Bear Basin Mines August, 2001

Route Information

Finally, we were able to schedule another quick trip this summer. For some cruel reason, every weekend for the past month had brought crappy weather. With grim determination, we set out early on a gloomy Saturday up the long North Fork Snoqualmie River road.

The road was in good shape, and we made record time to the Bare Mountain trailhead some 20 miles from North Bend. Not a car was in sight. Fog engulfed the trees above. We started up the rocky trail, making small talk about last year's recon trip that was made by one of our members. During that trip, the basin was scouted and some beta was gathered from a character packing a couple of pearl-handled pistols.

This portion of the Bare Mt trail traverses above the river

If Monte Cristo is the Mecca of Northwest mining history, the Bear Basin mining area surely at least qualifies as a small Disneyland. We were up for the adventure, and made good time up the trail - which used to serve as the mining access road to Bear Basin. After about one mile, the old road ends at a parking lot feature, and now has a stout bridge crossing Bear Creek. From here, the Bare Mountain trail traverses a beautiful sloping hillside above the creek. This is a high-maintenance portion of the trail, and when not taken care of can be a head-high jungle of ferns and flowers. Fortunately there had been some brushing recently.

This is the location of the cutoff to Bear Basin (looking back)

The cutoff for the route to Bear Basin is at about the 2-mile mark, where the Bare Mt trail suddenly makes a switchback after traversing for about a mile. The route can be seen taking off straight from the switchback into the brush. It had taken us about 1.5 hours to reach this point, and we stopped for a while and put on full rain gear. After a while, we plunged into the head-high wet brush and continued to contour the hillside. This part of the route is rough and brushy, but not hard to follow. After a few minutes of travel, we could look down to the creek below and see the ruins of the old mill site. This would be our first extended stop. We continued to traverse above the creek, aiming for a small cliff. The mill site cannot be seen when directly above it - we figured that once we got to an area of large talus blocks, that we could make our way down to the site. After some slippery rocks, logs, thick brush and a 5 foot plunge off a hidden cliff, we were at the site of the old mill, which had burned down in the 1930's.

At the mill site, with Bear Creek in the distance

The amount of machinery at the mill site is amazing, and most of it cannot be seen until one is right on top of it. Some large wheels which harnessed power from Bear Creek are laying about, along with gears and rotting belts. Some of the large iron objects are stamped with the name "Risdon Iron Works" of San Francisco. This company was active during the late 19th century and in addition to making mining equipment, had a shipbuilding arm and locomotive works as well.

We think the ore was fed into this, and crushed inside

Up higher seems to be the remains of a large stamping mechanism, but the most interesting thing seems to be a huge circular bell-shaped object. After some inspection, we determined that the ore mixed with water was run through the middle of this object and crushed by golf-ball sized iron balls inside. With a flashlight we could still see the large rusty iron balls. This object is so massive that large rocks almost make no sound when hurled at it. (This was a slightly unscientific, yet effective test.)

We rested here for a while until the bugs became prohibitive. Instead of slogging back up the way we came, we decided to take a 'short-cut' uphill from the millsite north, to intersect the trail in the woods. The track disappeared in minutes, leaving us thrashing through the wet brush to finally hit the trail. We continued roughly SE on the old miner's route into Bear Basin.

The trail into the basin goes over some bridges

The trail here is suprisingly good. It continues over a rotted plank bridge, and passes a nice little waterfall on the left. Not too much further, one will see some machinery immediately on the left of the trail. This is a sign that in just a few feet, one will reach the "Y" in the trail, the left branch curving a few hundred feet to the site of old mining camp headquarters, and the right branch continuing towards the head of Bear Basin (see the Bear Basin Sketch Map.) We took the left path and set our stuff down for a while at the headquarters site, which reportedly had a cabin standing until the 1970's, when it too finally was burned down. Now there is a large barrel serving as a garbage can, and some mining junk 'furniture' among some tent spaces and fire rings. We relaxed for a while, but by this time it was around 11:00 am, and there was more to see.

We knew that there must be a trail of some sorts that led north to the donkey engine high in the basin. The donkey engine was reached on last year's recon, but only via a circuitous route that took much too long. We backtracked just a few feet from the fire ring by the camp headquarters, and noticed a small trail leading north into the trees. This must be it! We followed the path down to the creek, and crossed on a number of small pipes that had been laid across the water. To the right was a nice campsite. This would be the preferred camp if one overnighted in the basin.

Looking at the donkey engine and down the valley

We continued in the direction of the donkey engine, and adits 6 & 7 - which were our first goal. Just past the creek camp, we lost the route. Just uphill from the camp, we had seen two fir trees with large scrapes on them, but didn't think much of it. Instead of backtracking and finding the trail, we plowed up through more wet brush for about 15 minutes until we could see the donkey engine. We then followed up some old cables through the alpine trees and talus to the large fallen piece of machinery.

Evidently the donkey engine was in the process of being moved to adit #6 (which we could see above us) when mining operations ceased. The engine probably would have been used to power an aerial tramway that was to extend down to the millsite. What a task to get it here! It would seem that the only way to move it would be to power it up, and make it winch itself up the hillside. The donkey engine has now fallen off the log framework that it once rested on - the frame is now just uphill from the engine. This is most likely due to being ravaged each winter and spring by avalanches coming down the basin.

This particular donkey engine is Washington Iron Works #1802, probably built in the early 20th century. Donkey engines were used heavily in the logging industry, and one can be seen in this old photo, and also here. On a side note, Washington Iron Works was sold in 1975 to Ederer Inc. in Seattle - now somewhat known for the work they did building the moving roof mechanism at Safeco Field.

