[achildinthesehills]

I again spent two weeks at Holden this summer and got distracted bagging mines instead of peaks. The Edil Mine and associated trails appear most recently on the 1949 USGS Lucerne quad:

Beckey notes an approach for Flora "via abandoned trail on Ninemile Creek to Riddle Creek, or via Lightning Ridge trail". Last year I discovered the Lightning Ridge portion of the trail to be obliterated by fire and impassible (although some evidence of it higher up is still visible on current satellite imagery), so part of this trip was to see if the Ninemile portion has anything remaining. As far as I can tell, "Edil" is a corruption of J. H. Holden's original name for the claim, "Ed. L.". I further speculate that "Ed. L." refers to Edward L. Lindsley, a Denny family son-in-law and carpenter whom Holden hired in 1897 to help him work in the Railroad Creek valley. Regardless, by the end of 1897 Holden had sold the claim to some friends in Walla Walla. Somehow or other, the Howe Sound Co. had possession of the claim by 1938 and did some investigation there, finding small amounts of copper but nothing economical. (Based off background information from Adams and Grant). The mine workings here are described as mostly on the surface, so I wasn't expecting to find much as I headed east down the Monkey Bear Falls trail in the late morning. I had mapped out a GPX file of the old trail route and started up the ridge roughly where it would intersect. I was unable to find any definitive evidence from there that I was ever on a human-made trail, although a few of the switchbacks in the game trails looked a bit too neat. Mostly it was light bushwhacking and log-hopping up the burnt-out ridge.

Lots of this.

And this.

Looking back down towards Holden.

And up at some of the Riddles.

The only major obstacles of note were a couple creek crossings that required some care, but the mapped trail route put me in a fairly good spot for each. Soon enough the objective was in sight:

"Mine" is in the reddish area in the center of the photo.

A bit of scrambling got me there, pretty much right where the old map indicates:

Mine site. Surface cuts visible; adit remains are behind the snow patch.

Closer view with adit entrance visible.

Outside of adit.

Inside of adit.

Supposedly the adit went in about 20', but it's collapsed or otherwise filled in. The site is located in a creekbed/avalanche chute, so that makes sense. I was hoping to at least find a rusty tool or something, but I'll bet any of those left behind are a few hundred feet down the mountain or buried by now. I poked around the area a bit but didn't see any other signs of activity.

Area above the mine site.

Buckskin(s), Copper/Fernow, Dumbbell/Greenwood from the mine site.

Descent was roughly the same as ascent, with a bit more optimization because I wasn't looking for the trail. About 7.5 miles and 3000' round trip from Holden counting a side trip to Monkey Bear Falls. This route would definitely work as a more direct approach to the Riddles than Tenmile Pass, although the distance savings is somewhat offset timewise by the cross-country travel.