The Search for Red, White &. Blue, Part One

January 01, 2021

The Search for Red, White &. Blue, Part One

It was going to be a perfect day to accomplish something, and that something in my case meant discovering the Red, White and Blue Mine deep in San Antonio Canyon. With a little help from a friend, I had read some accounts of the mine, adding solid information to the one account I had read previously and, after the ride of two days earlier, knew the quickest route along the lower portion of the canyon. What might slow me down beyond that, however, was yet to be discovered.

Sometimes it is the simplest thing that causes the greatest problem. Riding a well-worn trail in that lower portion, barely past the Shinn/Mountain bridge, I wiped out or, more accurately fell over. I don't know how; I do know there was time to react, but my left foot wouldn't unclip and down I went, twisting that ankle in the process and abrading my azz when I hit solid rock. Sitting comfortably on the couch with a beer at hand now, they still bother me (as do all the additional cuts and stabs from yucca leaves and bramble thorns) as I write, but a fool on a mission is not easily dissuaded from his folly. This fool remounted and carried on, soon enough coming up on a man and his dog. The two moved to the side as I drew near, but I had to dismount anyway as the trail was becoming increasingly rocky, and I was not willing to risk another tumble. A little too rocky for me, I said while hobbling past. "I rode my mountain bike lower down yesterday," he responded, "but this is something else." We exchanged the greeting of the day, "Happy New Year;" surprisingly it was only the first of numerous similar exchanges today.

I reached the first section of the old road not much further along, and turning to look back down canyon saw the two, man and dog, making good time right behind. I didn't really want to play this game of attempting to stay ahead now, but saw little choice. I was wrong, though, and would not see them again. The mountainside at this point was cut to make room for the old road, with the bulk of the mountain to the west, and a rocky outcropping crowned by (what I believe are) a couple spruce trees. On the opposite side of the new Mt. Baldy Road, Spruce Canyon comes down from Sunset Peak. Zoom into Spruce Canyon using Google Earth, and you will see a tunnel daylight on the canyon side of Mt. Baldy Road; I didn't explore up there, but I am pretty confident it is much like the one at the maw of Evey Canyon. Anyway, this was also the general area of my first "discovery" of the day. Two days ago (during the Four Wreck Ride) I noticed something blue down off the trail; I thought it was probably a tarp at someones camping spot and avoided it. Google Earth shows something blue and round, and that was enough to pique my interest. Turns out it is just a big blue cable spool. Not such a great discovery after all.

Pushing on I continued to find bits and pieces of the past - big old sections of corrugated steel conduit, other pieces of twisted metal and cable, and more sections of the old road, some long, others so short and buried they were easy to miss.

Mt. Baldy Road is always just up slope along here, and I could see the usual winter-time line of cars snaking their way, slowly, up to the snow. It is strange how, down in the canyon, their sound is only sometimes heard; there are places where the din of running engines completely disappears, not to be replaced by running water, or birdsong, just - silence. Then you take another few steps and the stream babbles again, or worse, the motors. Anyway, I looked up and noticed the stone portal of the first tunnel up on the new road. The section of old road I had been easing along crumbled with a jagged edge back into the wash. And so there I went as well. A large, though short piece of corrugated pipe presented itself and I strode over to check it out. Walking around to the far side of it, I noticed it had been converted into someone's abode. Knocking on the door there was no answer, so I peeked inside; but for a little green toy truck outside, it looked abandoned. A short distance further I emerged stream-side where someone (maybe the same someone who lived at the abode) had used sandbags, post pilings and heaps of branches to create a dam with a well-formed pond backed up behind it. I descended along a fence line crossing the stream below the dam, and up the embankment on the other side.

I knew I was close now, at the southern edge of the western slope of Spring Hill. I clambered up to yet another section of crumbling asphalt, this time, and for the first time, on the east side of the stream. This section petered-out with a six foot drop off into brambles and shallow water, with alder and willow branches further barring the way. A fool on a mission is not easily turned away, and I managed to, first push the bike through the branches and down the rock face, and then myself. I emerged into a clearing with a great length of corrugated steel snaking away up canyon. This could be it I thought. Up to my right a narrow defile reached up the mountainside, a line of alders and a wall of brambles guarding the entry. Damnit, I packed a light, I packed food, extra CO2 cartridges, why oh why didn't I pack a pair of jeans. I spotted two likely ways into the tangle and took the closest. Thorns tore at my legs with every step while the vines upon which they grew tried their best to trip me up. I made it through; a pair of shoes hung from a tree, but I could make out no mine opening in the rock face in front of me. Back through the brambles - what kind of berries are these going to produce anyway, I wondered.

Back out in the clearing I surveyed the damage to my legs. Well, what the hell, I don't think they can get any more bloody than they already are. I might as well make another attempt over here.

Pushing through the brambles I reached a steep slope littered with leaves and branches and rocks and, most significantly, a little flow of water running down it. I had read that a CCC camp nearby had used water from the mine. Could this be running out the opening, I wondered, and so I saw some possibility in following up the defile. Steep at the bottom grew even more so the further up I climbed, and the place was not looking any more likely the higher I went. I couldn't recall any description implying the mine entry was this high and out of the way, so sense got the best of me at that point and back down I slid. I checked out the corrugated pipe, noticed another abode across the stream (this one occupied, judging by the bright yellow vest and set table outside the doorway), then made one more push, further upstream. Another crumbling piece of old roadway presented itself at just the right moment; I threw my bike up onto it (yes, I was still dragging the thing along) and climbed up myself. Too quickly this one came to the usual sharp end. A shallow gully cut this one off - I could climb up, around and then back down to the steam, but I had been doing that for a couple hours now and it was beginning to wear into me. I dropped the bike and did climb up but that was it; I wasn't going to leave my bike unattended with a homeless encampment just across the way. I knew the historic Sierra Power House was just ahead, probably right through that wall of alders blocking the view, but it might as well have been a hundred miles distant. It was entirely possible the mine entry was just around the bend as well. I've read that not many people find it on the first attempt; there is no sign after all. Well, there will be a next time.

I did notice one interesting thing on the way back - a single remaining concrete bollard and cables, the old-style guardrail along the old road - just the one, still standing upright, cable passing through it as if there were still '30s DeSoto's and Plymouths to hold back from a cold plunge into the stream below.

Big, bad me, scared a families little toy dog on the way back down - it saw me riding down the trail and high-tailed it the other way. I stopped long enough for them to run back and collect him / her, for which I received a thank you and another "Happy New Year". Am thankful the guys shooting arrows by wreck #4 saw me riding down the trail and stopped to let me pass in front of their target. Another "Happy New Year" from them. It was 2:30 by the time I got back down to Shinn / Mountain, five hours after I had left home. I was dumbstruck by the line of cars heading up both Mountain and Mt. Baldy Road at this time of the day, and I wondered if they were, realistically, expecting to get to the top before dark.

Anyway...

So, yeah, next time maybe I start above, at Barrett-Stoddard and work down - shorter distance, mostly service road before the rock-hopping begins, but it would involve driving first, and the whole point of this adventure was to endure it with strictly human power. Hmmm. Definitely need to pack jeans, though, either way. And maybe hiking boots.