RonnieAdventures: RonnieAdventure #0009 - "Lobo" Mine, Nye County, Nevada

As I hacked my way through the dense underbrush the sharp thorns pulled at my clothes, scratching my arms and legs; so, I was certainly glad that I had purchased a machete at the local Army Surplus Store before setting out on this adventure. (After having undertaken considerable research work at the library, I was certain that I had found clues that would lead me to the Lost Dutchman Gold Mine in the Superstition Mountains outside of Phoenix.) When I reached the end of the box canyon that I was following, all that I could see was a pile of rubble. However, near the top of the rubble I noticed a small hole that was partially covered with brush and the hole appeared to extend into the mountain. Upon closer examination, I could see an old wood beam with Spanish markings that looked like part of a mine opening. Eureka! This must be the mine entrance that I was looking for. After crawling through the small hole I found myself in a narrow tunnel leading over a deep, bottomless pit. Someone had left an old plank across the pit and it seemed safe, so I started inching my way across the plank with one outstretched hand on each wall. When I was almost to the far side of the pit, I touched something sharp with my hand, causing me to drop my flashlight. For several seconds I could hear the flashlight hitting the sides of the bottomless pit as the light quickly faded away. It suddenly became dark. Very Dark! Then it happened! I heard a loud screeching sound and suddenly I felt a blow to my shin! Then another blow to my shin! Followed by a sharp blow to my solar plexus! I opened one eye and I could see a red eye starring back at me. I knew this must be the end and I was about to be devoured by some prehistoric dragon that would eat me alive, or maybe a million vampire bats that would that would suck all of the blood out of my body. I frantically moved my hand up the wall and I could feel hair. Human hair! This was just like the Indiana Jones movie when Indy finds an old mine tunnel full of human skeletons. Suddenly, there was a booming voice that said: “Quit pulling my hair and shut the alarm off.” My hand frantically grouped for the alarm clock with the red numbers flashing “5:30.” Finding the off switch, I silencing the wretched red-eyed screeching beast with the flick of a finger! When I finally managed to open both eyes, I announced to my wife that I hated getting up in the mornings and that I was going to call the office, quit my job, and become a full time travel-adventure writer. She said that before I quit my job, she had one question that she wanted me to answer – How was I going to live on $5.00 a week? I decided to take a shower and go to work.

I had been at work only a short time when I received a telephone call from my friend Basil, telling me that he had found a book (He has also been looking for the Lost Dutchman Mine.) that gave directions to the “lost Lobo Mine” in the Spring Mountains. According to Basil, some of the old buildings and parts of the ore cart tracks at the "Lobo" Mine were still intact and worth visiting. I knew that this must be some type of omen, since I just had a dream about an old lost mine. Basil said this would be a great family adventure and suggested that on Saturday we take our families and two vehicles on an outing to find the mine. I liked the idea of two vehicles because I've been stranded in the desert before with two flat tires. When you have two vehicles traveling together, and something would happen to one of the vehicles, the other vehicle can be used to get back to civilization. We agreed to meet at 7:00 AM on Saturday.

When I arrived home after work, I searched the internet but could find no reference to a “Lobo Mine,” or any other mine in Basil’s described Spring Mountain location. Time for a RonnieAdventure!

Saturday morning I was up early, read the paper, and was having breakfast when the telephone rang. It was Basil, telling me that he wasn’t feeling well and he had to cancel out on the trip. Bummer! I had really been looking forward to the trip. After talking it over with my wife and daughter, we decided to find the mine on our own, using Basil’s directions.

About an hour out of town, we arrived at the described turnoff and I started looking for the GPS unit, only to realize that I had left the GPS unit at home. Oh well, who needs a GPS unit when you have a paper map!

After traveling a short distance, it became obvious that we were not on the right trail. Back to the highway and after a few more paved miles we found another turnoff that looked better on the map. The only problem was that there were numerous trails crisscrossing the desert that were not shown on the paper map! While driving and simultaneously reading the map, I found myself going in circles and ending up where I started. Finally, my daughter said that she could do a better job of navigation and asked for the map. Now you have to realize that this is the girl that couldn’t find her way around the block when she was in Junior High School, but has somehow developed excellent map reading skills in later years. Within a short time she found the correct trail and we headed for the “lost mine.” Unfortujately, the trail soon disintegrated and turned out to be very rocky and rutted, so travel toward the mine was at a very slow pace.

After about an hour we had almost reached the mine when I heard a bang, then a flop, flop. Getting out of the vehicle, it was just what I had expected – a rear flat tire. Great! Where was Basil when I needed a second vehicle and some help! I was hopeful that I had a spare tire because in the three years that I owned the vehicle I had never had a flat tire. Crawling under the vehicle I located the spare tire behind the rear bumper and it was even inflated. Good, so far! Now the trick was to figure out how to find the jack/tire wrench; and, of course, there was no owner’s manual in the glove compartment. Removing the rear cargo mat I found a plastic cover that could removed without any tools and under the cover was a jack and various other tools that looked like they could be used to change a tire. The only problem was that there were no directions on how to get the tire out from under the vehicle. After about 10 minutes, I finally located a small space between the license plate and the bumper that appeared to be large enough to fit part of the jack handle through and sure enough, I was able to use the tool with the long handle to crank down the tire so that I could get the tire out from under the vehicle. The rest of the tire change went well.

After I finished changing the tire, we walked the short distance to the old mine operation. It wasn’t quite like Basil had described, but it was still interesting. After taking some pictures, we headed back to the highway and arrived back at home without any further incidents. Now to have a chat with Basil!