When we went out to the refuge we also made a stop at this mine. The building used to house the miners. It is locked up because the floors are unsafe. There are a few things left around the mine area. A very scary looking ladder that goes up to the mine -- the ladder looks very rotted. There is a mine tunnel that is open and on the floor of the mine are core samples from the surrounding rock. They would drill to see if there was a good vein of gold or other metals. The cores are about two inches around and anywhere from inches to feet long but most are broken into small easily carried pieces. People like to take them and polish them up because they have colorful rock in them.
Mining out here had to be a pretty hard life but there was a lot of mining activity back in the 1800's. Now there are still one or two active mines in the area. They are very small scale and don't produce much. It is very beautiful country and fun to explore when the temps are reasonable. Can't imagine what it is like out here when it gets up to 120 degrees.
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