Last year on our Colorado road trip, we saw the Yankee Girl Mine from a distance but weren’t aware that there were off road trails to reach it. This year we had a plan. It pretty much consisted of going on every off road trail that looked like it led to Red Mountain and to see where it took us.
Our first off road trail in which we attempted to get the Yankee Girl Mine, led us elsewhere. This detour led us to an abandoned mine:
After 2 other attempts, we finally found the right trail. This was at the base, right after the questionable looking trail we were on split into two other questionable looking trails.
This old girl was once the mother lode of mines. Back in 1882, a prospector by the name of John Robinson was out hunting when he stumbled over a rock of galena on Red Mountain (galena deposits contain significant amounts of silver) and thus began a very profitable career. The Yankee Girl mine became one of the most profitable mines in the history of silver mining in the United States. At its height, Yankee Girl produced 10 tons of ore on a daily basis. 250 pounds of this was carted out by 75 mules every day.
We got the jeep dirty so overall it was a pretty successful day!
Part 5 of our Telluride Road Trip (Read Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 6).
