. If you feel it's quite heavy.

Oh, wow.

This is probably my favorite find. Like down in one of the mines, I found this jacket. If you feel it, it's really stiff. And it's well preserved because they rub wax into it to make it waterproof. And the craziest thing is. So I looked it up and it's this company called Black Bear. And it's actually this guy bought the brand a couple years ago. He's trying to bring it back to life.

Wow.

There's a lot of parallels between, like, what he's doing and Cerro Gordo and he was able to date it. That's 103 years old.

That's awesome.

See, like every day back in the mines is like a treasure hunt. Like, these are original dynamite instructions from like the 1800s. And it's like that wax paper.

I feel like this is all stuff that I shouldn't get to touch.

I feel that way sometimes back in the mines. For me, each of them sends me on a different Google hunt to try to figure out what, how old each one is, where it's from.

Do you have Internet up here?

I have a hotspot so I can hotspot my AT&T, but no streaming, no watching. Too many things up here, unfortunately.

Yeah, that's okay. Could be a good thing.

Yeah, exactly. These are the goats.

Hey, guys.

They're new additions to the property. The star of the goats is definitely Tofu. Tofu's the smallest one. This one, she's the crowd favorite.

Okay, here we go. Who's first? Be nice, be nice. Oh, sorry. Oh, look at Tofu being all sweet.

So we have Elon Tofu, and that's Beretta.

They're so fun. So what do they do? Like, why are they here?

Just pets. I just wanted some like live of any type up here, you know. You want to hold Tofu.

Hi. Oh.

Hey, little girl. She's like a really big fat puppy with horns. I can't believe I'm holding a goat.

Good girl.

That was super fun.

This was the assay office. So the assay office is where they tested the quality of the minerals coming out of the mine. So they would say, oh, this is 18% silver. This is 25% silver. And what I think is kind of an interesting contrast is that they would determine whether they were rich or not there. And then this used to be one of the original brothels. So it's like they would strike riches and immediately go to the brothel or.

Wow.

Some interesting setup like that.

So before you came here, did you have any experience with like construction and building?

No, nothing, Nothing. So to start off, there's a little cabin over the hill over there quite a ways. So I started working on that first cuz I thought the stakes were lower. Like if I messed up that cabin, nobody could at least see it. Yep.

It's not like in the main because.

I built up my confidence over time. And now, yeah, now this is like a bigger project, you know, I see like, a whole thing. Come on in. That's like, one of the original bars from the town. So they would stamp at Cerro Gordo. So that way if anybody got caught but the bar that wasn't supposed to have the bar.

Yeah.

Obviously they'd be in a lot of trouble.

This is silver.

Silver and lead mix.

Yeah.

Even if you were to tell me that that bar was $10,000, I would still keep it just because it's part of the history here. And, yeah, I haven't seen any other silver Gordo bars since.

So I feel like you have a pretty good vantage point from here.

Yeah.

How much land do you, like, how many acres do you own?

The property's about 400 acres. Okay. And so about 100 of it is here. So it goes to, like, the peaks and valleys above us. And then if we were to go to the saddle right over there, then it looks into Death Valley national park, and we have about 300 acres over there. And originally this building was like a mechanics garage to work on the wagons and stuff. Over the years, it became a church. And the stained glasses, they shot a movie up here called Nevada Smith. It was a Steve McQueen movie, like an old western.

And they donated the stained glass after the movie was done. Don't even trust a friend. So one of the owners incorporated that, and then now it's kind of like a movie theater chapel mix.

I think it'd be hilarious to have.

Like a film festival of sorts where like, everybody gets dressed up in, like, almost tuxedos. And we have like a red carpet, you know, and all that. You're like, come on in. And this is like this old crappy building.

Everybody has to wear three pieces.

Oh, look at all the chairs. So we're done with the vlog.

There you go.

Listen it to you.

It's pretty neat, cuz this is just like an old sheet metal building. But because it's in a ghost town, and because they've put some cool, like, theater chairs in here, it feels really special. Just for where we are on the tour, this is our haunted bunk house that we're sleeping in tonight. The church friend's house.

