The Lost Carson Mine

[Crow]

There may still be a descendant in Area I will PM you.

Crow

 

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[UncleMatt]

Thanks, all I need is names of current living relatives in the area and I will take it from there.

 

[UncleMatt]

Its curious, on Google Earth Pro I can make out what appears to be a well worn trail along Twilight Creek. This area may be more heavily traveled than I first imagined. It may be that a lot of hikers move through the area. I will check on that to see if that is the case. If not, it may simply be an old sheepherder trail that has become a game trail.

 

[UncleMatt]

Yes, there is definitely a trail going up Twilight Creek, and it even goes over the top of the divide to the east at the top. I have not been able to locate it on any maps online this morning, but will check my NFS maps when I get home this evening. It is well defined and appears to have been frequently traveled. So maybe accessing this area will not be quite so difficult, but I imagine it will still be a workout!

 

[UncleMatt]

Well, I would post Google Earth Pro images to illustrate the trails, but for some reason T-net won't allow pdf's to be posted in threads. I will rescan them as jpg's and post.

I can email them to you crow if you will shoot me your email in a pm, and also anyone else who wants them. The presence of these trails is either from a lot of game using them, or from a lot of hikers.

 

[sdcfia]

Well, I would post Google Earth Pro images to illustrate the trails, but for some reason T-net won't allow pdf's to be posted in threads.....

I can email them to you crow if you will shoot me your email in a pm, and also anyone else who wants them. The presence of these trails is either from a lot of game using them, or from a lot of hikers.

Seems like most of the hikers/climbers to Twilight and West Needle come in from the Crater Lake side.

 

[UncleMatt]

Sdcfia, are you seeing that trail on any official maps?

Here are images from Google Earth Pro



I put a thin yellow line next to the trails for illustration purposes.

 

[sdcfia]

Sdcfia, are you seeing that trail on any official maps?

Here are images from Google Earth Pro

View attachment 1135376 View attachment 1135377

I put a thin yellow line next to the trails for illustration purposes.

Those are clearly trails. No, I've seen no trails on any maps that I have access to. If you look at the mountaineers' blogs, they all describe an eastern access to the Twilight/Needle high ridges, and they don't mention any trails, only routes. Question: do hunters use that high basin where your base camp is, by that small alpine lake/pond? If so, they'd certainly pack in there from the west, and if often enough with animals, would establish a permanent trail.

 

[UncleMatt]

I have no idea, but it definitely looks like a pack trail

 

[UncleMatt]

I'm wondering if the ascent from Lime Creek along Twilight Creek is possible. I can't imagine anyone taking the long way around when it would involve climbing up another 800 feet and adding miles to the whole trip in some of the roughest country on the planet. Its easy to get fooled by GE maps with regard to this, and all it would take is a cliff of 30 feet or so to make it impassable trying to follow Twilight Creek.

Sdcfia, can you give me a URL to the mountaineer blogs you refer to above so perhaps I can contact people who have already been there and know first hand the terrain involved? I would appreciate it.

 

[Crow]

I'm wondering if the ascent from Lime Creek along Twilight Creek is possible. I can't imagine anyone taking the long way around when it would involve climbing up another 800 feet and adding miles to the whole trip in some of the roughest country on the planet. Its easy to get fooled by GE maps with regard to this, and all it would take is a cliff of 30 feet or so to make it impassable trying to follow Twilight Creek.

Sdcfia, can you give me a URL to the mountaineer blogs you refer to above so perhaps I can contact people who have already been there and know first hand the terrain involved? I would appreciate it.

Good point. from the pictures posted it looks like you have to traverse across slope of loose shards of rock also.

Crow

 

[UncleMatt]

Last night I spent some time closely examining the watershed of Twilight Creek below its upper head area. I found intriguing trails switchbacking up the slope in a specific area. As you rise from Lime Creek, there is a place where the creek takes a left turn up a waterfall area, but the main ravine continues straight ahead. Near the top of that ravine is where I found the trails. And it appears they end up leading to the head of Twilight Creek. Not sure if they are game trails or pack trails, and I need to do more searching to connect the different segments all together. But it looks like they may allow an ascent from below by passing up the waterfall area, and then switchbacking up the top of the ravine until you find yourself even with the creek above the falls and are able to cross over to the creek above them.

