Misc data and adventures of a Tayopa treasure hunter

[rockhound]

I have used those type of lanterns also, but in this part of the country we used carbide lights, mainly. Probably because the mines in this area used them in their normal operations. Carbide was readily available and cheap. They produced a nice flame and plenty of light. You would think that it would ignite the coal dust in the mines, but apparently it didn't. We also used these to temper and harden knife blades after shaping them on a forge, or we would buy a pocket knife, then use the carbide lamps to temper and harden them to hold a better edge. Good Luck. rockhound

 

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[snakeyes]

Don Jose
Interesting story, bet those guns would be worth as much as gold if they're still there, well I'm on my and I'm looking at my thermometer and it's 105 in my greenhouse, I'm tying to decide weather to grab my MD or head off to the casino. The wind is blowing so it looks like the casino won out to day
Rockhound
I remember the carbide lanterns, but not as construction markers, I worked in a silver mine in Cleator,Az. when I was 15 or 16 and if I'm not mistaken we used them as lanterns that attached to our hard hats. I thought that was pretty neat to just mix those rock with water, then light them up, and burned pretty hot.
stay safe HH
Marty

 

[rockhound]

Yes, most miners attached them to their hard hats. They had an attachment made just for that. Some also hung them up at posts inside the mine to get better light. They sure put out the light, and heat. Good Luck. rockhound

 

[Real de Tayopa Tropical Tramp]

In the more remote areas and for explorations, we still use the hard hat, carbide lamps. They are excellent for writing on the walls, indicating dirction and past history.

Don Jose de La Mancha

 

[truckinbutch]

Still maintain a carbide light . Have used one for nearly 60 years . Fabulous device and calcium carbide has many other useful applications .
Jim

 

[snakeyes]

If this is not like sitting around,the camp fire, its the next best thing. I had a pretty good day today but I glade to get back to the house.
I'm surprised to hear that you can even buy carbide anymore, let alone that its still in use.
Don Jose my wife tells me that her dad knew Villa, true or not I don't know.He was born in 1889 in Zacataca and came to the US in either 1906, or 1916 everybody is a little fuzzy on that. I never had the privilege of talking to him as he passed in 1972.
About 10 years ago my son and his traveling partner went into Mexico with another bronc rider whose family owned a large ranch, guess it had been in the family for several generations, I think his name is William Wallace.He told me they had a whole village including a school and church on the ranch property.The name of the village is Coraletos(sp?) near a place called Casa Grande, do you know of this place? He and his friend were there to help with the branding, No squeeze chutes just labor, a bunch would hold the calf down, and it would be branded, castrated, dehorned.While he was there a limo and two other cars pulled up, and out jumped several armed men. Seems as if a High Mexican official came to talk to Mr Wallace and he brought along his armed guards,They told my son and his friend that if they heard an airplane to hit the dirt as there had been several attempts on this official life by the drug cartels.Guess life in Mexico can be pretty tough at times.Guess thats enough rambling for now
Marty

 

[Real de Tayopa Tropical Tramp]

Hi Marty. that is probably 'Coralitos'. It was common in the larger ranches in the past to have an entire village inside the limits. One must remember that the next town may be one or two days journey away. In my explorations with my mule, many times if I saw a ranch or the tall palm tree, I would go there for supplies.

In fact it was on just such a trip that I made my now infamous boo boo with my mule and paper. sheesh.

From your post I take it that you are blessed with a Latina wife also? if so, congratulations y "Buenas noches Senora. Tengo mucho gusto en conecer a usted. (Yankee gals I love you also, honest, smoochies)

I have lots of true stories, some mine, some others.

