Upper Seattle-Cascade Mine August, 2008

Seattle-Cascade, Silver Dollar, Akishin, Alexander, all different names for the same set of adits that are up the steep gulch just 1/2 mile or so up the old West Fork Miller River road.

A look at the old timbers inside the lower Seattle-Cascade Mine

Our story of the Seattle-Cascade actually started 3 years or so ago, with an initial foundering trip up the gulch, and more recently, our trip last year to the lower adit, which ended with some shenanigans around the cliffs above in a clueless search for the upper adit. Kent and Jimbo returned later in the summer and braved the squeeze into the lower adit.

After the shenanigans trip, Kent did notice something - and we all agreed that he had found what seemed like a trail cut into the steep side of the woods which headed over to a convenient crossing point below the cliffs and beyond. That day he continued for a while on the route, but due to heat, fatigue and time turned back to join the rest of us. We jotted the elevation down and made mental notes of the spot. Over the next winter we had plenty of time to think about this spot and how it probably would lead us to the upper Seattle-Cascade adit.

In addition, we dug up some old claim maps and other old documentation which showed the relative location of the upper adit, with this information we felt that we could make an easy score, once the snow melted...

Normally, this trip should have been an early one, May or even April. However, the snow levels of the spring of 2008 dictated differently. By the time we could all agree on a good day, it rained. The next proposed day was early in August of 2008.

Kent and I agreed to meet Jimbo and Bryce at the lower adit that morning, and since Jimbo's truck was at the trailhead, they were somewhere up above us.

Going up, Kent found a quick and straight up route from the creek to the ore dump, which seemed to cut off much time. From there, we pretty much followed the line of old ore buckets and parts that litter the forest slope up to the lower adit mine dump. The steep mine dump is then climbed to the collapsed adit at 2100'. Not entirely collaped, if you are crazy enough to want to squeeze through a dirty hole, with a 2000 lb boulder sitting in the dirt above waiting to crush you. In any event, no one was going in the lower adit today; we reached the mine dump of the lower adit, and after making some calls above we received some tossed rocks down the hillside from some inconsiderate person, which we easily side-stepped. We had gotten there within 10 minutes of each other and soon started up the steep hillside above the lower adit. The trip this far had only taken a little more than an hour.

Jimbo crashing through the worst of the route near the end

I had decided to flag the route up, since last time we got "lost" coming down, ran into a hornets nest where Rich got stung, and finally crapped out down to the road. Not a good way to end a trip - therefor the flagging this time. This was greeted with much scorn (even though all flags were pulled coming out), but more on that later.

Up we went from the lower adit, up to the right and in the steep forested terrain. After a while the route makes its way straight up along the edge of the steep walls of the gulch to the southwest. We followed this up, steeply, until around 2500' where we ran smack into the old carved route over through the cliffs that Kent found last year.

We arrived at the upper adit to see a crazy dude there

The route over to the cliffs and through was really the crux of the route; it put us in a great spot for following what we thought would be the logical route up towards the upper adit. The rest of the route was never hard or particularly scary, at times we were somewhat confused but followed our instincts for what would be the logical route of miners in the day.

Up around a corner. A traverse over a slight slide area. Up and through a ferny slope. Up a steep dirty slab and another traverse over to a brushy area. GPS and altimeters said we were very close. Kent waded through the last (and worst) vine maple area before shocking the group with the low key statement, "I see something dark". A few seconds later we heard the unmistakable sounds of someone finding a mine. The rest of us flew through the vine maple, Jimbo noticing old mine rails underneath. The Upper Seattle-Cascade adit was just across a small steep rocky branch of the creek, and Kent stood guarding it, brandishing several weapons. We left him alone for a while.

The tunnel took a bend after a ways, following the vein

There was a survey done of the upper Seattle-Cascade mine back in the 1970's for the Alpine Lakes Study, but other than that we didn't know of anyone that had visited it recently. The steepness of the route and general routefinding problems probably kept most people away, and we were amazed that we literally walked right to it!

We cooled off near the upper adit, ate a little, and got ready to explore inside. The first 50 feet or so of the mine looked wet, so some of us took off socks and took out bootliners and started to wade in.

About 200 feet in, a wide spot contains a nasty winze

After the initial discomfort of the cold murky water, we found that the mine still had ore cart rails intact almost the whole length, with a nice boardwalk down the middle - as if the miners had just recently left. If it wasn't for the inevitable rust and mung clinging to everything inside, thing might look like they were back in the 1930's. An old adjustable stand (for drilling?) and remains of a wooden bucket stood in the tunnel where they were discarded one day after work.

150 feet later, the tunnel made a short bend to follow the vein, and there was a small drift a few feet to the right into the granite, that was stopped shortly after going in. Immediately on the left was a larger room-like opening. This contained a lot of creepy timber wreckage, and a huge gaping hole in the ground filled with grungy mine water. A good shot looking back at the winze by Bryce shows the extent of the wreckage. It's not known how deep the winze actually is, but it's possible that a substantial amount of production came from this spot. We stopped and wondered why it was so jumbled up.

At intervals there was flagging tied around the mine rails, presumably from the US Bureau of Mines when they did the Alpine Lakes survey back in the 70's. Near the end of the tunnel, we started seeing some of the typical graffiti left by the mine workers, dating from the 1930's to the 1950's. Mike was here a lot. Also making a showing was the familiar Bozo, whose drawing resembled Kilroy from WWII graffiti fame. Coincidence? Who knows.

After 300 feet we reached the end where work was stopped in the solid granite. Some of us stayed inside to take pictures, while the others drifted outside to dry off and eat a little. Finally we packed up and started the trek down. The route back to the lower adit was surprisingly quick, taking a little more than 1/2 hour. The rest of the route back to the West Fork Miller road was quick as well, probably taking 20 minutes. Part of this is due to the flagging which guided us down. Upon reaching a flag, I noticed that no one would pull them down. All this was left for me, which was some sort of retribution for the sin of putting them up. Of course I noticed that no one had a problem with actually FOLLOWING them... Funny how that happens.

References:

• Discovering Washington's Historic Mines - Oso Publishing. Seattle-Cascade Mine information.
• Mineral Resources of the Alpine Lakes Study Area (1975) - Gualtieri and others. Information about the Akishin Claims.