On your video, we were like, not going in there. And that's like, where we're supposed to the full experience.

If you want to come and stay at a ghost town, then why not stay in the place with the ghosts?

True. At least you didn't put us in her bedroom.

No, back left room.

All right, so just picked up a couple lights and we are about to go check out Our first mine. Brent's done some some renovations to this one.

I recently flattened this with tobacco because that's the mine. And my hope one day is to create a cabin here. Cuz the views of Mount Whitney and then the town would be beautiful. And then I want to create like a bookshelf here. And you'd slide the bookshelf and it would show my secret private mine. And I'm even going to like back fill it so it looks like the mountain. So you'll never know mine was here unless you open up the bookshelf. So you have to have some like Willy Wonka like hidden stuff up here. You know, in a ghost town. This is the brightest flashlight in the world.

Is that like a true statement?

Yeah, like actually.

Right. Boom. Whoa. I don't even need my headlamp.

I know.

This is crazy.

Wow. Yeah. This is like an actual silver mine. And I think a lot of times when people see stuff, there's fans inside of the flashlight.

Okay, cool. So we're not all about to die. I still have my sunglasses on and I can still. And I could still see.

This is massive.

Yeah. There's something like 30 miles of mine underneath the town. And back in the day this was called the Safeguard Mine.

I think that's a bat. I think we just passed a bat.

Oh yeah.

It's a bit messy back in this mine cuz this is where I celebrated Christmas this year.

Oh, wow.

Ouch. It's not easy to drag back here.

Did you do this by yourself back here?

There a lot of dragging and a lot of time on my hands.

Can you imagine just opening the bookshelf to the cabin that you're staying in, walking 100 yards down a mine and then just having this place to hang out?

Yep.

This has to be the only mine in America that has a Christmas tree snowman in it.

I hope so. This is like a vertical shaft on the mine that just goes straight down.

Oh, wow.

Oh my gosh.

That's not where we want to drop the camera.

No.

Have you made it down there?

I did, yeah. I used rope just to be a little more safe.

Were you terrified? Have you always been this brave?

I don't know if it's brave or dumb. We can go a little further. I have more creations of my own. Boredom ahead.

Okay.

Which include a mini golf course.

No way. You are like the Willy Wonka.

You know. I got too much time with him.

That's so creepy. Excuse me, man.

I don't have the carpet down yet, but this eventually will be My mini golf course that I put on.

You were the right person to buy this, though. Because if somebody would have bought this, just like trying to turn it into a resort to make money, it just wouldn't be the same. Like, you could tell that you're doing it for the love of it.

Yeah, I do love it. I have fun with it, which I think is important.

Yeah, this is.

You know, just putt. Line up your putt and cut the hole in there. This is another kind of hypocrite.

Yeah, thanks.

Just another. I'll do the light. Just another kind of sketchy pit to.

Wow.

Oh, gosh.

Makes my stomach.

Oh, that's deep. Okay. No, we'll be completely dark. Let's do it.

Okay, Just don't move. All right, ready?

Nobody. Step two.

Yeah, don't move. One.

Yeah, I can't see my hand in front of my face.

Sorry.

I was scared you were moving.

There's a bat right above me, so.

Oh, it's super furry.

That's a big transition. California desert sun from a cave. Does she start?

Doesn't sound too good, huh?

No. All right, we'll take the car. That was fun. That was a fun idea.

So go up this road, and then we're turn up the other road.

This is just all so much fun because I feel like I'm doing something wrong. Yeah, but you own it, right? So we can do what we want.

I feel that way sometimes, too.

It is huge.

The hoist house inside is the Union Mine. And the Union Mine is the main mine at Sorogodo. It's the mine that goes 900ft straight down. And every 100ft, there's levels to it. And they pulled something like $500 million worth of silver out of the hole.

What?

It's. Yeah, it's the reason Sarah Goro is what it is. So I'll show you how you get down into the mine. But keep in mind, when I show you the cage, all of that rock we see, all those big dirt mounds all came out of this cage. So it was just running 24 7. Up and down, up and down. Wow. Well, the whole building is to support the running of this cage.

