I pulled these two trails out of the Massey/Wilson book and wanted to see if they were worth running with the SCCX. I found that the Starbright trail was more of the Starbrig__ trail as since my book was published in 2006 the Goldstone Deep Space Communications center expanded their southern border about 12 miles cutting off miles worth of both trails. I had maps of the area but still it took awhile to find a trail that cut far enough west to meet back up with the public access to the public land. The opal collection area of Black's Canyon was behind fence line, I did find an open gate but decided to not cross onto the "fort".
The area has been a national landmark since 1972.
Starbright and Black's Canyon
OK that "little" bit of problem aside the trip was about 50 miles of 2WD and about 2 miles of 4WD fun and exploring. The trail starts north of Barstow along the Fort Irwin Road and runs a zig-zag trail back-n-forth across the hills around the remains of mining ruins. The area was mined until about 1920 for opals and other gemstones.
Starbright and Black's Canyon
The views are beautiful and there weren't many folks out there - I ran across a couple of families out on their quads and bikes. The rains have the cactus happy.
Starbright and Black's Canyon
The ruins of an old cabin.
Starbright and Black's Canyon
The ruins of some mining equipment. It looks like the equipment that could be unbolted and moved to the next mine were removed leaving only the concrete mounts. It looks like something went around and around here crushing rock while water from a nearby spring was used to washing the rocks.
Starbright and Black's Canyon
A watering trough looks fairly new construction.
Starbright and Black's Canyon
Well preserved wooden structure.
Starbright and Black's Canyon
Before dark we reached Inscription Canyon where the local Indians have been making petroglyphs for an estimated 10,000 years.
Starbright and Black's Canyon
There are hundreds of them covering both sides of the canyon.
Starbright and Black's Canyon
That night we snuggled in for a cool night. The night was the quietest night I've ever had, there was no wind at all so once the birds settled down for the night it was 100% quiet. The aircraft have to fly around GoldStone apparently as there was nothing in the skies above us either. We were the only ones in the huge canyon from 5:00 PM to 10:00 AM when the first tourist started coming down the trails again.
Starbright and Black's Canyon
Come morning there was frost on the tent walls, the chairs and the Xterra. The coyotes were calling each other from all parts of the canyon, something I've heard before at night but never in the morning.
Starbright and Black's Canyon
Black's Canyon was a nice rough trail with some good rock hound discoveries.
Starbright and Black's Canyon
The canyon was formed when a volcano pushed against the existing sedimentary rocks. The miners have been everywhere seeking gemstones and there were digs in lots of places. Some of them pretty deep and a few big enough to be sealed off with the iron bars. In the picture below you can see the volcano flowing around either side of a sedimentary rock ridge.
Starbright and Black's Canyon
The canyon was used as a stage coach and freight line to move 500 pound balls of silver from the Panamint City mines toward Los Angeles ports. One of the teamsters was A. Tillman from San Francisco and the photo below is suppose to be his signature marking from back then.
Starbright and Black's Canyon
The way out south of Black's Canyon takes the trail across a "dry" lake bed which thanks to the recent rains was a bit less dry than normal! The trail crossed into an area that was several hundred feet worth of water and an unknown depth of water. I cowardly took a by-pass around Superior Lake rather than wade out into it to see how deep it was. Without another truck - or at least trees or rocks to act as an anchor point for the winch - the lake was not save to cross.
Some of the water puddles were fun!
Starbright and Black's Canyon
Starbright and Black's Canyon
The ride out takes the roads through Hinkley which has seen better days. The hill to the north of the "city" is covered in cans from the turn of the century but closer the locals have been using it as a trash dump. The city itself is a mixture of burned out and abandoned homes and a few hanging on. The movie Erin Brockovictch with Julia Roberts was shot in the town.
Starbright and Black's Canyon
We shot a bunch of HD video which I'll put together later.
