South Pass, WY - Wind River Range trip - Aug 2013

[macmcintire]

You can boondock camp anywhere near South Pass and Atlantic City. There also is a nice public campground on the road to Miner's Delight ghost town just outside Atlantic City. Red Canyon is a nice one-hour dirt road drive. Sink Canyon isn't worth camping in. If you like to fish, there are many spots along Forest Road 300. If you have ATVs there are numerous trails off of 300. There also are some really great hiking trails in the area.

On the other side of the Wind River Range is even better hiking and lake activities outside of Pinedale.

If you are interested in the history of the Oregon and/or Mormon Trails you can visit numerous historical sites along the trail all the way back to Casper. That would keep you busy for a very full day.

[rionapo]

Love the hotel pics, Mac. Thanks.

Don

[rionapo]

Originally Posted by macmcintire

. . .The Carrisa Mill is a ball mill versus a stamp mill. I wonder which is louder: stamps pounding the rocks into smaller rocks or metal balls in a cylinder crushing the rocks. . . .

This may not answer the question but here's a description on the process in the California gold rush from Rough-Hewn Land by Keith Heyer Meldahl, professor of geology at Mira Costa College and great, great, great grandson of a '49-er:

Once the blasted rock emerged from the mine, miners set about separating chucks of quartz ore from waste rock. They sledge-hammered the quartz down to fist-sized pieces, which then went to a processing mill. There, batteries of steam powered steel stamps smashed the quartz to powder. When Mother Lode mining was in full swing, it was said that no place in the western Sierra Nevada was out of earshot of the thundering stamp mills.

Lest you think the miners had it rough, sledge-hammering quartz, here's what he writes about the mules working underground:

These unwilling troglodytes rarely saw the light of day after they were lowered (using great slings around their bellies) down the long vertical shafts to the underground tunnel networks. Entire populations of donkeys lived and died in California lode mines, for it was far cheaper to bring hay in, and haul manure out, than it was to bring the animals up to the surface.

When lode mining faded, the mining companies developed hydraulic mining, blasting away mountainsides with water canon--probably noisy enough. That cane to an end after the runoff overran the banks of downstream rivers, flooding the Central Valley and piling up debris in "massive sand bars that ran steamboats aground" closer to San Francisco. The downstream locals weren't impressed.

Don