Today we left earlier than normal, ate breakfast in the car and drove to Silverton. We got there about the time that stores were opening and did some fun shopping! It was nice to get there early and not have a crowd at all!
About 11 o'clock we headed up the trail to Animas Forks! It started off wide, but narrowed to a one laner farther up. This was by far the most popular place we've been to so far. There were lots of jeeps, dirt bikes (which Zane really needs), and other vehicles. It was rough again, but we made it back in one piece with a working suburban!
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| Pretty recent mine, but not operational. |
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| Cable still suspended |
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| GRADER! Picture for Zane. |
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| Standing near a water fall and blueish clear water. Very pretty. |
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| Hi Love! |
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| A Marmot! We've seen several! |
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| And a random sheep! It looks old, don't you think? |
We found an awesome place to eat our lunch with a view of the road so we had our own show of all the dirt bikes, jeeps, ohv's, etc driving up the trail.
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| Jeff wanted to sit in the shade and then got cold. I almost caught him with my long sleeve shirt wrapped around his head! Almost, mister! Almost! |
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| HAHAHAHA!!! It was funny! |
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| Sweet, sweet snuggles! Zane said he was sweating in his jacket so I suggested he unzip, but he didn't want to because it was so soft. haha! |
Animas Forks is an old miners town. There was a jail, several houses, and some other buildings that we weren't sure of. Pretty neat. They built a large mill but only used it for 6 years because the price of precious metals went down. That's what I understood at least. One house was pretty large, especially for that time, and told the history of the family that lived there. They lived there year round and when the snow would get to the roof, the wife would open the window to get snow to melt for her family. They had four children and the biggest deal was that she had an "indoor" toilet. Fancy for that time period.
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| The jail. Once they shut that door, you were in! |
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| View from the ghost town |
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| Foundation of the mill. |
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| Huge fireplace in a house. |
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| I got me this here house and I'm fixin to mine me some gold. |
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| Not sure if you can zoom in and read this, but it was really interesting. |
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| Root cellar! |
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| Indoor outhouse! I'm sure they were so happy to have this. |
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| This is the house with the indoor outhouse-it is so long. |
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| This will have to be framed for sure. |
After we toured the houses, we drove up just a little ways to the mine and walked the rest of the way. Jeff discovered a big big rock that he wanted to break apart and once he got his pick, he set to work. We found so much fool's gold! It was so fun and if I hadn't of reminded him of the time, he would still be breaking that rock apart. It had a lot of pretty crystals and minerals in it.
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| Anyone want to check out the inside of this building? |
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| Equipment and opening to the mine shaft! |
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| Jeff said it's underwater. |
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| Another old mine in the distance. |
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| Rooting around |
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| She had all sorts of treasures |
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| Look at this one!!! |
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| A modern miner. |
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| It really was a ton of fun. |
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| Driving back through Silverton-this is City Hall |
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| Greene Street is main street in Silverton. |
That's it folks! Came home, ate spaghetti and meatballs with green beans!
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