Author: mstolicny

That’s right everyone! Mina Nevada has airport! How cool is that! Now, it is not large commercial airport where you can land jumbo jets but, it is still an airport. And a very cool one!

This Mina Nevada Airport is a public use airport and is owned by Bureau of Land Management. So I believe if I or you owned the right kind of airplane and I knew how to fly it, I would be able to land here. And off course take off from here. Now you might say, off course Milan, airports are for landing and taking off. Yes exactly!!!

Suddenly, as many say Mina Nevada is in the middle of nowhere, it is not true! I believe you can fly here from San Francisco or Los Angeles in most likely under 2 hours. And flying from Reno or Las Vegas here will take way under 1 hour. That is so awesome!

Now imagine you are small sports air plain flying enthusiast and you’re looking for fun get away place to buy. Maybe little house with small air plain hangar in the backyard is the coolest place you should have.

Park your plain into your hangar anytime you fly here from Las Vegas for a weekend. Or just park it in the backyard like you’d park your boat. And when it’s time to go home again, you hop into your plain instead of a car. You drive yourself to the Mina Airport and fly home. Yes people do it! They just drive their small plain from their home to the airport and take off! There is even book writen about it! Check it out. It’s called Heart Of The Desert by Jack Randy Martin. It’s a fiction book about Mina Nevada and the main character owner of a shop in Mina owns an air plain. And he flies in and out of Mina all the time while his plain is parked in his hangar next to his house there. So cool! And so possible!

Mina Nevada airport has almost 5 star review ranking and is fun spot to land small sport airplanes. Now I’m not a pilot or hobby flying enthusiast so please check all specifications before landing here and don’t rely on my info in here. I’m very excited for Mina having this small airport indeed!

Mina Nevada being still considered a ghost town with an airport makes my mind wander into many directions. No! This is not a ghost town. It’s a small town where incredible opportunities are possible. It’s a town that wasn’t discovered yet with all its amenities, location and opportunities. This town will grow in the future. And it’s Mina Airport that will help it grow too. But do we really want Mina town to grow? I think little growth and little bit more care would help this beautiful town a lot!

Related articles:

Vacation get away in Mina Nevada

Mina Nevada population and is it growing?

Walker Lake the jewel close to Mina NV

I had a conversation with a local guy in Mina Nevada few years ago about some interesting facts about this beautiful town.

One of the the interesting things he mentioned was the geothermal activity that is happening under Mina Nevada. He was serious about potentially trying to tap into this hot springs that are there in Mina. I find it fascinating that Mina Nevada has this incredible resource under it.

Often I dream about creating little hot springs resort there or maybe someone should. And I think someone will do it eventually. Why not? I think it would be very cool!

Maybe Mina Nevada will in the future become the famous hot springs town where people will go and relax in this beautiful desert mountain environment and enjoy what nature provides naturally for us people. Let’s keep dreaming!

Mina Nevada is a very small town. Some call it a ghost town. But I disagree! This town lives! And people live here.

Mina has 182 people according to world population review statistic. And just looking at the graph of population I believe Mina NV is growing! What do you think?

Considering what just happened over the last 2 years with pandemic and major population shift from cities to the more rural places, I believe Mina Nevada will grow in the future.

People need space. Living in big cities is not as attractive as it used to be. Everyone has access to internet these days. And working from home is becoming more and more common norm.

Mina Nevada is not too far from big cities like Reno or Sacramento. Even San Francisco Bay Area is only about 6 hours away from Mina.

Now imagine having your little personal piece of paradise far away from hustle and bustle and still being able to work and bring income from places like San Francisco.

I believe it is just a question of time when people discover this historic beautiful small mining town of Mina Nevada. And it will become great, unusually special vacation home town. I strongly believe that’s coming.

Beautiful far stretching vistas with desert plains and magnificent mountains makes this perfect oasis of peace, quite and freedom. And I believe every human being need this for rejuvenating and healing. The perfect balance we all seek!

Mina Nevada will grow in the future. It’s already growing. People see it’s beauty and true potential it really deserves. It is a perfectly placed far and not too far from everything that makes cities so great and so terrible at the same time. If you long for the city, just hop in the car and in few hours you can be there. The same applies if you want to escape the city. Just drive home to Mina!

