Plumas County Adventures

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West Branch Mines


I won't even attempt to describe the route we took--it is not a good memory! John, and Bob, and I started at Quincy and headed toward the west branch. We reached a "Y" in the road and John (driver, smiling) asks "which way." I had a map and saw no need to use my GPS, after all, I am an expert at this sort of thing! I consulted the map and announced "Yea, here we are, section 27--I see the wye, and we need to go right. About 2 hours later we are at a tee on one of those roads that you are afraid to go forward, but know you can't go back. John (not smiling anymore) says "which way _______" (I think you know what he called me). Now that my credibility was on the line I decided to use the GPS. I got a fix and made an amazing discovery. I was in section 27 two hours ago, but not the 27 I looked at. Yes, I was one Range off (1 mile off). The roads in these two sections are almost identical. Needless to say, I had to withstand a fair amount of abuse for a while.

It turns out that we were pretty close to our destination so we kept going on the really bad road. The good part is that we saw a big bear and a cub. Sorry, no pictures--they were too fast for me.

We parked and started our hike. Here is the panorama we saw :

That's John in the center, and Bob to the left. Now, I'm not saying that Bob is quirky, but he carries a golf club on hikes. He claims it is for balance and protection. It is a Johnny Bulla model for you golfers out there.

We started on fairly level ground but quickly got to a steep part. John, looking tense again, asked how far I said it was again. I reminded him that 1000 (level map feet) on the edge of a canyon, can be a long way down. He groaned and mumbled something about hating to sleep overnight in the woods with no food. I told him I would shoot him some dinner. That cheered him right up!

About half way into the canyon we found this mine tunnel.

Nearby was a 5 stamp mill.

Bob (and Johnny) investigated the mill thoroughly but found no gold

Now, for the best part--the stove parts I found. Oh, did I forget to tell you I had an obsession with stove parts? I really like the old parts with designs on them. I found these.

The circular logo has "S P & F Co. and the small piece has parts of "Sacramento" on it. If you are a stove expert please contact me, I need to know about these (and other) logos.

We crawled back to the top and made it home before dark!