 

[sdcfia]

Sdcfia, can you give me a URL to the mountaineer blogs you refer to above so perhaps I can contact people who have already been there and know first hand the terrain involved? I would appreciate it.

Keep in mind these mountaineers will be carrying a fair amount of gear, but likely not as much as you're planning. If you're thinking about a western approach, it might take an extensive separate trip just to scout out those trails. Any trail is a good trail - beats going up the flowline of the creek.

https://mtnguide.net/

http://www.mountainproject.com/v/west-needle-mountains/106867741

Twilight Peak : Climbing, Hiking & Mountaineering : SummitPost

Twilight Peak - WOW.com

http://14ers.com/php14ers/tripreport.php?trip=10276

 

[UncleMatt]

thanks for those, I will check them out tonight.

 

[UncleMatt]

Here are some examples

 

[Crow]

Hello Matt

certainly has some potential. In the website of picture of the mountains. One picture of saddle between two peaks show a peak if my eyes do not deceive me, with what appears to be an exposed quartz reef? So it may be favorable location in general area that gold can be found. in fact right thorough the mountain range.



Crow

 

[UncleMatt]

There is another tale of a lost gold strike in these mountains as well, known as the Lost Estes Mine. Only this one was an eight inch wide vein of sylvanite on the southern side of the West Needles. Supposedly Tom Estes even drove an adit into the mountainside following the vein and timbered it.There are likely more such veins that were never found. Which kinda makes one wonder why it was declared a Wilderness Area that had no minerals of value...

Crow, there is a much larger visible vein directly above the one you circled as well...

 

[Crow]

Hello Matt

These days most modern miners look for valuable gold, copper silver in host rock. To mine reef gold is expensive because of set up cost of mine is much more complicated. They do costings of the amount of precious-metal per tonne of host rock to mine for the best approximate cost of ore mined and processed.

In Aussie slang we have term for these type of gold reefs we call them noodles as they can be very rich in quartz vein. But poor mineral value in the host rock surrounding them. Once the quartz reef is dug up the mine is finished. There are thousands of abandoned reef mines in the United states and Australia like that. So large modern mining companies are not really interested in Very rich in small concentrations along the quartz reef. They prefer open cut large mineralsed ore body that has several million tones of ore to process for a good return, to justify huge set up costs.

A good paying reef mines are the ones very close to the surface that do not require large scale underground operation. Ones on surface are the easy ones that can be worked one or two miners small scale for big profits. Some reefs are small but can yield high amounts of gold in small area. The Downside is during the Gold rush the First miners sifted the alluvial gold from the rivers and creeks. When that began to get worked out they took their attention to reef mines. However to mine them effectively they had to form companies to mine them. It spelled the end of independent miner in some respects. Many of the 49ers ended up working for wages, not much better of than where they had come from. Still I have no doubt some reefs where were missed or only partly worked lost or abandoned for various reasons.

So perhaps Levi Carson reef still has some life in it, if you can find it of course.

Just quickly for example, I show plan of reef mine the trio had an interest in years ago. it was actually a series of reef deposits.



This maddens reef was series reefs formed along the fault. Surrounded by world heritage area the site was restricted by soaring operation costs and falling gold values to make it worthwhile operation. The site became a hobby mine for a group but they still had to comply with state mining laws and compliance codes and permits.

So the best reef to find one is one you can hack out the gold bearing surface quartz reef yourselves and get a couple of hundred ounces and not be tied up with large scale mining costs and liabilities.

Hopefully with Carson reef it has not been fully exploited.

Crow

 

[UncleMatt]

I would love to be able to fly a quad copter drone up those kinds of cliff faces, watching the veins through my high definition camera and goggles. And then rappel down to check out anything interesting I might see with a bag and a prospecting pick.

 

[KANACKI]

Hola Matt

I hope that rabid beach bum Crow who preyed on my young girl crew has not lead you astray too much. You know hes been captivated by your treasure legend when he need to put his beak back into his own work he has to do.

But that drunken beach bum of Crow cannot help himself. And indeed it appears you have an interesting story to hunt down.

Kanacki