*western background music plays* Hey, guys.
Today we're going to be visiting the ghost town of Grafton.
So this place is only about 22 minutes
from Zion National Park, and it's absolutely free.
But you do have to drive over like this really rough terrain
to get there for a bit.
Anyway, Europeans moved into the traditionally Southern
Paiute lands in 1859 and they established Grafton hoping to raise cotton.
But it eventually became a ghost town though, because they experienced
flooding, farming problems and hostilities with the original native residents.
The very last settlers left in the 1940s.
Guys, we're at the ghost town.
So what should we do first?
So as we go through this tour, let me know in the comments down below
which of these houses you could imagine yourself living in back in the day.
So first up, this one, it's the Russell home.
It was built around 1862.
It's that red color because it's made out of adobe with the local dirt.
And the local dirt is, well, that red color.
As you can see, this place has had a lot of restoration work done to it.
Anyway, it was built by the blacksmith named Alonzo Haventon Russell.
And it's this big because he had a huge family with more than one wife.
He was a polygamist.
This is where he and his second wife, Nancy, raised their children.
- E: Ahhhh!
There's bugs!
There are so many bugs guys.
- B: No!
- E: So, it's so cool now because you can actually go inside of these buildings.
When I was growing up, this house was completely locked
and you couldn't even go near to a lot of other places that we'll be doing today.
So if you do want to come here because it's on the way to Zion
National Park, so if you're ever going there, you can come here.
But you can go into the buildings, which is really nice.
Though, I am seriously concerned about whatever these droppings are.
Especially because I did just put my like tripod down
on to that ground.
Mom, I love your umbrella. - M: Thank you.
- B: The swing is gone!
- E: Oh, yeah.
There used to be a swing.
So, like, right over there. There used to be a swing.
- So right across the street from the Russell House
is the Louisa Marie Russell House that was built in 1879.
And this was for the guy's fourth wife.
She raised their six children in this little home while her sister wife
got to live in the big, fancy house that we were just in.
I feel like she got the raw end of the deal there.
- It's a very, very tiny house.
Ahhh!
*creaking floorboards*
Oh. Oh, wow.
I need to show you guys this.
The nails are very pokey.
What about you, Bay?
- B: Absolutely not.
"Pa's five (ft) seven.
We only need to build the door to these dimensions."
- M: Walk into it and see what happens. No, that's cheating.
- B: I'm not going to touch my forehead to that.
I'll get bubonic acne.
- E: Bubonic acne.
It is. It has a very nice little tree-y yard.
So this is the schoolhouse.
This is the schoolhouse you can actually see in the background
of some of the shots of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.
It's, I forget whose girlfriend she's supposed to be, but
like the main girlfriend of the show, she's a schoolteacher and this is it.
This schoolhouse has actually been in more than one movie.
And according to the Grafton Heritage Foundation, is "perhaps
the most photographed ghost town historic structure in the western United States."
So it's kind of famous.
Anyway, up next, we are on to the John and Ellen Wood home.
Now, this couple built it around 1877.
They farmed, they raised cattle, they raised their kids.
Anyway, I have to say, one of the scariest things about touring these houses,
at least for me, is the possibility that they might be full of scorpions.
Where I live, it's not uncommon for people's houses,
even here in the city, to get scorpion infestations
and also rattlesnakes are a very real thing here in the desert.
- E: Ohhh!
This is a nice porch.
The porch.
No, we are not going into the cellar.
- B: Did you see the lizard? - E: I have not.
But the houses are sketchy enough.
This is how you die is going into the cellar.
-B: Look, lizard is going into the cellar.
I wanted to go into the cellar of the other one,
but I didn't have the courage to go alone. I'm scared of spiders.
- E: There's the cellar no one has the courage to go in.
- B: Dude, it's literally...
- E: I'm going to die. - B: Just look at...
-M: Just listen for a rattle.
- E: I'm scared!
I don't know if I can do this now.
I'll let my younger sister die... - B: I'm scared of spiders.
- E: Then why are we doing this then? - B: I can't see.
That's why I wanted you to go with me.
- E: Okay, at least if we're gonna die, we will die together possibly.
- B: Do you want to go in?
- E: Okay
- Retreat! We're retreating. - B: I got a picture with my flash.
- E: I feel like this trip is making me realize I'm scared of a lot of things.
Spiders, snakes,
spiders and snakes.
- B: Oh. Why didn't you warn me? - E: So many holes.
Up next is the Wood's family barn and granary.
You can't really go inside these structures
because they're full of just old scrap wood, but they're still cool to see.
You guys are about to go
where we can't go, which is into the creepy barn.
What's it like in there?
It's just old wood.
So now I'm just recording on my mom's phone because mine overheated and died.
Well, it says it will come back when it gets less hot.
Maybe this was meant to be like our mass grave
for when we die from the spiders and the snakes.
Or it could be a pigpen.
So this is the Ruby Rose cabin, and it really has been heavily restored
as you will see me hypothesize later in this video.
- B: You don't have to worry about bathrooms back then.
You got the outhouse, right?
You have the stove here?
- E: Yeah.
- B: And then you can have like the beds over here.
You can have like bunkbeds I guess -Huh?
Yeah.
I'm gonna question whether this one's like a real house.
Or maybe they just had to do so much repair work on it that...
because how does it not have a fireplace
or, like, even, like a outlet for a stove?
Wow. I'm just getting really sweaty.
I really love the trees they have here, though.
And now we're doing a 25 point turn
trying to get out of here.
I'm going to go walk across this bridge. Doing this for the vlog, guys.
I'm going to walk across the aesthetic bridge.
Yeah.
When I see a bridge like this, I'm just like,
someone would have Instagram pictures on this bridge.
This is apparently a historic bridge.
*sound of the Virgin River*
I feel like so instagrammable right now.
I could just Instagram it all.
So after visiting Grafton, we hit up
my favorite place to eat in Springdale, which is Oscar's cafe.
It has a lot of gluten free options and delicious food.
Whenever I'm in the area right around Zion, this is the number one place
I want to go to eat.
So if you're ever there, I highly recommend it.
We're back in the car.
- M: Take off my sunglasses and protect my eyes. -
So my mom saw, was it a reel?
- Yeah, something like that.
- So my mom saw this reel.
That's pretty much saying if your air bags go off
and you're wearing cheap sunglasses and they shatter, you could go blind.
- Yes.
- And so now she avoids wearing her sunglasses while driving.
- B: I'm trying, but my cleats are stuck in your corneas.
- Waeyo? - No one is gonna know where that's from.
-So here is where people glamp.
So that was the trip to Grafton.
Let me know in the comments below which house
you could see yourself living in if you were a settler back in the day.
And as always, keep being awesome because you're awesome. Bye!
Okay.
So I just got attacked by a bee .
So that's what y'all need to know.
*western style music continues to play*