Don Jose de la Mancha

 

[snakeyes]

Ola everyone I hope everybody is having a fantastic Thanksgiving
Don Jose, yes my wife is Latina, she was born on Christmas day so the priest named her Natividad.
Ive been thinking about the sock coffee, we use to make it a little different, never thought about filtering it through a sock ,I think the coffee was was just dumped into boiling water, and if I'm not mistaken egg shells were added to it, though I could be wrong about that.
Have a Great day everyone
Marty :coffee2

 

[snakeyes]

When I was a young lad back in the 60's, I remember an old prospecter used to come through town in a covered wagon being pulled by a couple of goats. He would camp out in a field near my house, He looked a lot like Gabby Hayes, if I remember right I think his name was Orivel Erwing, or something like that and I think he was from Co. He had a lot of stories to tell, I guess he traveled all over the SW in that wagon.I saw him in Phoenix, then a couple weeks later ran into him again in Crown King panning for gold, that gotta be close to 150 to 200 mi. away. Later on I herd that he had died and was worth millions, and donated it all the game and fish dept in Co.
Does anybody else remember seeing him? Dam I hate getting old

Marty

 

[Real de Tayopa Tropical Tramp]

Good morning my friends --- and one for oro. A bit of notice on the tv reminded me of about the same date in the 50's. I had just returned from the Yucatan / Quintina Roo expedition looking for lost Mayan ruins.

I was enjoying a sunday cup of coffee at the lil sidewalk cafe in Alamos appreciatively eyeing the lovely senoritas walking arm in arm on the Central plaza promanade displaying their wares for possible suitors ( I was single then) .

In the midst of my sordid / erotic speculations, I saw a gentleman approaching me. He was well dressed in a conservative fashion. He introduced himself, then proceeded to tell me that he had been talking to my friend Reis, who was a former US Marine machine gun specialist in Korea. After a few minutes of rambling talk he finally came to the point.

He was a recruiter for a Certain Fidel Castro who was forming a group to over throw the Dictator of Cuba, Batista, and was actively looking for specialists for Castro. He said that Reis had agreed to join him as a machine gun instructor for excellent pay, and had recommended me as a former Military pilot, qualified in multi engine Sea aircraft.

He asked me if I was interested and mentioned what was a very high pay in those days, He said that I would be given a rank of an Officer and would be based in the Yucatan. I would be expected to fly at least a few times monthly to Cuba to deliver arms, personnel, and equipment, always at night.

I was to be given a PBY-5A and plenty of gasoline to bring myself up to date in water landings as well as to aquaint myself with it's handling characteristics. To a tropical tramp and bum it sounded quite romantic and appealing, a soldier of fortune, so I tentatively agreed.

Later, Reis and I commenced to compare notes and became a bit uneasy. It seems that I would earn that nice salary only while I was in Cuban territorial waters, the rest of the time I would be based in a jungle camp in Quintana Roo eating beans and tortillas at $ !:00 US a day

The same applied to Reis. A quick call to the American Consulate in Hermosillo asking about the swearing of allegiance to a foreign group - Gov't -and it's possible effect on my American citizenship, only received evasive answers. They only said that the US was effectively looking the other way. No commitments. Hmm red flags starting to be unfurled.

Further checking revealed that Batista now had a new group of P-51's being used as night interceptors as well as for daily patrols, sorta cooled off my romantic ideas a bit more. I was well aware of the ability of a lumbering PBY-5A to out fight or out fly a Mustang, my patriotic ideas towards Castro and his humanitarian efforts drooped considerably.

After finding that the mechanics would be from the dregs of tropical American aircraft mechanics, which was very low at that time, I finally told the recruiter "gracias , but no way". However I would keep his offer in mind. To put it mildly he was a bit upset and mumbled a bit about my short life expectancy since I now knew too much. I countered by mentioning that I had put out a life insurance contract with one of the Sinaloa boys on the agents life also, so to back off. He finally did.

I later learned that after the successful revolt, all foreign fighters, such as my position would have been, were promptly thrown into prison and most were simply executed for one reason or another, a pattern which Castro continued to follow throughout his career.

Just think if I hadn't been so suspicious, you would have been spared my rambling posts, and Tayopa would have been found by another. So have another cuppa coffee and cheer up.

