Old mines in Western Arizona

Made a long day trip out in to Western Arizona north of Wenden to check out some old mine sites from the 1800's and turn of the century. Didn't get to as many site as we wanted but, heck guess we'll just have to go again!
The first site, lots of gray waste tailing in an area of granite. We were told by a guy we met out there that it was a gold mine but a lot of the rocks had copper oxide on them??? The vertical shafts were scary deep by means of the old rock drop test...


The second site was up on the hill and again a very deep vertical shaft.


Just site had a lot of shallow digs following a vein along the side of the hill, this one was deepest at about 50 feet with lots of cribbing to support the two rock faces.

Lots of blue and green copper showing in the tailing

On the way to the last site of the day... had to do some flexing!


Had to get the WayaLife badge in...

The last site was more on an open pit mine for a vein of black rock in the host of red, which our research book said was a more resent manganese mine.

They used left over drills as timber supports.

Awesome!

Sent while sitting on the crapper.

Awesome!! I love exploring the mines out in AZ :thumb:

Looks like a fun trip. How far from Yuma were these? I'm going to try to get out there is a few weeks for a similar type of tour.

About 150 miles North East of Yuma. There might be some stuff around Yuma area... East of there is the Castle Dome mining area but I don't know how accessible it as the Proving Grounds cover a lot of that part of the state. You might be better going to the West on the California side into the mountains East of Ogilby(east side of the sand dunes) which has old mining areas. I use a topo map program on the ipad and scam the area your interested in and it shows the old mines and dugs including the roads/trails to them. I use a free-be called Trimble Outdoors....Good luck!

Man, I wish Florida had some spots like that:standing wave:

JK-JOHN-E said:

Man, I wish Florida had some spots like that:standing wave:

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Very True.

Nice shots of the old mines. This is definitely the best time of the year to explore.:thumb:

Nice run and some nice pics.

Jack

I have been wanting to check out the hills around Quartzsite. I have heard there are some cool old gold mines out that way. Hit me up next time you are headed out that way Desert Rose.

Will do Brewman... Planning on another adventure in Feb., where you coming from?

Desert Rose JK said:

Will do Brewman... Planning on another adventure in Feb., where you coming from?

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So cal. I go out to Ehrenberg once in a while so Quartzsite is only 20 min out from there. Feb is going to be busy but hit me up you never know what will shake loose.