Our First Visit to the Virginia City Camel Races Was a Hoot
Virginia City NV, Sept10, 2022 – Virginia city is one of the first locations I visited some 15 years ago when I moved to the Carson City region of the Sierra. The Annual Outhouse Races for Halloween, that year was such a fun way to experience Nevada. I have been back from time to time over the years as friends or family traveled to the area and we wanted to soak ourselves in old west culture, tails and amusements. But until today I had never made it up there for a fall tradition, the Annual Camel and ostrich races. Boy what a fun family event that I missed bringing my kids too.
Today was overcast and smoky because of local fires but that kept the heat down and had no chance of spoiling the fun had by thousands today in Virginia city. The Hendrickson Camel race productions sure put on a show filled with a crazy clown , audience participation games for adults and kids and some of the funniest animal races I ever witnessed.
Racing Camels, Ostrich and Zebra’s riders took to the saddle in a three animal race around a half oval, with nearly no possible way of controlling the animal they were riding. We had riders falling off, riding sidesaddle, and animals reversing course in every possible way before crossing the finish line.
For the kids they had chicken races, Emu races and wooden coin search, with all participants getting free candy and camel rides later in the day. For the adults we cherished the toilet paper roll contest and an event that mirrored the Olympic games of the movie the Nerds where contestants rode a bouncing horse around obstacle then had to chug a beer twice to become the winner.
There is one more day of event Sunday at noon. but if you cant make it this year and have always wondered if it was a fun event, Do yourself a favor and put it on the calendar for future September events. You will have a blast.
Here is a gallery of some of our favorite sites while in town today at the Camel races.
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