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How much adventure is there to be found out in the middle of the desert? Well, when Speedy Caver, Dawn Patrol, Therrin, and I get together things are bound to get exciting...and maybe a bit dangerous. Therrin and Dawn Patrol were only there for a long weekend and we had a lot of mines to explore so it was time to get going!
The adventure started early when Google Maps showed a "shortcut" to the mine. Not a bad route if you exclude the waterfall. Speedy and I had been up and down it a number of times so we were pretty sure we could get Therrin and Dawn Patrol down it safely. A bit of digging and placement of rocks and they were down without any damage.
We all got to camp just before it got dark.
The night sky out in the desert is something to see. The sky is so dark that the Milky Way just sparkles as it spreads across the sky.
The following morning we headed out to the "Raven Mine". Speedy and I came across this mine on a previous trip but didn't explore it because of nest of raven chicks a few feet below the collar. Looking down the shaft it looked to be about 100 feet to the bottom with drifts off to the north and south about 25 feet down. Therrin and Tony rigged the anchor while I geared up then headed over the edge. The little side drifts turned out to be where the miners were chasing a quartz seam. I continued down to the bottom where I found the shaft plugged with timbers, dirt, and junk, but there was a small opening that looked promising. I was able to wriggle through the gap and get down to the working level where I found about 50 feet of workings, lots of mud, and nothing else. Gravity always helps when you crawl down through little openings like this, but it's always more effort to get back up through the opening. Soon enough I was on top of the plug and heading up the rope.
(A goofy picture of me coming up over the edge)
Next up, a remote valley where we knew of two more mines that haven't been explored in recent history. The first mine looked like it might be plugged, but we always send someone down to verify. Therrin jumped in and headed down the rope. Sure enough the mine ended 20 feet below the surface. Based on the waste pile we had hoped that it would have had something to explore. We have information that it was a turquoise mine and we found lots of tiny bits of blue rock so our information is most likely accurate.
After the disappointment of the first mine we were hoping for better luck on the next one. There was a lot of jumbled wood around the adit but we could see an incline heading down at about 30 degrees. Dawn Patrol has been a mine explorer for a while now but she had not had the opportunity to be first down in an unexplored mine. She was unanimously elected to be first down. No arguements from DP!!
Dawn Patrol headed down the incline then called for us to head down as well. The incline was about 75 feet in length with stopes along one side. At the bottom the miners had built a barrier to hold back the waste rock so they could still access the workings. Stemples (wooden supports) were placed between the back wall and the barrier so the barrier didn't collapse. This left a gap about 18 inches wide to crawl through to reach the workings. We were especially careful that we didn't bump the stemples for fear of knocking one loose and having the barrier collapse, possibly burying us. As always, Speedy explores every crack and crevice.
Lots of good exploring but it was time to head back to camp for some food and Therrin and Dawn Patrol to get their first look at our mine. Knowing that tomorrow was going to be the explore of the "Clone Mine", DP wanted to practice passing knots both ascending and descending, as well as changing from rappelling to ascending while on rope. What better place to practice than our mine?
Monday dawned bright and clear. We knew the day was going to be challenging. We scouted the mine before Therrin and Dawn Patrol arrived. Speedy had rigged a 200 foot rope and rappelled down the entire length without reaching the bottom. From there he couldn't determine how much deeper it went. We weren't sure that we had enough rope for the explore so we texted Therrin to bring along his ropes. Turns out that it was a good decision.
We jumped in the truck and headed up to the Clone Mine. The mine is located about half way up a 600 foot hill that overlooked the desert valley.
The Clone Mine has a manway and haulage shaft exactly like our mine. Both shafts are of square set construction and fully lined just like ours. It looks like the same mining engineer headed both projects. Thus the name "Clone Mine". The collar has a lot of erosion and the top timbers aren't as structurally sound, but down a ways it's in amazing condition.
We had left anchors in place from our previous scouting trip, so Speedy started rigging the ropes. The first rope was the primary 200 foot descent rope. Speedy would tie on additional ropes to continue his descent towards the bottom. We sent a second 200 foot rope for Dawn Patrol to descend so she could stay in communication with Speedy as he continued down. Therrin and I stayed on top for surface support and safety watch. Once Speedy reached the bottom, he would call up to DP giving her an update on what he found. If it was good, we could decide who would head down for the explore. If not, DP and Speedy would climb out.
With our safety and communication plans in place Speedy attached additional 100 and 150 foot ropes to his pack and headed down.
Once he got to the bottom of the first 200 rope he called up to have Dawn Patrol rappel down to his level.
