After my hike around the Head of Sinbad area the previous day, my brother-in-law Mark arrived at camp, and on Thursday we hiked to some old uranium mines on the mesa that forms the northern boundary of Indian Flat. There was also a geocache there that had been placed six months earlier and only been found once. I brought along one of my dogs, Delta, so that Traci wasn’t as overwhelmed back at camp with the other three.
Friday’s sunrise
I parked near the Sinbad interchange at I-70, even though I probably could have driven the truck much closer, but I just wanted a longer hike and to see some new country. We dropped into a wash and started hiking up it, and after a short while a hollow boulder caught my eye. We went slightly out of our way to check it out and, despite hoping to find something cool like this, I was still surprised to find a metate at the base of the boulder. There were no other artifacts nearby and we returned to the wash and resumed the hike. If there’s more stuff out there like this metate, then it’s no wonder the place is called Indian Flat.
Hiking up a wash
Boulder shelter with metate in lower-left
Boulder shelter
Metate
Metate
We rounded a corner and the mesa came into view. We headed for the bottom of a bulldozed track that zig-zags up the steep slope below the mesa and then levels out at the base of the cliffs. We found the geocache near a sealed mine tunnel, and passed another sealed tunnel on the way to the end of the shelf road.
Mesa containing uranium mines
Uranium mine
Uranium mine
Old dozer track
On the shelf road below the cliffs
View toward the I-70 interchange where I parked
I-70 across Sagebrush Bench
Sealed mine tunnel
DOGM marker
Another sealed mine tunnel
End of the shelf road
Surprisingly there was one more tunnel beyond the end of the road and the only way to access it was by traversing a slope that dropped off steeply to the south. The miners must have hauled the equipment and timbers over that slope, but maybe there was a better trail back then than there is now. I didn’t dare take Delta across that slope because she has a tendency to pull against the leash and I didn’t want us to both go over the edge, so Mark and I took turns keeping her at the end of the road while the other crossed the steep hillside to check out the last tunnel. It was pretty shallow, with two forks that each ended in a dead-end only a couple dozen feet in.
Steep, loose slope leading to another tunnel
The last mine tunnel
Right side
Left side
Lodged drill steel
View out of the tunnel
The hike back was uneventful and we made it back to camp shortly after lunchtime. It hadn’t been a very long hike but it was nice to spend a couple of hours away from all the kids and dogs back at camp. 😀
Friday’s sunset
Photo Gallery: Indian Flat Mines