good morning
Julie and Tom here March 24th here we are
in Death Valley look at the view
beautiful Telescope Peak with the
Ashford mill ruins visible below it a
little hazy today and a little windy
today we're just going adventuring on an
un marked trail and we're going to see
what we find we're hoping to find a mine
ruin and a tram maybe some adits and
we'll see what else we find
well death valley sure can make you feel
small Hey buddy what you doing looking for
a flower or leaf to eat how about that
one how about the next one
mmm YUM there you go that's your
favorite kind well there's a lot of
debris in the wash a lot of butterflies
here to look at them all there's another big
piece of steel
well this looks like it was some sort of
a loading area I believe trucks would
have been able to drive up to here it
doesn't appear that this is the bottom
of the tram although that should be
coming shortly so there's an interesting
collection of parts it looks like
somebody has salvage these out of the
wash and put them to the side here this
is some sort of a transmission type of
case it's got a bearing on the other
side and a throw out fork some other
miscellaneous items gearing bearings
 
well I tried prying that motor out
of the sand I got it out of little ways
here is the official bottom of the tram
there's a stairs here I don't know if it
still works or not
looks like the bottom half might I'm not
sure about the top half there is still
the the tram cable is still there which
is cool an old jerrycan lots of junk good
junk though grade-a USA made junk
 
a lot of mechanism here that I'm not
exactly sure what it is but there's some
anchors are right in the stone there
there's some more anchors over there a
lot of miscellaneous parts so this is
the lower end of the longer of the two
there are two trams up here supposedly
this is the lower end of the longer one
and we're hoping to get up to the upper
end of either one or both of them to see
if there is any mining mine exploring we
can do
alright let's go up canyon and see what
we find
first shade feels good since we left the
car it's good I guess the only been hour
and a half but shade and Death Valley
always feels good they must be liking
the flowers on this little bush got to be
two hundred butterflies in there well
the canyons getting kind of rugged and
narrow so far no impassable Falls though
which is good there's a little narrow
spot some slick rock a rock climb right
now
I think you gotta go to your right a little
here you go old girl
not the biggest rope in the world but it did the trick
well we rounded the corner and you do
see the upper tram terminal it looks
like or at least part of it and then
something to do with the lower part over
here - how in the world they ever get
this stuff up there I'll never know
this looks like a dump gate for
an ore car here's what's left of an ore car
look at the old car trucks that's pretty
cool
well this looks like it was a base for
something down here there's some anchors
in the stone and a little pile of rocks a
barrell well isn't this interesting the
scallywag mine ore bin and ore chute made
out of heavy gauge pipe
this must have been their little room
with their clothing in there whatever
else let's go take a peek oh cool belts
and parts and the Shelf shovel that is
so cool
and here's the line going up
 
here's a cool old ore bucket from
the tram this old pulley still spins it
sounds a little dry but the whole unit
spins too and that's some good old
American made junk
so you can see a couple of structures up
the hill and then there's another one on
the very horizon I don't know if you can
see it or not let me see if I can zoom a
little bit now we need to find the
source of the ore
that's looking across the wash at the
tram bucket and we're following up the
pipeline all right here up up and away
it's fairly steep but definitely climbable
 I don't know what we're going to come to
if we come to a cliff up here or not but
it's possible only one way to find out
that's the top of this ore chute from the
lower adit and that chute goes right on
down to that ore bin at the bottom here
comes old Julie plugging down the
pipeline what a view well I got up
here to this Ridge and I see a bit of a
working over here
 