When DP reached Speedy's level, he tied on another rope and headed down. About this time we realized that our communication between me on the surface and Dawn Patrol wasn't reliable. I could pick out a few words but couldn't communicate effectively. Given the depth and complexity of the explore, Therrin and I discussed the situation and decided it was best to drop another rope so he could descend 50 feet or so and reestablish reliable communication.
Once Therrin was stable at the 50 foot level he called up that the rope was about 8 feet too short. At this point Speedy had a 200, 150 and 100 foot ropes all connected end-to-end. Now he needed another 10 to 15 feet to reach the bottom (we added extra to make up for the stretch in the rope). Yeah, at this point Speedy had 3 full ropes and a partial rope to reach the 460 foot bottom. Dawn Patrol was at the end of her 200 foot rope. And Therrin was down 50 feet on his 100 foot rope. At this point we had 3 people and 760 feet of rope down the mine! I remained on the surface for support and safety.
So at this point SpeedyCaver started to evaluate the workings to determine if we wanted to start moving folks down to the bottom. He found about 200 feet of workings and a few artifacts, but nothing worth all of us going down to see. Especially considering that the 460 foot climb out would have been exhausting.
It's not unusual for the bottom of the mine to be a jumble of timbers, rocks, and other mining debris. The air pipe that continues down into the rubble indicates that the mine continued downwards. We weren't able to determine whether the bottom was a plug with more mine below it, or whether there was a sump below this level that all the debris had filled up. We'll never know unless we find documentation about the mine that gives the final depth.
One nice artifact was this barrel. In our explorations they have been a pretty rare find. We often find that metal bands but rarely the entire barrel. I suspect most of them were burned for cooking or heating.
Looking back up the shaft it doesn't look all that far to the surface. Even with well adjusted rope climbing gear, it's a very strenuous effort to climb that far!
Now it was time to get everyone out and de-rig all the gear. Therrin came up first, followed by Dawn Patrol. Of course Speedy had the longest climb so we carefully started to pull up the other ropes up to get them coiled and put away. It took Speedy about 45 minutes to climb out. That's an average of 10 minutes per 100 feet. Not bad at all!
We were all tired but exhilarated about the explore. It's not often that you get the chance to explore a mine of this depth with a group of friends. Although the mine didn't have any amazing workings that we could find, it was quite a logistical effort to put an explorer 460 feet below the surface and safely back again. I don't use the word "epic" to describe exploring, but this is as close as I've come to an epic adventure.
Back at camp we all relaxed and celebrated with some peach cobbler. An appropriate ending to an amazing exploring weekend!
Joanne
The adventure started early when Google Maps showed a "shortcut" to the mine. Not a bad route if you exclude the waterfall. Speedy and I had been up and down it a number of times so we were pretty sure we could get Therrin and Dawn Patrol down it safely. A bit of digging and placement of rocks and they were down without any damage.
We all got to camp just before it got dark.
The night sky out in the desert is something to see. The sky is so dark that the Milky Way just sparkles as it spreads across the sky.
The following morning we headed out to the "Raven Mine". Speedy and I came across this mine on a previous trip but didn't explore it because of nest of raven chicks a few feet below the collar. Looking down the shaft it looked to be about 100 feet to the bottom with drifts off to the north and south about 25 feet down. Therrin and Tony rigged the anchor while I geared up then headed over the edge. The little side drifts turned out to be where the miners were chasing a quartz seam. I continued down to the bottom where I found the shaft plugged with timbers, dirt, and junk, but there was a small opening that looked promising. I was able to wriggle through the gap and get down to the working level where I found about 50 feet of workings, lots of mud, and nothing else. Gravity always helps when you crawl down through little openings like this, but it's always more effort to get back up through the opening. Soon enough I was on top of the plug and heading up the rope.
(A goofy picture of me coming up over the edge)
Next up, a remote valley where we knew of two more mines that haven't been explored in recent history. The first mine looked like it might be plugged, but we always send someone down to verify. Therrin jumped in and headed down the rope. Sure enough the mine ended 20 feet below the surface. Based on the waste pile we had hoped that it would have had something to explore. We have information that it was a turquoise mine and we found lots of tiny bits of blue rock so our information is most likely accurate.
After the disappointment of the first mine we were hoping for better luck on the next one. There was a lot of jumbled wood around the adit but we could see an incline heading down at about 30 degrees. Dawn Patrol has been a mine explorer for a while now but she had not had the opportunity to be first down in an unexplored mine. She was unanimously elected to be first down. No arguements from DP!!
