Kershaw Ryan S.P. and Caliente

Sunday, March 15, 2026

Photos of Kershow Ryan State Park. I’m having trouble with the “slideshow”, and “gallery” features of this program so rather than not include any photos I’ll include them all, one at a time.

This looks like. a jumble of vines but it is a large patch of canyon grape

Jil took a few photos of the garden at Kershaw Ryan SP. It’s really nicely laid out yet a little early in the spring for roses to be budding out and trees leafing out. There were a few daffodils blooming, welcoming in the warmth after a cold winter.

The bluffs at the campground are impressive. There’s been some slide activity in the past that make them even more impressive. The campground itself is shaped like an elongated “U”. The interior sites are spacious back in while those on the outside of the “U” are end to end sites. There are tent sites on one side and a garden that hasn’t started to grow as of yet.

We head over to Caliente which happens to be the smallest incorporated city in Nevada at 990 souls. An outstanding feature downtown is its beautiful railroad depot. The station was built by the Los Angeles and Salt Lake City(later the Union Pacific Railroad) in 1923 to serve the railroad’s division point on the mainline between Los Angeles California and Salt Lake City, Utah.

The depot is a two-story wood frame stucco building. The first floor held the passenger waiting room, station agent’s office and other railroad offices. The second floor was used as a hotel.

The division point at Caliente served as a maintenance facility and was a base for helper locomotives. In the 1950s, as diesel locomotives replaced  steam, the railroad no longer needed to use the Caliente site. Maintenance of the locomotives was moved to Las Vegas in 1948.

Until 1997, the station saw service as Amtrak’s Desert Wind. In 1970, the building was turned over to the city of Caliente. In order to preserve the depot structure, the city moved its municipal services into the building. The station is now the Caliente city hall, library, and art gallery.

We cruised around town which has an amazing amount of city parks. US Highway runs parallel to the railroad tracks where many businesses are located. More businesses the “downtown area” are located on the other side of the tracks which may be problematic if one is in a hurry and the railroad guards drop down across the only road cutting off access to the other side of town.

Caliente has had an interesting past. I wonder what the future holds for this little community?