Sunset Mine May, 2002

Route Information

After a dreary winter, we were ready to finally get out and do something. The spring never quite materialized, and we kept waiting for some decent weather before we planned something. The snow level in late May was reminiscent of the spring of 1999 - the year that we almost never had a summer. Fortunately, the weather for the weekend was promising, so we met at the usual place outside of Sultan on a Saturday morning.

We parked near the remains of the Sunset Mine mill foundation

We should have known that the weatherman would break his promise. What should have been sunny skies looked gray, and it was threatening rain. No matter. Since the snow level was still so low, we had decided to make an initial push up the Trout Creek valley, just up the North Fork Skykomish from Index. There exists much history in that long, low valley, with the Sunset Mine being one of the biggest producers of copper ore up through the early 20th century. While most of the workings were too dangerous to enter now, we just planned on looking around, and maybe hiking a ways up Trout Creek.

Close to the mill site is Tunnel #2 which was the main haulage tunnel

The North Fork Skykomish road is really a nice road. All the bridges/creeks are nicely signed, and we just drove 5 miles until we crossed the small bridge over Trout Creek. A few hundred feet later, we turned right on the unmarked dirt road heading off to the right. After turning on the road, keep left initially. The road doesn't pretend to be much right away, and it was slow going in the 2DrX rig, climbing sometimes steeply over ruts and rocks, avoiding branches and driving over small blowdowns. 4WD was needed immediatly, and a low-clearance vehicle wouldn't do well here. After bumping and crawling up 1.75 miles of this narrow road, we suddenly came upon a large clearing, where the old mill site foundations of the Sunset Mine stood perched on the hillside to the left. It was about 8:45. We parked here and took a quick survey - as expected, many shotgun shells and bullet casings littered the area, as well as numerious cheap brand beer cans, and topping it off was an old bullet-riddled washing machine (or was it a dryer?) which we lobbed a few rocks at as we got out. The river was rushing a few yards away.

A close-up shot of the flooded Tunnel #2 near the mill site

We climbed around the old foundations for a while. This was uninteresting, so we walked up the road a few yards until an fork turned left, following a creek. As we walked, we could see this creek was flowing quite nicely out of an old, caved adit - Tunnel #2 of the Sunset Mine, which served as the main haulage tunnel when the mine was active. Nothing much to see here, and it was hard to believe that this was the main center of activity for the mine, around which nothing much remained.

The old road grade wasn't much of a road any more (going down)

The old road to Tunnel #2 was much like a circular driveway, and we followed the it around back to the main road, which we followed up the valley approximately 100 yards (see detail map). We were searching for an old roadway the made its way up left, up the hillside, and saw a faint trail into the brush here. Soon were were following an old road grade, now a young alder forest, which heads roughly east as it climbs the hillside. After about 5 or 10 minutes, the road switchbacks left, and we continued until we came upon the mine tailings of Tunnel #1, which sits in the forest above the old road at an elevation of about 1630'. We climbed the tailings pile and fought through some brush until we came to the adit (caved) from which eminates a small stream. There looked to be a loose, dangerous way into the tunnel, but we were having none of it. It was now about 9:30, and we rested briefly and took some miserable pictures.

Tunnel #1 is found in the woods up the old road grade

We climbed up around the right side of Tunnel #1, and started up the steep hillside in search of the mysterious chasms above. The way was easy through the open forest, and we could follow the path that others had taken. Following DWHM instructions, we climbed up 250 feet or so, passing a large cable wrapped around a tree, in 5 minutes we came to a level landing area that was shored up by some large logs. Continuing up about 50 more feet, we climbed up to the rim (about 1730') where we could look into Chasm #1.

This person has just stepped down, into the first part of Chasm #1

It is amazing to see how much earth has been excavated, and in turn, how much has caved in to the large chasm, this happening in the 1930's when stope #1 caved in unexpectedly. To the west, the canyon continues a hundred feet or so, and ends in a steep wall. The east side continues down into a murky hole (see detail map for additional photos). We scrambled down the rough trail into the chasm. Water was dripping on us from the overhanging walls, and we cautiously climbed down a few feet in the darkness. The first part of a tunnel is the hardest to see in, sort of a twilight effect where the eyes cannot see good enough in the darkness yet because of the remaining light. This was no exception, and it was tough to see down. Even the cameras had a hard time. Some bad shots were taken of the wooden structure that exists within the hole, remnants of a 3-story manway used to move miners and ore after the stope had collapsed. It was raining now hard, and the water was dripping and flowing into the tunnel getting us quite wet. We climbed out and regrouped with the map to figure the next part of the route.

