Nevada’s weirdest roadside stop grew from a geothermal accident in 1964

It’s been growing since 1964

Something went wrong in the Nevada desert back in 1964, and it turned into one of the strangest sights in the country. A geothermal energy company drilled a test well on a remote ranch in Washoe County, right on the edge of the Black Rock Desert.

They sealed it up and left. The seal failed.

Scalding water, about 200 degrees Fahrenheit, started shooting from the ground and never stopped. Decades of dissolved minerals have piled up around it, and the mound you see today looks like nothing else on Earth.

Two wells, two mistakes, one desert marvel

Before the 1964 well, settlers drilled into the same ground back in 1916, looking for irrigation water. What they got was near-boiling and useless for farming, so they walked away.

Over the years, a cone of calcium carbonate grew 10 to 12 feet tall at that abandoned site. Then the geothermal company came along and punched a second hole nearby.

When their cap failed, and hot water blew through, the pressure from the new geyser drained the original one dry.

The mound grows several inches every year

Calcium carbonate and silica have been stacking up around the geyser for over 60 years, and they add several inches of new material each year.

The cones now stand about six feet tall, and the whole mound rises roughly 25 to 30 feet above the desert floor. Water shoots up to five feet in the air from multiple openings at the top.

The formation never looks the same twice because new minerals keep reshaping it, layer by layer, season by season.

Thermophilic algae paint it red and green

The wild colors come from tiny organisms called thermophilic algae that thrive in hot, wet conditions.

They coat every surface of the mound, and their colors shift depending on temperature and moisture levels at any given time. Against the dry, beige desert that surrounds it, the effect is sharp.

Reds and greens glow against flat brown earth in every direction.

People who see it for the first time often say it looks like it belongs on another planet, not 20 miles from a town of fewer than 100 people.

Quartz is forming inside it thousands of years too fast

A geoscientist who studied the geyser found something that caught her off guard. Quartz was forming inside the mound far faster than it should.

In most geysers, quartz takes up to 10,000 years to develop.

At Fly Geyser, the unusually high concentration of silica in the water, combined with the heat, speeds the whole process up dramatically.

The researcher said Fly Geyser is unlike any other geyser she has studied in her career. It is as scientifically strange as it looks.

Three geysers stand on one ranch

Fly Ranch holds three geysers, and you can see all of them on a single guided walk. The oldest one, called The Wizard, formed from that abandoned 1916 well.

It is now a weathered calcium carbonate pillar, tall and pale against the desert. Fly Geyser is the main draw, the largest and most colorful of the three.

The third, known as Will’s Geyser, showed up in 2006 and appears to have formed on its own with no drilling involved.

Travertine terraces hold 30 to 40 warm pools

Hot, mineral-rich water flows from the geyser and spreads across the land, building travertine terraces as it goes. Those terraces hold between 30 and 40 shallow pools that cover roughly 74 acres.

The same algae that paint the geyser give these pools their color, so the whole area shimmers with reds and greens at the surface.

Tall reeds and grasses grow thick around the edges, fed by the constant flow of warm water. The landscape feels more like a tropical wetland than the dry desert surrounding it.

A tiny snail lives here and nowhere else on Earth

A biological survey of the ranch counted 144 plant species, 138 bird species, 15 mammals, and 12 reptiles. Wild horses roam the property, and you might spot them during the nature walk.

But the most surprising resident is the Fly Ranch pyrg, a tiny snail that lives in just one spring-fed pool on the property and has never been found anywhere else.

The warm springs and wetlands pull in migrating birds and support a concentration of desert life you would not expect out here.

The guided walk covers two miles in three hours

Fly Geyser sits on private land, so the only way in is through a guided Fly Ranch Nature Walk. Friends of Black Rock-High Rock, a conservation nonprofit, leads the walks.

Each one lasts about three hours and covers roughly two miles across two sections of the ranch. You see the geysers, the wetlands, the wildlife, and large-scale art installations spread across the property.

Walks run nearly every Saturday from April through November, so you have a long window to plan around.

Burning Man art installations dot the desert

The southern portion of the ranch holds large-scale art pieces built by members of the Burning Man community. You walk through them as part of the guided nature walk before heading to the geysers.

Installations include the Baba Yaga House and projects from the Land Art Generator Initiative, spread across the open desert.

The contrast between raw landscape and creative structures gives the ranch a feel that sits somewhere between an outdoor gallery and a science fiction set.

Gerlach has fewer than 100 people and a mile of folk art

The tiny town of Gerlach sits about 20 miles south of Fly Ranch, and fewer than 100 people call it home.

Just north of town, Guru Road stretches a full mile with carved stones and sculptures that a resident created between 1978 and 1992. Main Street has an Open Air Art Gallery with wall murals.

Beyond town, the Black Rock Desert spreads across 800,000 acres of National Conservation Area. The vast, flat playa, a remnant of ancient Lake Lahontan, runs for more than 200 square miles.

Golden eagles and wild horses roam the desert beyond

The Black Rock Desert region is home to wild horses, golden eagles, pronghorn antelope, bighorn sheep, and kit foxes. High Rock Canyon has towering walls, historic emigrant trail markers, and nesting raptors overhead.

More than 120 miles of preserved pioneer trails from 1800s California emigrant routes cross the area. Natural hot springs pop up across the landscape, though many run dangerously hot, so keep your distance.

The remote location also means some of the darkest night skies in the lower 48 states.

Visit Fly Geyser on Fly Ranch in Nevada

You can see Fly Geyser only through a guided Fly Ranch Nature Walk on private land off State Route 34, about 20 miles north of Gerlach.

Friends of Black Rock-High Rock leads the walks nearly every Saturday from April through November. Tickets are donation-based, with a suggested amount of $40 for adults.

The 2026 season went on sale in early February through the official website.

Gerlach is about two hours north of Reno, so you can make it a day trip or pair it with time in the desert.

This article was created with AI assistance and human editing.

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