The hook
A half-mile of roofless brick storefronts with iron doors is nearly all that's left of the town that was once the capital of California's northern gold mines.
01Why it's worth it
In the 1850s Shasta was the "Queen City" of the northern mining district, a town of about 3,500 that nearly every Forty-Niner heading up the Siskiyou Trail passed through. When the railroad chose Redding instead in the 1880s, Shasta emptied out and slid into ghost town. What survives, now a state historic park, is a striking row of 1850s brick buildings with iron doors along the old Main Street, standing open to the sky, plus a restored courthouse that serves as a museum, a bakery, a church, and the cemetery. It's the northern counterpart to the Gold Country ghost towns further south, quieter and far less visited, fifteen minutes west of Redding.
02How to experience it
The park is on Highway 299 just west of Redding. The ruins are free to walk; the courthouse museum keeps limited state-park hours, so check before counting on it. It's a natural stop on the way to or from Mount Shasta, Lassen, or Whiskeytown, and since summers here are brutal, a morning walk is the kind one.