Mines Like This Aren't Supposed To Be In California - Part 2 of 2

Part 1 of this abandoned mine can be found here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cLTXrx_ZeG8

I told you that there was some good stuff down that winze! I was amazed to see that perfectly preserved skip car poised on the edge, ready to go back in service… It is rare to see them at all and even more rare – exceptionally rare – to still see them in place and prepared to return to work. The hoist operator brought up the last load around 75 years ago and the skip car has rested there ever since. I wonder if the miners knew that was the last load of ore when it came up? Or did they expect to return the next day or the next week or the next month? That skip car has outlasted the men that built it and all of the miners that worked with it. And it is still down there…waiting.

I was also quite impressed by the size of the large stope down there. Can you imagine the miners hauling all of that rock out of there, one skip car and ore car load at a time? That would have been an extraordinary amount of work… I have seen bigger stopes, but not many.

Then, of course, there are all of the artifacts down on the lower levels… I love it when those have not been looted because it gives so much more insight into how the miners were working, what their habits were, when they were working, etc.

Pretty amazing that this mine is in California near large population centers, huh? And, if I didn’t mention it last time, this is on public land…

As I’ve said many times, the really good stuff is found in the places where others fear to tread or that are difficult to reach. And, of course, that holds true in all facets of life from investing to fitness, not just mine exploring.

Successful mine exploring usually takes a lot of local knowledge. I consider myself an expert on the mines around the area where I grew up and parts of Nevada and Italy where I have spent a lot of time... However, what about those parts of the world where I have not spent as much time exploring? So, I often work with other mine explorers in places like Utah or Colorado or Montana as it is simply impossible to match the hundreds or even thousands of man hours that one spends exploring their own backyard. So, I could spend a few years scrambling around a part of Alaska, for example, to become an expert on that area. Or, I could simply befriend a mine explorer in that area and go out with them. I prefer the latter model… So, credit for putting me onto this abandoned mine goes to “Mine Explorers” on YouTube, which can be found here:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCxhNU-gNyPq2lXA7JhLB90Q

For those that didn’t see the first video, the title of this series is a nod to those that say that all of the abandoned mines in Southern California have been sealed up by the government or plundered by “collectors” to the point that they are just featureless holes in the ground… They have not.

This was primarily a lead and silver mine, with copper, gold and zinc also being present in small, but rich quantities. Work appears to have started in the early 1900s and continued into the 1950s.

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All of these videos are uploaded in HD, so I’d encourage you to adjust your settings to the highest quality if it is not done automatically.

You can see the gear that I use for mine exploring here: https://bit.ly/2wqcBDD

As well as a small gear update here: https://bit.ly/2p6Jip6

You can see the full TVR Exploring playlist of abandoned mines here: https://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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Видео Mines Like This Aren't Supposed To Be In California - Part 2 of 2 канала TVR Exploring