American Green, which bought the town and surrounding land for $5 million this summer, has also renovated the small café and has big plans to dramatically expand lodging options, which today consist of scattered RVs, a few canvas tents and a handful of hotel rooms.
The only thing missing right now is the marijuana.
“You guys have the marijuana here?” called out Toby Armstrong, 62, as she pulled up to the Nipton Store recently. “I heard about you on the news.”
Unfortunately for Armstrong, for the next few months there’s no legal recreational marijuana for sale in Nipton or anywhere else in California. People with medical marijuana cards can get pot from a dispensary, but Nipton doesn’t have any of those either.
Armstrong, who had been staying about an hour’s drive away in Las Vegas, drove to Nipton after hearing news reports about American Green’s plans. A retired long-haul truck driver, Armstrong says she hasn’t tried marijuana for decades — truckers are subject to random drug tests — but is curious now that it’s more widely acceptable and her body is broken down from long hours behind the wheel.
Armstrong said she doesn’t trust drug companies and thought maybe a little pot could help her old bones as she drives the country in her conversion van, looking for warm weather and new friends.
“I’m not interested in being stoned for the rest of my life, but I sure could use a little pain relief,” she said.
The town is changing almost daily, said Stephen Shearin, who is managing the project for American Green.
“It’s really a combination of modernizing some things, returning other things to the way they were, and bringing in our own touches,” he said.
Shearin said the company hopes to restore postal service and bring in a bank, along with supporting marijuana-related businesses like cultivators and glassblowers, in addition to hosting marijuana stores when they become legal next year.
“This isn’t an 80-ace development of condos. People have been living there for 130 years,” he said “We’re evolving the town into the future.”
Eslinger, an eight-year resident who stumbled upon the area while helping a friend search for a mythical underground river of gold, said he always envisioned retiring to Amsterdam, where he could smoke a little marijuana for pain relief while watching the world go by. Instead, the retired trucker found his place amid the quiet of Nipton.
He said he’s not worried about the changes American Green is making because it fits largely with his own dream.
“Amsterdam was my idea of heaven, and it looks like it might be coming here to me, right in the middle of nowhere, “ he said. “So far, all American Green has done is put a smile on this town’s face.”
credit:wbir.com
