Zzyzx Off Of Interstate 15 || Soda Springs / Mineral Springs & Health Spa || Lake Tuendae 2023

What's going on everybody? Welcome back to 909 Adventures. We are on our way to Nevada and there's a couple of stops that I wanted to stop and check out. I wasn't expecting this place to be open the last two or three times I've come through here. It's been closed, but we're here at ZZX and we're going to see everything that the public can see. This is now private property. It belongs to the California State University system, so they don't allow people on here, onto their, I guess you could say campus, without signing up for one of their classes, their weekend classes, right? So there's a couple of cool things that we can still check out. So come with us and let's see what we can see. All right guys, so we are here in the Mojave Desert at ZZX. From a little bit of history, from what I remember, I didn't do my research as I normally do. I've done research on this place years and years ago. I came out here about three years ago and I was thinking that I'd be able to get in, but it was closed. I didn't realize at the time that the California State University system had purchased this land and is now using it for weekend courses. So they control this now and everything was closed the three years ago I came out, but today we are here and it is open. But from what I remember doing research on this way back in the day when it first opened, it was like a sham doctor. I don't even think the guy was a real doctor. He was claiming that the springs here had some sort of healing properties in it and he was a sham. It was a sham doctor. Everything was a scam. And yeah, so I'll put a little bit more information if I can find it down in the description. But yeah, like I was saying, that's really all I can remember at this moment. But there is something else here. There's a lake here where the fish is called a pupfish and it only exists in this lake. Nowhere else. I believe the aquarium at the Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas has some of these said fish, but other than that, they're only here and we're gonna probably not be able to see the fish, but we're gonna be able to check out the lake today. Kelly, the word Zyzax was coined by radio evangelist Curtis Howe Springer, who said he wanted to have the last word in the English language. And it was the name he gave to a health resort he started building in 1944 on land obtained on the basis of mining claims. But the government says the last of the old medicine men did everything but mine. For 30 years, Curtis Springer operated his Zyzax Mineral Springs, selling health, religion, and the Springer specialty, Andaluvian herb tea. But then the troubles with the government over who owned the land finally caught up with him in 1974 and he was evicted. Now, two years later, the buses rolling down the Boulevard of Dreams bring a different clientele. Representatives of seven campuses of the California State University and College System. The schools have formed the California Desert Studies Consortium and in an agreement with the U.S. Bureau of Land Management, will use Zyzax as a desert research center. Alright, so if you guys see right there in the center, I believe that would have been one of the, I guess you would call it a bathhouse where the original soda springs would have been. You go and you take a dip in there and supposedly get all of your healing properties out of the natural spring that was here. We're approaching the lake right now. Don't know if we're going to be able to see any of the fish that call this place home. They're pups. Pretty cool. Aren't they? Not guppies, they're pups? Pupfish. That's just what they're called, pupfish. It is a shame that we cannot drone this place. This is the no drone zone. I'm going to be respectful of that, especially since it's part of the California State University System and I'm not going to fly my drone. That was my plan. That was my plan was to fly it here, but you win some, you lose some. I'd say this is pretty deep. Oh, I'm sure it is. Alright, you were saying this looks really deep, huh? Yeah, it does kind of look pretty deep. I would hate to fall in. Look it, there's a fishy. A little, I don't, I don't know what the tadpoles are. Yeah, I'm pretty sure that would be a pupfish because that's all that is in here. Well, there you guys got, there's your pupfish. Yeah, now we can't see some bigger ones. There's a, there's quite a few. Yeah, it'd be nice to see a few bigger ones, but that's not going to happen. That's pretty green. Not today. Pretty green. I mean, you never know, we might see something. A big shark. Imagine, got jaws out here. That, that, I wasn't expecting to see this fountain turned on though. I wasn't expecting to see that going at all. It is really hard to see though. It's very, very green. Oh yeah, I mean visibility, if you're in the water, under the water is probably only a couple of feet, if that. Staff only beyond this point. All right, so, you know, gang guys, private property. I would love to go check this stuff out. This was all abandoned at one point. You only get to do a little loop and that's it. Yeah. Unless you come on the weekends. Yeah, you got to take one of their courses though. I don't know how to sign up for that or anything. Still, but that's the only way you can get beyond those ropes. I'm sure if you go and uh, on the California State University website and sign up for one of their weekend courses here at Zizzix, you'd be able to stay here. Getting a little closer to that fountain. That's actually a really nice picture right there. It's really peaceful. There's no, hardly anybody out here. Nobody wants to take that long drive. There is one, one worker right there working on the AC unit, probably cleaning it up, getting it ready for a summer. Summer. This is the Mojave desert. It gets really, really hot out here, guys. Not that far from Death Valley either. Oh, it's pretty shallow right here. Uh, you think so? Oh, look, there's a couple of fish in there. Yeah. You know what? I don't think. It stinks though. Not as bad as salt and sea. No, but