Oh, this is dead, huh?

This cage and that cable is how everybody would go down into the mine. And so you would stand here. This goes down much like an elevator, but obviously there's no buttons or anything. So there's a wheel back there that a guy's looking at a dial, kind of guessing how far down you are. I'll take care. Bye, guys.

Where'd you hide all that money in that suitcase?

Oh, man. All supported by that cable above me.

That looks like it might have been here since the 1800s.

Yeah. I don't have any records of it being replaced, so I think that's the unfortunate truth. It feels to me like an amusement ride. So there used to be an amusement I called the Tower of Terror.

Yeah.

Studios. It feels like that, but then you have to remind yourself it's not Disney.

It's not meant to be safe.

Yeah, exactly. This is actually dropping like that. It takes 45 minutes to get down to the 700 level in this cage? No, Just waiting, waiting, waiting, waiting. And then you're thinking the whole time, if anything falls, I'm falling. The whole shaft is 900ft. I'm falling 900ft. That's going to be the last 900ft that I do.

Yeah, right.

They say it's the. It's not the fall that kills you, it's the impact.

You know, my favorite part was when you said the guy with the wheel would just kind of guess.

Yeah, he kind of guesses. I'll show you the.

We need to learn how it is.

Yeah. And that's the original hoist that would let people up and down. So there's guys running 27.

So who is he? Who's doing this?

We have a guy named Cody that operates it for us. But if you look at that very primitive dial.

Yeah.

That shows you how many feet down in the earth you are.

So the shaft is all the way over at that end of the barn. And the guy in control is over here.

So not very close. There's a lot of yelling.

Cody's got to be a huge guy.

He's a very big guy.

This thing is so heavy and he. So he just sits here with his own body weight and slows you down.

Yeah. So you have a lot of faith in Cody as you're getting lower down there.

No, thank you.

But we've never taken it past the 700 foot level. But there is a 900 foot level which the Indiana Jones treasure hunting part of me is like, I have to get to the 900. You know, so far I haven't been able to convince them to waste their whole day sending me down to treasure hunt. But maybe one day I can get something to do that.

Oh, shoot.

I saw. Like, I'm in slow motion. I know. Like, no.

Is it still working?

All right. We are going up to watch the sunset. The only thing I'm not excited about is that means next time we Come back to the bunkhouse. It's going to be dark.

Right over there is Death Valley. And then right over there is Mount Whitney. So you see kind of both the highest and lowest peak in the continental US at one spot. I just love that high low. I think even in town, I want to be able to have everything from nice hotel rooms to, like, basic campsites and kind of play off that high low across the whole board. I think that'd be a lot of fun.

Who thought? 0gordo.

Cheers.

Cheers.

Thanks for having us out.

Of course. Yeah. Thank you for coming.

Or twist this thing.

Oh, yeah.

I can't remember how to do it.

Nice. Let's go turn all the lights on in here. If I'm staying in the haunted cabin, I'm sleeping with the lights on.

Such a scaredy cat.

Don't even want to, like, look down the hallway.

Don't taunt them like that.

What are you doing?

My lunch. It's cold up here.

Yeah. The contrast of old cash register. But really it doesn't work. So just. Just Venmo me.

And usually people can't Venmo because they don't have service. The only time that I really realize how sketchy is it. It is. Is when I'm editing videos after the fact.

Yeah.

I'll look out of my.

The ghost knock over your lamp.

Yeah. Dang it.

Ghost.

Not again.

I'm glad you. You gave me this light.

That's all right.

It doesn't. I can't.

Only the best of my guests.

That's crazy. This tiny bottle has to be, like £15.

Let's clean up the shelf. I was like, wait. I thought it was glued down at first.

What do you do with mercury?

I think it's very toxic. Yeah. I think it's not.

I don't think you want to drop that.

You won't believe how heavy this is.

Can I hold it with one? Wow.

That's insane.

I'm trying to think. I do my curls with, like, 15 and 20s, right?