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| - "Living History" in the title is false advertising. We went today and the place was DEAD. There were no re-enactors at all, short of the blacksmith who kept to his forge and a random guy wandering around with an eye patch and a flannel shirt who didn't acknowledge us.
EVERYTHING (except the blacksmith's) was closed off. No gun fights (the nearby shooting range gave us a false hope when we had gotten out of the car), no demos, no people in costume, NOTHING. Even the pigs and chickens near the Northern House were out of sight.
The buildings were fairly dilapidated, which isn't surprising. But bees and wasps were living in the dried mud of the structures. BEWARE.
Comparing this place to Rawhide isn't quite fair considering the fact that Rawhide's pretty much a set and it's designed for kids. Goldfield would be a closer comparison since it actually looks like a ghosttown with people in costume. At least with those locations you didn't pay anything to pretty much wander around an empty town. At both Goldfield and Rawhide, most things are all in one area with many shops, vendors, activities, people to interact with, and things to see.
NOT SO with Pioneer Village. I might be biased because I also had an injured leg, but everything was spread out. You would walk for 10-15 minutes to a far off building just to stare in the windows at pretty much nothing.
I really wanted my $7 back. When we approached the girl in the giftshop who was also taking money for admission, she kept giving us a sob story/guilt trip about the economy being bad and refused us any sort of compensation. If they're all volunteers (all 3 of them) as she said they were, why charge just to walk around and not get to interact with anyone?
If there isn't anything to see but the buildings, no shows or anything, it should be pay-what-you-can/donation at best.
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