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Climax Mine reopened.

Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2012 3:31 pm
by milan
Whoever wants to hike Bartlett Mountain, be aware that the Climax mine has reopened May 10th 2012, supposedly after 17 years of shutdown. I hiked the mountain on Saturday and there was drilling equipment and a showel just next to the summit block, I guess, the elevation will have to be reset once again soon. Fortunately, nobody was around to make troubles to the trespasser, most of the work was being performed on the other side (south, McNamee's shoulder). They were working both Saturday and Sunday (as I saw from Clinton the second day). Also, there is a guard on the road towards the tailing ponds, so whoever needs to hike Jacques Peak this way, its probably not possible any more.

Re: Climax Mine reopened.

Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2012 4:19 pm
by BobbyFinn

Re: Climax Mine reopened.

Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2012 4:23 pm
by Floyd
Just knock off 200 feet from the summit and nobody will care to hike that pile of choss ever again. Not a bad strategy for the mining company. Making it completely uninteresting will be much easier/cheaper than actually patrolling it.

Re: Climax Mine reopened.

Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2012 4:33 pm
by Jon Frohlich
I had some vague plans back in April to do Bartlett but it never happened. I'm kind of thinking now that I'll just scratch this one off the list and forget about it. I am curious how much elevation will eventually get knocked off of it.

Re: Climax Mine reopened.

Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2012 4:41 pm
by EatinHardtack
Floyd wrote:Just knock off 200 feet from the summit and nobody will care to hike that pile of choss ever again. Not a bad strategy for the mining company. Making it completely uninteresting will be much easier/cheaper than actually patrolling it.
Except for ChicagoTransplant.... :)

Maybe climb Bartlett everytime they knock off 100 feet or so for new ascent each time?

Re: Climax Mine reopened.

Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2012 4:47 pm
by milan
Wow, I might be the last human to touch the summit of Bartlett at 13400 feet! Awesome. IMO they are not planning a big blast, to me it looked like the summit will loose maybe 10 feet at this blast. But they will probably keep blasting...

Re: Climax Mine reopened.

Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2012 5:36 pm
by BobbyFinn
I thought this was pretty interesting:
http://books.google.com/books?id=td4DAA ... e&q&f=true
It starts on page 63 of the file.

The people in the security office told us that when they blast, rocks go flying very far - so even if the blast isn't on the summit, rocks could get thrown that way. The security folks were very friendly and didn't have the attitude of "It's our mountain - stay off!" instead they pointed out their safety concerns - especially the concern of them throwing rocks into Clinton Creek drainage and the flying rocks after blasts. We saw a small accidental rock slide near where they were working and it is something that we were very glad that we were very very far from.

Re: Climax Mine reopened.

Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2012 6:51 pm
by sevenvii
The lady at the security office was very kind and helpful when I was asking about the parking/road situation that I wanted to use to access Arkansas.

Re: Climax Mine reopened.

Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2012 6:59 pm
by dave alex
I climbed Jacque on Friday by ascending a very steep slope off 91, just across the highway from a pull off short of the private road. This slope relents after about a mile and 1500' of gain. Above tree line, I encountered an old road leading to cabin ruins. Ski slopes and the rest of the route was visible from there. Good route to avoid private property issues.

Re: Climax Mine reopened.

Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2012 7:45 pm
by IHikeLikeAGirl
dave alex wrote:I climbed Jacque on Friday by ascending a very steep slope off 91, just across the highway from a pull off short of the private road. This slope relents after about a mile and 1500' of gain. Above tree line, I encountered an old road leading to cabin ruins. Ski slopes and the rest of the route was visible from there. Good route to avoid private property issues.
Happen to have a gpx file or could you roughly draw your route on a topo?

Re: Climax Mine reopened.

Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2012 7:50 pm
by Papillon
Jon Frohlich wrote:I had some vague plans back in April to do Bartlett but it never happened. I'm kind of thinking now that I'll just scratch this one off the list and forget about it. I am curious how much elevation will eventually get knocked off of it.
In retrospect, we should've John Wayne'd it. I figured something was up because I could see the earth mover from US-24 heading north on Sunday. Bobby has a photo of it in his conditions report.

I think for peaks like this with access issues you have to go in abhorrent conditions. Either that or recruit somebody slower and fatter than you to be the sacrificial lamb if the sh-- hits. You could also throw your partner under the bus by giving him/her a hard two-handed shove in the back when the chase starts.

Re: Climax Mine reopened.

Posted: Mon Jun 11, 2012 8:08 pm
by harrise
IHikeLikeAGirl wrote:Happen to have a gpx file or could you roughly draw your route on a topo?
Ooh, I get to interject, I've done Jacque from 91 keeping the boundaries in mind. If he went roughly the same way I went, it was about here...
Image

T'was summer and not a soul in sight. Rounded the bowl to grab Tucker as well. Lots of dense aspen and loose needles rolling on crunchy dirt from what I remember.


*Edit* Crap, that's a Gore peak. What have I done? Those better be fire fighting blackhawks overhead.