Coolest Find While Hiking

[Scott P]

I found what I believe are fossils of some kind on Dyer a few years ago:ADC54F9C-620B-4DCD-B99F-35535F1C5980.jpeg

I also found a chunk of coal below the long-defunct DSP&P RR line up toward St. Elmo in a talus pile along Chalk Creek. Kind of a neat piece of history.

I'd have to look closer, but to me they look more like iron concretions that fossils. Still cool either way.

[Garrett]

Those look like Belemnite fossils.

[Hiking_TheRockies]

Might as well add-on. This is a great thread!

Don't have a direct picture of it, but on the hike up to La Plata Peak via the lesser-used Southwest Ridge route, the trail passes by an old mine. The site route doesn't have a pic either, but there are mine cart rails coming out of the ground right next to the mine. I've seen plenty of old mines, but never any real cart rails! They're still in decent condition, too. I'm sure plenty have already passed by and seen this, but I thought it was pretty cool. Shows that people back in the day actually took the time to haul metal cart rails up high above treeline and go mining for gold or whatever it was.

[fepic1]

I was coming down from Phoenix Peak in the San Juan mountains about 6 years ago. I had read USA Keller's trip report for this peak
and was on the route she described. From the summit I dropped down slightly lower than she did. I had only lost about 100' of elevation, so I was at around 13,800'.
Like normal I was looking down to keep my footing. Laying on the ground in plain sight was the most beautiful white flint arrowhead. It was maybe
1-1/2 to 2" long, so large it possibly could have been a spear point. The edges were serrated. Amazing craftsman to make serrated notches along both edges. Who knows how it got that high? Possibly more game animals were around for hunting that high back in the day or a wounded animal died there?

[justiner]

I found an old bucket last weekend - which isn't much, but it's OSMP, so you'd think everything that could have, has been picked clean,

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Then I stumbled upon some cached bouldering pads, which is kind of a no-no in this area,

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I left a note sharing my opinion of this practice,

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[justiner]

Then I stumbled upon a mountain lion on the summit

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Yesterday I passed a tree that had barbed wire going straight through it, and about 7 feet off the ground - so I'm guessing it's been there for a few years. I neglected to take a photo of that.

[ltlFish99]

i thought the airplane wreck debris in airplane gully on Navajo peak was interesting, kind of creepy to see, but fascinating.

We came across plane wreck debris on West Spanish peak at a small saddle below the summit. This was unexpected, as no one on the hike had heard of a crash in that area.
Personally, the most favorite thing we found was the peak register on Kismet in 1987.
The register had been placed there in August of 1934, which was wonderful for me as that is the year that my mom was born.
it was also quite interesting to see the people who signed it and thst there was almost no one who climbed it in the 1940ies, most likely because of WW2.
One of the Gentleman on the trip recovered the register for the CMC, abd left a new one.
it will be fascinating to see who has signed it when i return in a couple more years as it will have been 38 years since i was first there.

[Marmot72]

Outside of Colorado, it seems to be a "thing" to lug ammunition boxes to the summit to serve as registers. Summits where I found these were Organ Needle in the Organ mountains by Las Cruces, NM and Thompson Peak in the Sawtooth range, Idaho.

Organ Needle summit register

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Thompson summit register

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In Colorado, I've found many interesting mining relics and pieces of machinery/equipment. One thing that surprised me a few years ago was a cast iron panel - I think from an old wood burning stove - in the woods right off the trail leading into the basin framed by Ruffner and Mears to the north and T0 to the south.

wood burning stove panel

Colorado iron scrap (1).jpeg (224.54 KiB) Viewed 18774 times

[sunbleached]

Outside of Colorado, it seems to be a "thing" to lug ammunition boxes to the summit to serve as registers. Summits where I found these were Organ Needle in the Organ mountains by Las Cruces, NM and Thompson Peak in the Sawtooth range, Idaho.

I'm so used to seeing summit registers on peaks that it strikes me as weird Colorado doesn't have a culture around that!

In the Sierra, they're almost exclusively ammo boxes. You can tell when you're at the real high point when that tell-tale rectangular box is nestled among the rocks. I've also seen peanut butter jars, demolition charge canisters, and embossed Sierra Club metal boxes from the 1940s. Some people have strong feelings about them being litter, but I like them as a nice semblance of mountaineering history and as a way to read other people's feelings and entries. More obscure peaks generally have older and more unique signatures and summit registers; I've seen a few that have Norman Clyde's signature!

[Will_E]

Then I stumbled upon a mountain lion on the summit

meow.jpg

Yesterday I passed a tree that had barbed wire going straight through it, and about 7 feet off the ground - so I'm guessing it's been there for a few years. I neglected to take a photo of that.

Cats

[justiner]

Yesterday we met little Gandalf

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[justiner]

And a cheeky Downy Woodpeaker

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