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"Keystone Silver" Mine

"Keystone Silver" Mine

After a few days of long drives in Nevada, we ended up at a remote mine that doesn’t see many visitors – my favorite kind of mine. We visited a few of the mines out there, but most of them didn’t have much to offer outside of long cross-

Mojave Lava Tube

Mojave Lava Tube

Out in the volcanic cinder cones, a few miles east of Baker in the Mojave National Preserve, and hidden among fields of broken basalt and cinder, is the Mojave Lava Tube. Over the course of the last seven million years (during the Pleistocene and Pliocene epochs) and perhaps as recently

Quail Point Petroglyphs

Quail Point Petroglyphs

I met up with a few friends to explore a lesser-visited petroglyph site in Arizona. We didn’t know what we would find. We discovered Quail Point has hundreds of petroglyphs and was certainly worth the trip. The petroglyphs here show influence from the Gila (Hohokam), Desert Western Archaic,

"Mineral Spring" Log Cabin

"Mineral Spring" Log Cabin

Micah, Ed, and I did a lengthy cross-country hike out to a remote log cabin high up in the mountains. It was an impressive find, and there was no sign of anyone having been there in years. I named the place after the mineralized spring nearby. The cabin must

Honolulu Mine

Honolulu Mine

The old Honolulu mine lies on a ridge high in the Panamint Mountains of Death Valley National Park. The mine was first discovered in 1907 by John Thorndike (sometimes misspelled Thorndyke), who worked for silver, lead, and zinc. On a warm April day in 2013, Dan and I hiked up

Owens Valley Three Stamp Mill

Owens Valley Three Stamp Mill

In 2013, I stopped by a forgotten and overlooked three-stamp mill in the backcountry of Owens Valley. It seems like even the locals don’t know it exists. Besides being off the beaten path, the stamp mill is unusual in that it had only three stamps instead of the

Marble Bath Pictographs

Marble Bath Pictographs

There is a place way out in the backcountry of Death Valley National Park called Marble Bath. Actually, it is two places. Why there are two Marble Baths is a bit of a story. The real Marble Bath is a narrow marble canyon that contains some potholes (also called tinajas