I didn’t really know what we were getting into with exploring this abandoned mine, but given the remote location and the fact that it is a shaft (which fewer people are willing to venture into), I had some optimism… As it turned out, this optimism was amply rewarded on the bottom level of this mine (which the next video will be devoted to). A handful of spots on the descent down the shaft were a bit sporty - the areas where the track crossed over huge voids and areas where caved material made getting down the shaft a very tight squeeze… And I can assure you that it was a lot of work climbing back out of this mine!
As you saw, the miners did some stoping on the small drifts running off from the shaft on the way down. What’s interesting is that all of these workings seem to connect to each other in one place or another (independent of the shaft) all of the way down to the fantastic bottom level. So, it would seem they were following a pretty substantial ore body down.
According to our records, this mine dates back to the 1870s and was primarily a gold and silver mine, but also had some lead.
It is difficult to imagine this mine being accessible for too much longer as those spaces we squeezed through were getting tight and also it was damp in the upper part of this mine and so the wood spanning those deep pits on the way down is mostly rotten. In other words, I’m glad we documented this mine when we did.
Don’t miss the next video of the bottom level of this mine!
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All of these videos are uploaded in HD, so adjust those settings to ramp up the quality! It really does make a difference.
You can see the gear that I use for mine exploring here: bit.ly/2wqcBDD
You can click here for my full playlist of abandoned mines: goo.gl/TEKq9L
Thanks for watching!
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Growing up in California’s “Gold Rush Country” made it easy to take all of the history around us for granted. However, abandoned mine sites have a lot working against them - nature, vandals, scrappers and various government agencies… The old prospectors and miners that used to roam our lonely mountains and toil away deep underground are disappearing quickly as well.
These losses finally caught our attention and we felt compelled to make an effort to document as many of the ghost towns and abandoned mines that we could before that colorful niche of our history is gone forever. But, you know what? We enjoy doing it! This is exploring history firsthand - bushwhacking down steep canyons and over rough mountains, figuring out the techniques the miners used and the equipment they worked with, seeing the innovations they came up with, discovering lost mines that no one has been in for a century, wandering through ghost towns where the only sound is the wind... These journeys allow a feeling of connection to a time when the world was a very different place. And I’d love to think that in some small way we are paying tribute to those hardy miners that worked these mines before we were even born.
So, yes, in short, we are adit addicts… I hope you’ll join us on these adventures!
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