More about Mina Nevada:

History of Mina Nevada in photographs

Mina Nevada historic Southern Pacific railroad roundhouse

Carvile in Mina Nevada

These kind of beauties used to cross Mina Nevada town on regular basis. When I visit Mina and my little piece of western freedom land in it, I sit down under the birch tree that grows on my land and I imagine trains like this one passing by with a big whistle and energy of the true American west! Ahhh! How beautiful! How nostalgic!

I can spend doing this for hours and hours at a time. I love this place!

This is one is one of my favorite historical Mina Nevada photographs. It really captures the hey days of Southern Pacific Railroad in times when mining was respectable industry and miners were the hero’s of the west!

We stopped at at Walker Lake in Mineral County Nevada on our way to Mina Nevada. This is a majestically beautiful lake. It is huge! And it makes your mind wander. What is this wast body of water doing here in the middle of desert?

No, the beach of the Walker Lake is not typical sandy beach like setting, but it is very interesting, natural and beautiful in its own way.

We went for a swim. Just a little bit and not too far. I’m not sure if it’s recommended to swim here but we did. if you do, please be careful and don’t go very far. Actually just stay close and relax in the water. That’s what we really did.

We stayed maybe 45 minutes at the lake admiring the beautiful vistas and than we hoped into our cars refreshed and ready to see our highlight of the trip Mina, Nevada town!

Above on the old photograph it says:

“People live in these cars and further up the track three cars are used as a kitchen and dining room where railroad boys board.”

Maybe a miner who came to seek work here in Mina Nevada long time ago when things were booming here wrote this postcard home. Railroad was running regularly through this town. Railroad boys were everywhere. Mina was great mining town.

I only recently found out that there wasn’t a turn table in Mina Nevada. There was a so called WYE to turn the locomotives and engines.

I was surprised by this. Because until now I thought that the historic photo of Round House of Mina, NV was actually the turn table. Well, people corrected me. And I’m thankful for that! I have a lot to learn still about this beautiful town. And I’m learning!!

The Round House of Mina, NV was used to store locomotives and trains. And usually round houses accompany the turn table. But with the plenty of land available in Mina, NV, the Southern Pacific railroad company installed WYE – a track arrangement shaped like “Y” to turn engines and locomotives.

Wye – Definition

A triangle of railroad track used for turning locomotives or trains

I learned something new again today about Mina Nevada history and I know that there is still so much to learn and discover about this beautiful ghost town in Mineral County Nevada.

Amazing photo guys! I love this old historic photo of Southern Pacific Co. Round house in Mina Nevada.

I often call it turn table, but obviously as written on this photograph it is also called round house!

I have personal attachment to this round house and it’s history. It’s my little secret. Some day I will share it 🙂 In the mean time, enjoy this beautiful piece of history of this beautiful town of Mina, NV.

So as I found out, me calling this round house turn table was wrong. These are 2 different things. Roundhouse is a building where locomotives and trains are stored. Turntable is a place where locomotives are turned. And Mina Nevada never had turn table as I found out just few days ago. The lady, a historian enthusiast of Nevada’s history and librarian notified me about it. And she told me that the info on my website is wrong. Mina never had turn table!

And now I know. There was never a turn table in Mina Nevada. There was a so called WYE for turning the trains there.

I love this photo! It apears to me that the person who made the photo was standing on top of the old Southern Pacific Railroad turn table.

Maybe I’m wrong, but I’m almost certain it’s the old Mina Nevada turn table where trains were rotated. So this photographer sometimes around 1909 climbs on the top of the roof of this turn table to take photo of this family or it might be 2 couples and one child a girl most likely daughter of one of the couples standing down.

I would only guess that one of the guys down on the ground gives his son camera who’s maybe 12 years old and he is fit climber, that’s how kids used to be.

The boy is fit and strong and tough, not like today’s kids staring all day into the computer. And he’s pleased to be asked by his father to do this for him.

His father gives him instructions to be very careful with the camera and take one carefully crafted photo of them standing down.

I can only imagine how expensive were cameras and making photographs in those days. I only hope this boy and the camera made it safely back down.

What a great photograph! Good job little Freddie!