well here we are at the upper part of
this round ore chute so above here I
believe it was a tram and I don't know
if you can see the base down there yeah
you can kind of see the base down there
and there was a track coming out of the
adit it went over here to the waste
dump and it's a fair sized waste dump I
guess not huge and let's see what else
do we have so this is the top of the ore
chute there's a rail junction there's a
little water tank of some sort
the tracks are eroded out pretty
good right here there are some barrels
here with I don't know if it was water
or something else in there they're kind
of plumbed together in a strange fashion
and that looks like maybe an air tank
down there and here is the portal with a
big wood shelf right by the edge of it
let's get some shade anyway looks like
it's wide open all right let's see what
we can find in here you look solid so
far there's a dust mask somebody's been
in here more recently than the miners it
looks like there are some tracks and
possibly an air and or water lines
the walls are solid
air seems okay
some wedging to hold up the vent line
and our water lines I don't know what kind
of mine this was if I had to guess I would say gold
but I don't have any idea I know there
were some workings up above - so we may
see some chutes coming in looks like the
tracks are going to curve to the left
there was a short piece started going
straight ahead but that's not a collapse
that's the face of all of a mine there
here's to the left I see a ladder not
too far down the line going up some vent
pipe on the ground there's a little
bucket for grease or something I haven't
seen any bats yet there's another little
bucket for  or something you know
whole pile of something down here couple
of shovels hmm that's interesting this
is looking straight up
I don't know how you would get through
that this is about a 2 foot diameter
pipe here that's just a short piece of
it though just this elbow all kind of
crashed up Timbers but I think they're
just piled I don't think that's broken
down Julie can give you some
perspective on how the size of this
thing is I don't get it do you
well I climed up this first ladder a
little ways yeah this is just a chute
from another level up top we'll have to
go up and see if we can see what else is
going on up here
shovels no oh a garden sprayer back here
yep Trojan high explosives nothing in it
Burgermeister not too old it's got
flip top well that was interesting
we're back to the portal this are
fairly good shape in there the chute was
something like I've never seen but I'm
sure they had their reasons for it let's
go up a little higher see if we find
something else
so that it was an interesting adit
let's try and climb around the left side of
this and up over this little notch here
and see what we see
here comes Julie up there though that notch so here
we are below the upper tram terminal the
little triangle of a piece of lumber we
could see from way down below is just
over there to my left there are a couple
of lower entrances down here some
adits by the lumber wall there below
the tram terminal let's go look at those
well we worked our way up to the adits
just below the upper trim terminal
at least that what it looks like it is and the
other wire for the for the lower tram
starts here too so there's a right adit
and they left adit let's go look at the
right one first let's see we got going
in here some vent pipe right off a little
shelf area there's a little split here
that's a pretty good down right there
maybe a chute of some sort
rope and a bucket some timbering look
at the shiny sparkles in the wall
it looks like it might be a chute from
 from up above somewhere there were
some tracks at least to here
oh so this just stops right here this is
just a this is just a chute from up
above so this doesn't really go anywhere
and there was a little piece of track
coming out of this okay oh that's that
that only goes in about 75 feet and
there's a chute come up above I hope I'm
not standing on something that's going to
give away
look at the colors
okay so that didn't do much most
chute from up above and also one to dump
down lower and the nice fuel can here
not even a dent in it yeah you don't see
them that nice very often let's go see
what the other side is doing all right
let's go in this left side it looks like
it's kind of water pipe track maybe an
air line I don't know big breeze coming
through here so this got good air in it
big breeze
kind of a mess right here there's a
shovel without a handle a big pillar a
floor that looks like it may or may not
hold you there's a ladder why don't you stay
back there for a second  large stope
well here are these ladders and there's
some stoped areas below it the line goes
down in there so you could go down this
ladder and then there's another ladder
over there
this is looking dead straight down so I
I think it's just an area that they
worked that is a large scope in this
room ahead of me and I haven't really
looked over here yet this is the other
side of that stope see this Julie
look how big that is a straight-up here
this probably goes up 30 feet and across
probably more and this I'm not sure
where this goes over here
this was a chute somewhere there's a
chute that to fill that big large
diameter thing we saw in the lower adit
somewhere there's the top of that up
here
well I'm up here at the top of this mess
of a of a tram tower and ore bin I guess this
is the ore bin Wow heck of a climb
getting up here I have to say that okay we're up
at the line that goes to the longer of
the two trams and the lower tram that
you come to first in the wash as you're
making your way up here look at the size of that
roller that's big
that still spins the big one doesn't not
for me anyway
I don't quite understand how this tower
here worked it looks like this was a
place where the cable ran this is old
grease in here feels like
so this thing stood up somehow
anyway the cable continues to go on over
there maybe was just a cable guide of
some sort that the cable ran along so
anyway this is the big money shot down
to the all the way down to the lower
tram terminal down there there it is
there's the big shot across Death Valley
can't quite see telescope peak it's
around the corner so here's what's left of
this upper ore bin and tram terminal I
don't quite understand how the ore was
moving around here with the two trams
and the ore chute but I'm sure they had
their methods there's some unusual
stoping and other things in here and
let's go take a look
so there are some open Stopes here and
they're all braced up and in kind of a
crazy manner although I've seen crazier
there's a nice big plank there and
there's a chute over there there's a
ladder piled in here and a pair of jeans
yeah no not jeans looks like somebody's
been rolling your own dynamite at least
to me
you know there's a Hercules box like a
little break room some sort there's a
Trojan powder company box in it these
papers Salt Lake Tribune looks like a
piece of fuse here  in this
little box paper looks like from 1969 I
think they really weren't trying to roll
their own charges here I don't see why
else these newspapers would be rolled up
they are probably powder in here I'm
guessing
hammer handle not much life left in it
 
