diablo

rode up at night for birthday celebrations, winter sunrise










clayton

fin (6 | 6)

north to yucca valley, wrapping it up on pavement for a change. nothing quite like bombing a mountain pass home

desert lines (5 | 6)

we thought we were in the middle of nowhere, but the border patrol truck rolling by assured us it was somewhere




finished up a long power line corridor traverse


then an aqueduct




pump station


water from the artificial wash






cosmic country

desert infrastructures (4 | 6)

morning


19th century mine


20th century mine

today saw a primary aim of the trip, sneaking into a vast, 10 mile wide, abandoned iron mine complex that generated the initial capital of the kaiser corporate empire. 40 mile backdoors are hard to open unless you have a bicycle.wiki






nobody comes this way anymore


sign was sunbaked and illegible, we figure it probably said "welcome" or something similar








bobby is the blue speck at the lower third intersection of the frame


it is hard to convey scale here








at left, the mine continues deep beneath the basin plane. at right, the abandoned gold mine.


we camouflaged ourselves with painting canvas and got down to it


new acropolis














the leach fields were each about a mile wide and 60 feet deep. land art scale.




21st century mine














this is one of my best