A shot of the wooden structure built deep inside of Chasm #1

We worked our way around the west side of Chasm #1, and contoured the slope for 500 feet or so in the open forest. In about 10 minutes, we came upon the old air shaft from one of the other Sunset Mine stopes. This was basically a large hole about 6 feet in diameter, which extended down about 80 feet. While the hole was pretty obvious from a distance, I wouldn't want to be walking though this part of the hillside in the darkness. We got down on our knees and crawled up to the edge to peer down into the air shaft.

Just past the airshaft was another chasm, part of the same cave-in that had created Chasm #1 on the same slope. It took a few minutes to round the edge where we could get a view into it - Chasm #2 was even larger than Chasm #1. Unfortunately, one can see that it isn't a great idea to climb down to the floor of Chasm #2, as dark holes can be seen beneath the "floor" indicating that it could collapse more at some point. There are also large rocks that litter the bottom of the Chasm, which look to have fallen from the rim above. We had a quick look around here, and noticed a faint path which seemed to lead down the slope. We took this path down. After a few minutes, we could tell that the path merged into an old road bed and soon recognized the mine dump material of Tunnel #1. We followed the road bed back down the rough trail where it soon dumped us out on the Trout Creek road.

This old bridge can be found upstream from the millsite

Now the plan was to explore up the road as far as we could. In a matter of minutes, we were surprised to come upon the old bridge that spans Trout Creek. We walked over the bridge - which is rotting and not in good enough shape to drive over. If a vehicle did get across without breaking though, there is no road on the other side, and it never looks like there really was. We looked around quickly, and agreed that any exploration of the far side of the creek would have to be done on a subsequent day. We crossed back and continued up the main road.

After the landslide/washout, someone made a little bridge for this creek

We continued about .5 miles past the Sunset Mine area on the road, still drivable but getting rougher as we hiked. Our next goal would be the Non Pareil mine, which was further up the road. The next landmark would be a washed out creek, where the road was destroyed. According to the GPS, we were getting close. In minutes we came to an area where the road basically ended. Not so much a washout as a huge landslide, the road was gone. Instead was a large uneven area of dirt, mud, and newish growth of trees and brush. Despite some chainsaw action, no vehicles were going to pass this. After the landslide, someone had built a small bridge across a creek.

The Non Pareil mine dump extends down to the edge of the road

A few moments past the landslide area, we noticed many small rocks that were cascading down the slope on the left to the road. We figured this was the mine dump from the Non Pareil, and one of us climbed it to look for the mine, as the other one stayed on the road, and puzzled out the pronunciation of the mine. We never did agree on the how to say it, but a shout from above confirmed the location of the mine. We climbed up the rest of the rocks, past some old mine rails, to a waterfall next to a dark opening.

The Non Pareil mine sits back by fallen logs and a waterfall

Many fallen trees littered the immediate mine area, at about 1900' elevation. The Non Pareil looked Non-Inviting - it was full of water, and more water was flowing down inside it. It also looked somewhat caved. We had no interest in going in and didn't have the necessary equipment anyway. As we looked around, it was obvious that this operation was not a big one like it's downstream neighbor. It was now 11:30 and the rain was picking up. We decided to keep hiking up the old road, until we got to the end or decided to give up. It was raining quite a bit at this point.

Some old mine exploring garbage left by wader-toting morons

We continued up the road in the rain. The road now was less defined, had occasional blowdowns (some big, many small) and had a nice soft bed of pine needles to walk on. Several creeks and waterfalls were passed. At one point, we noticed a large cable wrapped around a tree stump. To the left we noticed a faint road bed which switch-backed up the slopes toward Iron Mountain. We followed it for a while the best we could, but soon it dissappeared. We figured it was a small logging spur from long ago. Soon after that detour, we came upon a campsite in the road, and the apparent end of the road. We stopped here and ate some lunch, as it was about noon.

We turned back at this campsite, beyond was a dangerous fording

The road seemed to end on a small overlook, with a steep canyon below. After lunch, a little poking around revealed that the 'road' took a sharp left turn toward the gully were it stopped at a raging creek. The creek (coming off of Conglomerate Point) followed a rocky slot gully, and it looked like a tough crossing. Someone had fallen some small trees across it, but nothing big enough to walk over. We made the decision to turn around here. This crossing wouldn't be impossible, but one would get wet, and to get washed down the rocky series of waterfalls was an unthinkable consequence. We left the rest of the road and beyond for a future trip.

We started back in the rain. Even though we were early in the season, it seemed like there would be too much water in the many creeks to explore to the road end. A tentative plan was made to come back in late summer, or fall. On the way back we walked over the old bridge again, and looked in the woods beyond. Nothing. At the mill site, a few more rocks were tossed at the boxy metal shape, which we now agreed was an old washing machine. A slow rough and tumble ride down the road put us back on the blacktop. It was even still too early to have dinner at the Dutch Cup, so we split up and went home early.

References:

• Discovering Washington's Historic Mines Vol. 1 - Oso Publishing. Information about the Sunset mine and Trout Creek valley.