well I'm up a little higher now
more stoping been going on up here
doesn't look to be the most stable area
in the world well let's go outside here
and see what happens you don't want to
fall in one of those open stopes
these big stope from up above here looks
like they cleaned this whole area out
you can see where the earth used to be
and now it's not so this must have been
a big deposit up here when you sent it
down that cut there just off that upper stope
the breeze coming out of here
is incredible and is what caught my
attention but boy does that go down
this is looking straight down and I
don't even dare lean any more over the
edge because this thing looks pretty
sketchy right here the point is that go
down a long ways mmm interesting well
here this will look from high above all
the tram stuff and there's the one that
goes the other way
looks like there's something down here
I'm not sure if we can get to it it's
pretty much straight down
this is just a little alcove I'm not
sure if it's another one of those break
rooms or what but there it is
this is the craziest looking vein here
it's really windy so I don't know if
you're going to get some wind noise but the
colors in here are just nuts look at this
thing Wow well this lower one doesn't go
anywhere either it only goes back a few
feet unless it's collapsed I don't know
what it was but pretty colorful there's
some tracks down here so there's this
other jumble of stuff and it looks like
there were some tracks here because
there are some cross ties and either an
air or water tank pretty big opening I
don't know if this turns into a shaft in
here or if it's an adit there's another
shelf looks like it's in pretty good
shape
that's a nice shelf there a little
hanging rack you camp out there in
your sleeping bag and a little pad
alright let's go see where this other
one goes I don't imagine it's real big
but who knows
there are a couple tracks going in here like
maybe a cat track and it's warm
but see the tracks maybe a little Bobcat
very warm there's a left there's a
straight-ahead
no human tracks in there that's for
sure
it looks like there possibly was some
rail in here because it looks like
they're cross ties only goes back this
far
hmm and I don't see that vein that we were
seeing outside so that only goes
back maybe 100 feet on that side let's
go take the right here
this is the other direction I just think
they had ventilation at one time
I can't imagine they would need it for
this short run cuz this stops right here
again there are several four boxes back
here hmm why would they bother to run
ventilation back for just that little
bit and you don't see any of that
vein that we saw before
don't see any of those colors in the rock sardine can okay this is part of this vein that
we're exploring and this is the way to
the right as you're going uphill there's
a bunch of lumber in here and not much
else this is below that very colorful
vein that we were looking at a minute
ago
well we made it back down the hard way
but we made it we did most of the
exploring that we wanted to do we could
have gone down the ladders there but we
didn't do it today all right we're
heading back to the vehicle probably
got an hour or two to get back there quite
an explore I must say
 
now we're in the Narrows and the shade feels good
it's about 2:30 now
 
that is one monstrous wash this is only
about half of it then the other half where
that cliff is is even deeper and steeper
but we're going this way
there's telescope peak it's still kind of hazy
today beautiful though the way the
mountains look when the haze is like
that the shading is really cool
well we're getting there
not much going on out here in the Big
Valley
 
well we're back to our vehicle we
visited the scallywag mine we hiked a
total of about six point nine miles and
the total ascent was 1660 so there
you have it it's a fun mine to visit
it's not easy to get up there but it's
not impossible if an old guy like me can
do it and a young gal like Julie so
thanks for watching the video you guys I
hope you enjoy it and we appreciate your
watching and we will see you next time
