Malakoff Diggins State Historic Park, California

Malakoff Diggins State Historic Park features the meticulously-restored gold rush town of North Bloomfield. Along with artifacts like this wagon, one can see several of the nozzles that were used in hydraulic mining. Although this practice of washing away the earth with high-pressure streams of water was outlawed in 1884, nearby hillsides were eroded so badly the scars have not healed in over a hundred years. On my visit (June 1989), I found the colorful cliffs incongruously beautiful, but could not put their message of environmental disaster out of my mind.