Things to do in Goldfield, NV. Once the biggest town in Nevada.

Goldfield sits on US 95 in Esmeralda County, roughly halfway between Las Vegas and Reno. It has been the county seat since 1907.

• To Tonopah: about 27 miles north on US 95, roughly 35 minutes.
• From Las Vegas: about 184 miles north on US 95, roughly three and a half hours.
• From Pahrump: about 142 miles, north on Nevada 160 and then US 95, about two hours and forty minutes.
• From Beatty: about 67 miles north on US 95, an hour and a quarter.
• To Gold Point: about 30 miles southwest, roughly 50 minutes. See our Gold Point guide.

Drive times are from a routing service, rounded. The county and the chamber both put Tonopah 26 miles away.

Walk the old town

The Goldfield Historic Walking Tour has 190 stops. Download the booklet from the Goldfield Historical Society or pick up a copy in town; the chamber has a short version. Worth finding: Goldfield Fire Station No. 1, the old Bullfrog Goldfield Railroad yard, and the telephone and telegraph building, the town’s communications center from 1908 to 1963 and one of the few spared by the 1923 fire.

Esmeralda County Courthouse

The county seat moved here on May 1, 1907, and John Shea of Salt Lake City won the $79,833 bid to build the courthouse that July. It is a two-story stone building, 75 by 85 feet, with a jail of three metal tiers of cells out back from the Pauly Jail Company of St. Louis. District court opened on August 1, 1908, and the county has used the building ever since. The district courtroom still has its original steel bench and Tiffany lamps.

Goldfield High School & the cemetery

The 1907 high school on Euclid and Ramsey was donated to a nonprofit in 2008, and the historical society is restoring it. Ghost tours run there. The Goldfield Historic Cemetery has the epitaphs, including one man who died eating library paste; the historical society has a cemetery brochure.

Rocket Bob’s Art Cars

Three cars on the main drag, covered in thousands of figurines and trinkets, plus a boat and the frame of another car. Built by a longtime Burning Man regular.

Gemfield

Four miles outside town, a pay-to-dig rockhounding claim with agate, jasper, turquoise, obsidian and six kinds of chalcedony, and a rock shop for anyone who strikes out.

The Florence Mine

The mine its owners kept away from George Wingfield. It produced about $650,000 in gold in a few months. Tours take in the grounds, the last working hoist house in town and the pen where the owners keep their burros.

Just outside Goldfield, next to the tailing piles, more than 40 cars, vans, trucks and buses are stacked on each other or driven into the ground, every one of them painted. Longtime resident Mark Rippie started it, wanting the world record for the biggest car forest, and artists Chad Sort and Zak Sargent joined him. Travel Nevada says it is the largest in the country, bigger than Cadillac Ranch or Carhenge.

• Hours: open 24/7, best from sunrise to sunset.
• Admission: free. Donations appreciated.
• At the entrance: a visitor log, a portable restroom and information about the area.
• Spray paint: leave it in the truck. The art is now commissioned from invited artists.

Construction started in April 1907 and the hotel opened in 1908: four stories, a main floor of gray granite from Rocklin, California, and red-brown brick above. The plans called for 150 rooms and 45 suites. Each room had a telephone, the building had steam heat, and the lobby had mahogany paneling, black leather banquettes and crystal lights. The elevator ran 300 feet a minute, one of the fastest in Nevada. It cost $300,000 to $400,000.

The Goldfield Historical Society says the Hayes–Monette Syndicate built it, to plans by the Reno architects Holesworth and Curtis. Travel Nevada credits George Wingfield, the banker and mining magnate.

After the boom

The hotel ran into the 1940s and the US Army had it during World War II. An owner in the 1980s spent millions on renovations and never opened it. Red Roberts bought it in 2003; his son owns it now. It sits inside Goldfield’s national historic district.

Can you go inside?