Looking up from donkey engine to mine dumps and adit #6

We then climbed up the north slope a short distance to adit #6, the eastern one of two 'Mines' shown on the topo map near Bear Creek (which flows from Bear Lakes). The mine dump is fairly level outside the adit, and we chose this spot to eat lunch and assemble our gear for going in. This also is a good vantage point for scanning the rest of the basin, and binoculars revealed the probable site of adit #3 on the SE side of the basin, a later goal for the day.

We rested for a while and ate at the #6 mine dump

We entered adit #6, which quickly bent around to the left, and soon all daylight was gone. After 180 feet, we encountered an uninviting narrow drift going to the left. Slightly creepy at first, this part of the tunnel soon opened up revealing a large 'room'. A large timber was wedged across the 'room' evidently used by previous explorers to stand on. Why did they get up on this board? We found out - all the way across the ceiling of the room ran a glittering vein of golden material - and soon we were taking turns 'cheesing off' some pieces. The minerals were somewhat soft, and after nearing falling into the mud several times, we had our share. The tunnel kept going for about 30 more feet, but one needed to squeeze over a pile of material apparently excavated from the tunnel end, but never removed. Seeing that the vertical clearance would be about 1 foot, we both passed on this option, and started back. We then walked down the other branch of the tunnel, which deadended after about 300 feet. On the way out, a hardhat brushed the ceiling and caused a large rock to crash down on the head of an unsuspecting explorer. We didn't waste any time getting out.

We came to this fork in #6 the left tunnel looked narrow

We balanced on this old timber and tried to get some mineral samples

Adit #7 was the next goal, being just a few hundred feet away, slightly lower and to the west. We gathered up our equipment and made out way down the brush against the cliffside. The mine dump for #7 is steep and somewhat tricky to climb. The top is cluttered with small alders and marshy, not too attractive for hanging around. We again put on our equipment and started in. Just at the entrance is an old ore cart, and the rails into the mine are still intact - constructed of 2x4 like timbers capped with a thin iron strip. This tunnel was wetter than #6, and we made our way to the end rather quickly, not seeing anything particularly of interest. Soon we were back outside, making our way down the dump towards the donkey engine.

Parts of the tunnels were stained bright blue from the ore

This is from deep inside adit #7, looking out at the ore cart

From the donkey engine, several rusty cables run down the hillside in the direction of the mining camp headquarters. We knew that there must be a trail that connects - and at this point was being dubbed the mystical "SuperHighway". We followed the cables down, and started seeing a few cairns. Viola! The trail now presented itself, and while steep and brushy, allowed us to make good time back to the area of the creek camp. We grimly noticed that the two large blazes on the fir trees did indeed signify where the donkey engine trail continued. In a few more minutes, we were at the site of the mining camp.

Our last stop would be adit #3, which we had seen from the north basin. We went back on the short access trail from the mining camp site to the "Y" in the basin trail. We now took the right branch which dropped to a crossing of another small creek draining from Bear Basin, and made our way to the head of the basin. The 'trail' at this point is sparse, and soon one will encounter a marshy area on the left. We made our way right for about 100 feet to the point where the woods met the talus. We soon discovered some rusty iron artifacts, and saw an old tree girthed by a cable. We started following this cable up the talus slope, where we could see the dirt and rock of the suspected mine dump of adit #3.

Climbing up the SE side of basin, dump from adit #3 is middle/top

The approximate location of adit #3 can be seen in this large photo taken from the Bare Mt. summit, the cable shown is pointing directly at the area of the #3 mine dump (Photo by Tom Davenport).

Adit #3 looks just like someone would picture a mine to look like: a dark entrance into the hillside, framed by some rotting timbers. The mine dump area is quite flat and large. On the edge of the dump sits a rusty series of gears mounted on an iron frame, which probably extended down to the basin below. The source of power was a mystery, but we did pass an old engine block down in the talus, and some old fuel cans near the girthed tree. We once again got our gear out and got ready to enter the mine.

This mechanism sits outside adit #3, probably used to wind tramway cables

Just outside the adit is a hole filled with water, depth unknown. We bypassed this and started into the darkness. 40 feet in, on the right is a bulge in the tunnel where a winze is located. Amazingly, there is a wooden windlass still in place, wrapped with an ancient rope. One can almost see ghosts of old miners, struggling to haul up buckets of ore in the gloom...

This is the winze in the #3 adit, showing the old windlass in place

This tunnel seemed to be a little more creepy than the rest - the height and width was not consistent, and in some parts we bent down to get though, and sometimes felt that the walls were closing in on us. One area had been stoped up a ways, and some timbers were still in place where men once stood. After about 450 feet, we reached the end and started back.

It was now about 4:00 pm, and we were moving pretty slowly. It was clearly time to get back to civilization. We packed up our gear, and took one last look at the basin from the nice viewpoint that the #3 mine dump provides.

This is the #3 adit, it had a water filled hole at entrance

The view from #3 adit. The mine dumps of 6 & 7 seen in distance

Carefully, we made our way down the steep rocky slope, following the old cables back down again. The route out of the basin went quickly, as did most of the Bare Mt. trail. The last rocky quarter mile seemed to take forever, as we finally reached the trailhead at 5:30. The end of another successful trip.

References:

• 100 Hikes in the Alpine Lakes - Mountaineers. Bare Mt. trail information.
• Discovering Washington's Historic Mines - Oso Publishing. Information about the mines and routes.
• Geology and Mineral Resources of King County - V.E. Livingston. Good section on the Bear Basin claims.
• Tom Davenport's Picture Site shows some good photos from the summit of Bare Mountain.