Dawn Patrol headed down the incline then called for us to head down as well. The incline was about 75 feet in length with stopes along one side. At the bottom the miners had built a barrier to hold back the waste rock so they could still access the workings. Stemples (wooden supports) were placed between the back wall and the barrier so the barrier didn't collapse. This left a gap about 18 inches wide to crawl through to reach the workings. We were especially careful that we didn't bump the stemples for fear of knocking one loose and having the barrier collapse, possibly burying us. As always, Speedy explores every crack and crevice.
Lots of good exploring but it was time to head back to camp for some food and Therrin and Dawn Patrol to get their first look at our mine. Knowing that tomorrow was going to be the explore of the "Clone Mine", DP wanted to practice passing knots both ascending and descending, as well as changing from rappelling to ascending while on rope. What better place to practice than our mine?
Monday dawned bright and clear. We knew the day was going to be challenging. We scouted the mine before Therrin and Dawn Patrol arrived. Speedy had rigged a 200 foot rope and rappelled down the entire length without reaching the bottom. From there he couldn't determine how much deeper it went. We weren't sure that we had enough rope for the explore so we texted Therrin to bring along his ropes. Turns out that it was a good decision.
We jumped in the truck and headed up to the Clone Mine. The mine is located about half way up a 600 foot hill that overlooked the desert valley.
The Clone Mine has a manway and haulage shaft exactly like our mine. Both shafts are of square set construction and fully lined just like ours. It looks like the same mining engineer headed both projects. Thus the name "Clone Mine". The collar has a lot of erosion and the top timbers aren't as structurally sound, but down a ways it's in amazing condition.
We had left anchors in place from our previous scouting trip, so Speedy started rigging the ropes. The first rope was the primary 200 foot descent rope. Speedy would tie on additional ropes to continue his descent towards the bottom. We sent a second 200 foot rope for Dawn Patrol to descend so she could stay in communication with Speedy as he continued down. Therrin and I stayed on top for surface support and safety watch. Once Speedy reached the bottom, he would call up to DP giving her an update on what he found. If it was good, we could decide who would head down for the explore. If not, DP and Speedy would climb out.
With our safety and communication plans in place Speedy attached additional 100 and 150 foot ropes to his pack and headed down.
Once he got to the bottom of the first 200 rope he called up to have Dawn Patrol rappel down to his level.
When DP reached Speedy's level, he tied on another rope and headed down. About this time we realized that our communication between me on the surface and Dawn Patrol wasn't reliable. I could pick out a few words but couldn't communicate effectively. Given the depth and complexity of the explore, Therrin and I discussed the situation and decided it was best to drop another rope so he could descend 50 feet or so and reestablish reliable communication.
Once Therrin was stable at the 50 foot level he called up that the rope was about 8 feet too short. At this point Speedy had a 200, 150 and 100 foot ropes all connected end-to-end. Now he needed another 10 to 15 feet to reach the bottom (we added extra to make up for the stretch in the rope). Yeah, at this point Speedy had 3 full ropes and a partial rope to reach the 460 foot bottom. Dawn Patrol was at the end of her 200 foot rope. And Therrin was down 50 feet on his 100 foot rope. At this point we had 3 people and 760 feet of rope down the mine! I remained on the surface for support and safety.
So at this point SpeedyCaver started to evaluate the workings to determine if we wanted to start moving folks down to the bottom. He found about 200 feet of workings and a few artifacts, but nothing worth all of us going down to see. Especially considering that the 460 foot climb out would have been exhausting.
It's not unusual for the bottom of the mine to be a jumble of timbers, rocks, and other mining debris. The air pipe that continues down into the rubble indicates that the mine continued downwards. We weren't able to determine whether the bottom was a plug with more mine below it, or whether there was a sump below this level that all the debris had filled up. We'll never know unless we find documentation about the mine that gives the final depth.
One nice artifact was this barrel. In our explorations they have been a pretty rare find. We often find that metal bands but rarely the entire barrel. I suspect most of them were burned for cooking or heating.
Looking back up the shaft it doesn't look all that far to the surface. Even with well adjusted rope climbing gear, it's a very strenuous effort to climb that far!
Now it was time to get everyone out and de-rig all the gear. Therrin came up first, followed by Dawn Patrol. Of course Speedy had the longest climb so we carefully started to pull up the other ropes up to get them coiled and put away. It took Speedy about 45 minutes to climb out. That's an average of 10 minutes per 100 feet. Not bad at all!
We were all tired but exhilarated about the explore. It's not often that you get the chance to explore a mine of this depth with a group of friends. Although the mine didn't have any amazing workings that we could find, it was quite a logistical effort to put an explorer 460 feet below the surface and safely back again. I don't use the word "epic" to describe exploring, but this is as close as I've come to an epic adventure.
Back at camp we all relaxed and celebrated with some peach cobbler. An appropriate ending to an amazing exploring weekend!
Joanne
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