Quartz Creek - Rainy Mine June, 2002

Route Information

With a free weekend morning, and the promise of good weather, I snuck out early and made the bumpy drive up the long Middle Fork Snoqualmie road, staying left until a group of cars was reached at the Taylor Gate. A quick and stealthy strike was going to be made on the site of the old Rainy Mine which is located up Quartz Creek, a tributary of the Taylor River.

The Taylor Gate is the stopping point for cars, and the trailhead

Quick progress was made up the old Taylor River road for a half mile or less, passing people camped near the river on the right. After about 10 minutes, the Quartz Creek road then turns uphill at a "Y" here, actually the better of the two roads at this point. The smooth road was followed as it winds up the forested hillside. At about 1700', the road starts to traverse more steeply up the hillside, and gets worse here - with brush crowding the road and the effects of water eroding the bed.

After a while, the Quartz Creek road gets steeper and rougher

The road continues in steep straight fashion, with views back behind to Garfield as elevation is gained. I started looking around after about 50 minutes for the old road which served as the access to the Rainy Mine. Luckily I was watching carefully; only a rough trail cuts off to the left at a certain point, not much is remaining that suggests a road. If you are hiking up the road and pass a large rusty cable sticking out into the road from the left, you just missed it - the cutoff to the Rainy Mine is back about 20 feet.

This somewhat hidden old road (now trail) leads down to the Rainy Mine

As this was obviously (or not so, actually) the way, I started down the rough trail. At certain points I could see that at one time there had been a roadbed carved into the hillside; now there was just a rough path crossed with multiple blowdowns. There wasn't much problem following it however, and soon it deteriorated into a creekbed making its way down the hillside. A few more rough steps brought me to a point where I could see the evidence of mine dump material, which in this case consisted of a large area of red dirt heaped in a clearing above the creek. I walked over and surveyed the site.

The Rainy mine was a copper mine, worked intermittently between 1901 and the early 1950's. When copper prices rose in the 50's, more money was invested in the mine, and several structures were put up in the area. The last work was done in the late 50's - and nothing much remains from all the effort.

An old foundation still sat on the hillside above the mine dump area

I could see no obvious signs of tunnels, despite the fact that I was in the area of the old workings. This didn't suprise me , since there was not much sign of a road coming in. As I looked up the hillside about 50 feet, the ruins of an old concrete foundation perched precariously. I scrambled up to it, and climbed around it.

Just above the foundation to the left was the old shaft. It was filled with much wood and debris, but I could still see darkness below. It probably would be possible to fall in, and I made a good effort of doing just that as I tried to get a photo down the depths. I climbed back down from the shaft location, amidst obvious efforts of rockhounds to chip away pieces of pyrite from the rock below the foundation.

This is a shot down the old mine shaft, it is filled with junk

This mine site is unfortunate to be so accessible, and to still be shown prominently on the latest topo maps. Although nothing much remained in the way of artifacts, I did see an old ore cart that was half buried and lodged against a tree. A large fuel tank was sitting further down on the hillside in the trees.

This old ore cart is hopelessly buried, probably why it's still there

An effort was also made to find the "Father's Day" adit which is located just west of the Rainy Mine, but after thrashing in the brush for a while, I saved it for another day. The area is incredibly brushy and overgrown, it was a tough hike just to get out to look over Quartz Creek. I had had enough by then, and had to be back home.

I climbed back up the rough road bed, and took a GPS reading near the cutoff. The topo map is very accurate in placing this road, or what is left of it. The downhill walk out was short and sweet, several hikers were passed as they made their way up the Quartz Creek drainage. A good quick trip.

References:

• Discovering Washington's Historic Mines - Oso Publishing. Information about the mine and route.
• Geology and Mineral Resources of King County - V.E. Livingston. A section on the Rainy Mine.
• Seattle PI "Take A Hike" Article about the Quartz Creek trail.
• The MidForc Site shows some pictures and hikes in and around Quartz Creek.