No. The Goldfield Hotel is closed and not offering tours, though you can look in the windows. It is not lodging. It is, by reputation, one of the most haunted buildings in the country; the Ghost Adventures crew keeps coming back, and the best-known story is about Elizabeth in room 109.

Not quite. About 250 people live here, it is still the county seat, and the courthouse still holds court. Travel Nevada calls it a living ghost town, which is fair: much of the boomtown is gone.

History of Goldfield, Nevada

On December 4, 1902, Harry Stimler and Billy Marsh, two young prospectors from Belmont grubstaked out of Tonopah, staked three claims on Columbia Mountain and named the district Grandpa. On October 20, 1903, the new camp voted to call itself Goldfield instead.

From 1903 to 1910 it was the largest city in Nevada, with a peak of 20,000 people, a railroad to Las Vegas, five banks and a mining stock exchange. Between 1903 and 1940 its mines produced $86,765,044 in precious metals. Virgil and Wyatt Earp, George Wingfield, Death Valley Scotty, Jack Dempsey and Tasker Oddie all passed through.

Tex Rickard ran the Northern Saloon, which needed 80 bartenders. On Labor Day 1906 he staged the Gans–Nelson lightweight title fight in town for a $30,000 purse; Battling Nelson was disqualified in the 42nd round and Joe Gans won. Rickard went on to build the original Madison Square Garden.

The bust

The mines were in decline by 1910. Fires hit in 1905 and 1906, a flash flood in 1913, and in 1923 a fire leveled more than 50 blocks. Today the largest employer in town is Esmeralda County.

Santa Fe Saloon

Opened in 1905 as the Santa Fe Club. It is the oldest business in Goldfield and one of the longest continually operating in Nevada. It was a saloon and a house of ill repute; the beds that used to be in the back gave way to the motel next door. Look for Julia Bulette’s bathtub and the old mining claims, and meet “Nevada’s Meanest Bartender.” Pizza is made to order, and there are slot machines. 925 N. Fifth Avenue.

Mozart Tavern

Formerly the Hoist House, at Crook Avenue (US 95) and North Columbia. An original one-piece Brunswick bar, a cash register more than 100 years old, and meals. Virgil Earp worked as a “Special Officer” at the National Club nearby.

Dinky Diner

The only restaurant in town, and family run: omelets, chicken fried steak and breakfast burritos in the morning, then burgers, sandwiches and Mexican plates.

• Santa Fe Motel: eight rooms next to the saloon, plus a laundry.
• Goldfield Stop Inn: a trading post by day with three rooms: two vintage studios, Pearl’s Place and Rosie’s Room, and The Crib, a cabin moved from the old red-light district.
• Clark’s Custom Camp: powered pull-through RV sites on concrete pads, with Wi-Fi, laundry and a rec room.
• Goldfield Miners Camp RV Park: veteran owned, pet friendly, and fits rigs up to 100 feet.
• Diamondfield Gulch: six miles east, a rebuilt Old West town on Ron Matheny’s private land, with primitive camping. Visits and stays are by arrangement with him.

Gold Point, 30 miles southwest, rents restored miners’ cabins; see our Gold Point guide. Tonopah is 27 miles north: see Tonopah, Nevada.

Goldfield Days is the town’s summer weekend, around the start of August: a parade, a land auction, vendors, food, raffles, bed races, Old West gunfights, haunted tours, a miners’ lying contest, a barbecue cook-off and a vintage car show. The 2026 edition ran July 31 to August 2 and is over. The chamber has not posted 2027 dates.

Goldfield is high desert. Average highs and lows by season:

• Summer: highs around 86°F, lows around 57°F.
• Fall: highs around 65°F, lows around 39°F.
• Winter: highs around 44°F, lows around 23°F.
• Spring: highs around 62°F, lows around 37°F.

Winter nights are well below freezing. Summer is the easy season up here.

Next stops: Gold Point to the southwest, Tonopah to the north, Rhyolite and Beatty to the south, and the rest of the ghost towns near Las Vegas.