you can still. Yeah, you could smell the. I don't know. The sulfur in the area or something became. Unless it's all like. The smell to it. Grass from under the water. Yeah, I think that's what that is. I don't know if you guys are able to see it. Algae? Is it algae? Algae, some sort of uh, grass that's growing in the water. Look, there's more babies. Yeah. Five of them. Oh, there's a bigger one coming up. See him? Oh, yeah. I think that's probably as big as they get. Really? I don't think they get very big. I don't think they get very big at all. So he was like that big. If I remember correctly, you only get about the size of a molly. Do you know what a molly is? Fresh water fish that you put in a fish tank. I don't think they get very big. It stinks. Kind of smells like a sewer. Yeah. Look at the old numbers on the doors and look at the signs. This is a really cool little spot. I would have loved to explored this. These are probably little hotels for people that stay. Yeah, they're just little rooms. Yeah. Yeah, but I would have loved to check this out when it was abandoned and uh, we were able to explore everything. But you know, I'm grateful just to be out here checking this out. And uh, looks like they need to update this sign. Yeah, it kind of does. It looks, it does remind you of something like old Hollywood. Like the uh, the bungalows at Universal Studio where like Alfred Hitchcock would stay. Yeah. Boulevard of Dreams. Is that an old swamp cooler? I don't know what that would have been. It kind of looks like it, but no, because it's all made out of wood. Yeah, if anybody knows what this might have been. Oh, you know what this is? I could see exactly what it is. It's an old weather station. You could see the thermometer right here on this side. See if I can come down at an angle. And I'm sure there was other things in there, you know, barometer. And uh, maybe wind would have been, no, no, that's not, definitely not in use anymore. Very cool stuff though. There's more buildings back there. Yeah, there's, there's a lot of stuff here. We're just not going to be able to see it. You guys see that right there? Does that look familiar to you guys or what? Oh, let me see what you're talking about. Yep. Let's check out that old bell. I've just seen that. Looks like you can uh, walk up to it and ring it. They got a string hanging right there in the middle. Very cool. Oh look, that looks like they're out of a, an old building that they don't utilize. Right back there in the middle. I've seen that too. You see that? That's got no windows, it looks like. Yeah, it almost looks like bars from back here, but I'm pretty sure it's not. It's just my old eyes. Look. We got an old boat. No, I guess it has windows. Does it? Mm-hmm. Windows with no glass in it? Yeah, I can't really see it anymore. Look at the old boat, Mrs. 909 just pointed out. There's always a boat in the desert. Yeah, there is, but you know, it's kind of fitting because this was an old dry lake bed. Look at that boat. The old wood boat. I think we uh, found Noah's Ark here. Dang, look at that. That's crazy. Yeah, it is crazy. It's cool they left it too. Yeah, I believe this was called Soda Lake. You could see out there where maybe there were some pylons out there. Here's a better view inside of it. Yeah, oh yeah. Yeah, you'd get a sliver in your butt if you sat on one of those. Yeah, now maybe not back then. Well, Mrs. 909, I don't think there's very much else left here to see that we're able to access today. Nope. It looks like there's even less to see on this side. Maybe that sign there won't be so badly roached out and we can actually read a little bit and see what it has to say. But again, I don't know why I'm so amazed that this is on. All right, so hopefully you guys aren't getting all this wind noise, but you actually can read this one for the most part. Oh, look at this. Mineral Springs and Health Resort. Shown here in the 1950s was the inspiration of Curtis. Curtis House Spring, a popular radio minister and health promoter. There you go. So it wasn't even a doctor. No, it was just a minister. That's right. And a health promoter. I got a lot of my memories correct though, researching this place from years back. Yeah, very interesting. The pup fish are all in there because it's too hot now. Yeah, they're probably in the shade. There's not very much shade. No, but right under there would be. There's not very much shade in this, I don't know if you'd call it a light wood, more of a pond, I guess. Not very much shade in here at all. So yeah, they're all probably in here. No, it's actually, it would be illegal to fish for these. They're protected. You know, I think what we're going to have to do, maybe after summer or maybe next spring, maybe sign up for something that they have going on here. Yeah, not the summer, I can't. Or at least, you know, get in contact with them for a tour. Yeah, the summer would be dreadful. Yes, it would be. Yeah, so Zizzix. The reason this radio minister named it Zizzix is because it was the last thing that would show up in phone books. And I guess it stood out more than anything else. If you were to flip to the last page and you looked at the last thing. So yeah, it was kind of built in advertising, marketing. Without advertising. Because if you turn to a page and you're going to, you're most likely to see the first and the last thing that is on that page. And for some of you that don't know what a phone book is, before the internet, the phone companies would go around and distribute these phone books. And it had every phone number in that county or city. And people. And person. People were in there too, if they so desired. You would have to opt out of it. But if you didn't want to be in that. Naming it Zizzix also is, you remember it. Yeah. Because there's not very many things that start with Z. Right. So yeah, Zizzix, it's pretty cool. I'm glad we finally made it out of here. All right guys, before we get out of here, I need to give a quick shout out to everybody that supported over on PayPal, Cash App, and of course, Super Chats. 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