Don Jose de La Mancha

 

[snakeyes]

Wonderful story amigo
In 1968 I was stationed aboard the aircraft carrier USS JFK, We sailed to (Gitmo) to conduct a shake down cruise. I was an engineman 3rd class and I was part of the liberty boat crew. Everyday the ship would sail out into the Carribean and I along with 5 other sailors would be left ashore to watch after the liberty boats.One of the guys got the bright idea that we go fishing, well we did that everyday anyway, so no big deal there, but there is a river that empties into the bay, so guess where we went? yep up the river. Now that I look back on it, I guess it was kinda funny, but didn't think so then. We traveled up stream for about 30 min, before we were stopped by the Cuban army, half a dozen soldiers pointing rifles at us.No where to run so we pulled over, first thing they did was to search us and out boat we didn't carry any guns just fishing poles. We were marched to what I guess was a guard shack where they lined us all up. I was thinking dam there gonna shoot us.Once they figured out we weren't spying on them, they were actually kinda nice.After a couple of hours of questions they let us return to our boat. We didn't have any proof of where we had been so one of the guys asked for a souvenir, so one of the soldiers gave him a cartridge to take back, I believe it was was Russian bullet.We managed to get back before anyone knew that we were gone, or no telling what would have happened to us.
Marty

 

[Real de Tayopa Tropical Tramp]

Geeze Marty, I always knew that if it were possible a swabby would get into trouble, however ? Just think of the sordid stories that the others in here would have missed if they had decided to expend a few cartridges. he he he .

Err, ah, did you have clean, fresh skivies back aboard the ship?

Now that you have opened up, get to posting. Naturally your "Rum & Coca cola" ventures cannot be posted, but then many of the readers have vivid imaginations.

Don Jose de La Mancha

P.S. did you ever catch any fish?

 

[snakeyes]

Never underestimate the ability of a young sailor to get into trouble it just seemed to find me.
My 1st 2 years in the navy I was on a salvage ship and just before I got transferred my CPO was transferred to Cuba. So when we Pulled in on the Kennedy I went to visit him. Some how he managed to get himself a job running the carpenter shop. One of his workers was a Jamaican from Montego Bay. He had built a set of stereo speakers and wanted to know if I cold take them to his dad in Jamaica. I didn't have a clue as to what I was getting into.
Now I never did actually see the speakers cause he had them boxed up for shipment. I told him to bring them down to the fleet landing and would just put them on the work boat, and I would take them ashore we we got there. He gave me $20.00 and a letter explaining how to contact his dad and where he lived.
Everything was going according to plan, I road the boat ashore in Montego Bay, and found a cab driver to help me out. No sooner did we have the speakers in the cab when the cops showed up. Seems I was guilty of smuggling, dam I never even thought about that. Luck was on my side again sorta of, seems one of the cops knew the guy I was supposed to deliver the package too.The cops took the speakers to custom house,and the cabby and I went looking for guy I was making the delivery to.
I don't know how many people have ever ridden in a Jamaican cab,for 1 thing they drive on the wrong side of the road, and they don't have brakes, only horns.
We finally find the guy,he's a really skinny black guy with a huge machete looks to be about 80 and he's making bamboo furniture. I gave him the letter and offered him a ride down the mountain, he looked at me then the cab driver,then took off running.Guess he didn't like cabs or white people We get back down the mountain and to the customs house and this guy has beat us there.I never did find out if he got the speakers, and I ended up having to pay the cab driver all the money I had, so much for liberty in Jamaica. I was lucky, the cops warned me about bringing stuff into the country without going thru customs,lucky again I wasn't locked up,I bet a Jamaican jail would be no fun at all. Nope never did catch any fish.

Marty

 

[birdman]

A few months ago I posted about going to Pompeii while in the Navy .We went where we were not sopposed to be and here are some pics from 1995. I just got back from overseas so here are the pics which were at home.I have some better ones if I can find them but these will have to do for now.
wish I was still the age I was back then..

 

[snakeyes]

Great pictures Dosen't look like anything has changed in the last 40 years

marty

 

[birdman]

Yea Marty ,it was a really neat trip.That was the only Med-Cruize I went on but we did do a north Alantic in 96. Naples was horribly dirty but once you got out of the city the country side was nice. No telling what treasures are still buried there waiting to be found. I wanted a souvenir and contemplated bringing a skull back it just seemed way too wrong.
It would have made a neat conversation piece though.

 

[Real de Tayopa Tropical Tramp]

Gracias mis amigos thanks Birdman.

Don Jose de La Mancha

 

[snakeyes]

Birdman did you ever get to go any of the 3 day tours, I went on one to Rome, we checked into the hotel, than a buddy and I hit the streets wanting to see the sites, one big problem, once we decided to go back to the room, nobody could remember the name or location of the hotel, so we had to wonder around streets of Roam until the next day when we caught up with the tour at Coliseum.

