Virginia City After Dark: The Complete Haunted Day Trip From Reno

Thirty-five minutes from Reno sits a town that never needed to build a haunted attraction. The Washoe Club, the graveyard train, a haunted mansion, and how to do it all in one day.

Reno builds its haunted houses. Virginia City just is one. The whole town sits on the Comstock Lode like a museum that never closed, and thirty-five minutes of hill driving gets you the most concentrated collection of allegedly haunted buildings in Nevada. Here’s the full-day version, tested and sequenced.

Afternoon: the Washoe Club

Start at the Washoe Club on C Street, the 1870s millionaires’ club where Comstock silver barons drank, and where paranormal TV has filmed so often the staff treat camera crews like weather. Tours run roughly hourly through the upstairs museum, the famous spiral staircase, and the crypt where, the story goes, winter bodies were stored when the ground froze too hard to dig. The house legend is the Lady in Blue, seen on the staircase for over a century.

It’s ten bucks for adults, history-forward rather than jump-scare, and the saloon downstairs pours a good beer with a 4.7 Google rating across nearly a thousand reviews. Committed types can book an overnight paranormal investigation.

The red brick Old Washoe Club building on C Street, with painted lettering and a long balcony — The Old Washoe Club building on C Street. Photo: Noah_Loverbear, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Late afternoon: pick your mansion

The Mackay Mansion on D Street has stood since 1859, built in association with mining magnate George Hearst and later home to silver king John Mackay. Staff tell of two little-girl spirits on the third floor, Emma and Lily, who tug at visitors’ clothes. In late October the mansion runs its Victorian Nightmare haunted-house event through the real period rooms, which is as close as Nevada gets to a haunt inside an actual haunted house.

A group of adults walking toward the Mackay Mansion at dusk beside a large bare tree — Visitors walking up to the Mackay Mansion at dusk. Photo: Mackay Mansion

A short walk covers the rest of the lore circuit: the Silver Queen Hotel with its fifteen-foot portrait of a woman dressed in silver dollars and its resident ghost Rosie in Room 11, and down the grade, the Gold Hill Hotel, Nevada’s oldest, sitting beside the mine where the 1869 Yellow Jacket fire killed dozens of miners.

Night: the graveyard train

If your timing lands on Halloween weekend, the finale books itself: the V&T Haunted Graveyard Train, a 40-minute night ride on 150-year-old rail past the Gold Hill Cemetery, where actual Comstock miners have rested since the 1860s. Costumed characters work the cars, and the high desert dark does the rest. It runs only a couple of nights a year and sells out, so book the moment dates post.

A Virginia & Truckee steam locomotive with its headlamp lit and smoke rising beside the Gold Hill depot at night — A Virginia & Truckee steam train at the Gold Hill depot at night. Photo: Virginia & Truckee Railroad

The drive home

Reno is north over Geiger Grade. If you still want a scare on the way home, The Final Hour in Sparks runs until midnight on haunt nights, about 40 minutes from Virginia City.

One practical note: C Street closes up earlier than city people expect. Eat before eight, and bring a layer, because the town sits at 6,200 feet and October nights up there bite harder than anything on the tour.