Minietta Cabin
After Saturday’s visit to Fossil Falls, Cerro Gordo, and the U2 tree we didn’t have a lot of light to find our campsite outside of Death Valley. We like to primitive backcountry car camp in the BLM lands outside the park since there are fewer restrictions (i.e. we can cook over a campfire with the wood we bring along), so we headed south out of Panamint Springs and found a nice spot along Nadeau Road. There is a lot of space to camp out there and we found many spots, some of which were occupied. The roads are rough so if you’re heading this way make sure you’re in a 4×4 with adequate clearance.
We camped near Minietta Mine and Lookout City amid the ruins of the old silver mining operations. We would have liked to have camped up by the Minietta Cabin, but didn’t want to take our Trailblazer (which has been acting up) up the rough road. Instead, we took a short morning hike up the road to the old cabin and mining operations. The cabin has been renovated and well cared for by a group of committed individuals and we were happy to see it in pretty good condition. Far too often these historic locations have been vandalized and looted.
After exploring the cabin and the ruins of the old mining operations (including an old tramway), we headed out to Death Valley to explore some canyons. Report and pictures of the canyons in the next post.
Links
- Photos: Minietta Mine
Hi,I am a member of the Minietta family currently doing some geneology research.I am currently looking for any information about the Minietta mine,it’s history and orgin.My family originated from Sicily in the towns of Palermo and Corleone.Minietta is the english translation of Mendietta and there are currently members of the Mendietta in Sicily and about 2 dozen surviving Minietta family members scattered across the United States.Please contact me if you have any information.alanm1@q.com
Hi,I am a member of the Minietta family currently doing some geneology research.I am currently looking for any information about the Minietta mine,it’s history and orgin.My family originated from Sicily in the towns of Palermo and Corleone.Minietta is the english translation of Mendietta and there are currently members of the Mendietta in Sicily and about 2 dozen surviving Minietta family members scattered across the United States.Please contact me if you have any information.
alanm1@q.com
I recently visited the Minietta Mine in February 2012. Upon exploring the mine, we discovered a couple of old newspapers dating back to 1899. We left the papers on the table in the cabin for other adventurers to enjoy.
However, on a return trip two weeks later, we discovered the papers were no longer present. I would like to take this time to personally insult the integrity of the person who took the papers (unless they were taken to preserve in honor of the Minetta Mine and Cabin).
Please reply- if you have the nerve.
That’s terrible – I hope whoever did such a thing would return them or face the karmic repercussions. I haven’t been down any of the tunnels at Minietta but I’ve found some cool stuff in other tunnels.
This is why I deliberately do not geotag my photos or share my GPS tracks from these kind of locations. It’s already pretty easy to figure out where a lot of these cabins are if you’re good with Google, but I’m certainly not going to be the one to make it easier for vandals to find the places.