Marty

 

[birdman]

The family and myself went in 05. It was a quick hop from Germany. We did not do the tours just did our own thing. I remember the anti Bush graffiti all over the place.

 

[Real de Tayopa Tropical Tramp]

Good afternoon ELLE, jason etc. : for some reason I was thinking about that bell, Tubares, and Your campaign Elle.

I remembered that I met Lupe vega who helped me with the Gloria pan mine investigation. He arranged for me to go to Jorge Juan's cabin in the Gloria Pan barranca. I had a young couple of Tarahumaras that agreed to act as my guides.

We went afoot since I was in prime condition and figured that i would have no problem with a young couple, that to me were kiddies, sheesh was I wrong. I left my mule and sleeping gear at Tubares since there was no grazing up there, and carried only 35 lbs - after all, it was only for one day..

The young couple in their teens, promptly ran up the hill and disappeared. I staggered on trying to catch up with them, near the verge of a heart attack, and finally stumbled over the rim where i had last seen them, I saw them wrestling (?) in the grass. As soon as they saw me, they jumped up laughing, and RAN up to the next crest. This was repeated at least a 'billion' times that first day. sigh

Then to add to my woes, it started to rain, a cold penetrating rain with wind. sheesh I was beginning to feel sorry for myself and wonder why or how I ever became involved with exploration and lost mines. As for my guides they appeared just as happy as if they had good sense.

We stayed in a cave that night where I warmed up a bit. The next day was an even worse repetition of the first, if possible. The boy called to me and pointing to a cleft in the ridge above us, fairly close to the Gates of Heaven, and said that was where I had to go. From there it would drop down into the barranca of the Gloria Pan. All that I had to do was to go down the barranca until I saw Jorge Juan's cabin. simple enough, no? As They then 'ran' off giggling and playing, I overheard a remark on how i had slowed them up from a two hour 'walk' to two day one??

The 'next' Day, about dusk, I finally saw a small one room brush covered shack and stumbled to the door, where with numb fingers I tapped on the door. No response, so I repeated the knocking, still no response, so I started kicking the damn door, it swung open. There was no-one there, so I entered.

It was by now dark, my matches were wet, and after three days of stumbling through cold gusty rain, continuously wet, I was trembling with cold and beat. All I could think of was getting warm and to sleep. There was just enough light to let me see a broken cot with a sleeping bag on it. Without further ado I crawled into it. sheesh it was so dirty and greasy that it was stiff as a frozen sail , but it did get me warm and I went to sleep listening to the wind howl, shake the cabin, and the roar of the rising arroyo.

The next morning it was bright and sunny, so after starting a fire and cooking breakfast, I returned to liking the life of an explorer and commenced searching the cabin. it was litterally full of junk, from mining equipment, to books and pages of notes. Being nosey, I quickly found why my unwilling host was gone. He had formented an uprising against the Mission in the 30's, He was called the "Arab". The gov't was still looking for him, There were vague references to a Priest having been killed. He had been involved in several murders and had lately been shot in the stomach, but recovered. This was my unwilling host, sheesh.

This is your job Elle, check on this.


Anyway, I quickly found what fit the sealed entrance of La gloria Pan mine and decided to return to El fuerte, where my friend and partner was waiting, so that he could be there when we opened it. That part you already know. About this time an Indian arrived with my sleeping gear, so I returned to Tubares with him.

Incidentally the return trip only took 1/2 a day ?

So Elle, dig up what you can about this mini, aborted uprising. But remember, the Gloria Pan was closed in the 1600's, along with Tayopa, Tepoca, Las pimas, LaTarasca, and two others near Caborca.
This also includes El Fuego de Barras (?) south west of Tubares.

Side thingie, to the East from the bell tower, on the south side of the river, there is a small rock walled corral. Check it with a metal detector. During the last rev. a gov't pay roll officer, with his escort ,were caught by the rebels and took refuge in there. They were all killed but the pay roll as never found. It is probably buried in there . It was claimed to be mostly gold, but this I doubt, since even a single peso was a large amount of money in those days, still the silver would be worth quite a bit and could go to help restoring the Mission.


Thank you Jason, as usual it is Elle's fault. This is a fill in for her project.

Don Jose de La Mancha