Lonesome Miner Trail, Inyos

[GowerGulch42]

Been looking into the Lonesome Miner Trail through the Inyos a lot lately, maybe I'll try and plan it out next season. Obviously, information is scare and woefully outdated. Most records I've seen date from the mid 90s! I've sent out a couple emails but haven't heard anything useful yet apart from Beveridge and Hunter Canyons, which are comparatively highly traveled. 

Any of you have intel about route alignments?

[Candace66]

This page seems to have a good trip report, with lots of pics and route info:  2017 trip report

Another map: https://caltopo.com/m/UKK5

Not sure if this will help you much, but here is a scan of a BLM handout I picked up years ago:  Click here

Sorry about the pink paper, that was their choice, not mine!

Also, the LM Trail is mentioned many times in the index for Digonnet's "Hiking Western Death Valley National Park" guidebook.

There are a small number of people around who have been to Beveridge, or otherwise hiked on these trails.  Hopefully they will chime in!

[DAW89446]

The 1990s info was created when Steve Smith (Ridgecrest BLM) and Tom Budlong researched and did ground work locating the old trails; eventually stitching them together to form the LMT. I helped their effort with old newspaper and courthouse documentation.

It seems a lot of old stuff has dropped off line. I was recently looking for photos and history for the old Wildrose Station and found very little. It used to be all over the place.

[GowerGulch42]

Alas I am not allowed to view your scan! I've seen all of that other stuff and even emailed the creator of that SmugMug album!

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Actually I haven't seen that Caltopo file! Where did you find that?

[Candace66]

Trying again with a link to the scan:  New link

The stuff I posted (other than my scan and the info about Digonnet's book) was found via a google search for "lonesome miner trail"!

[TacoLand]

I was unfamiliar with the LMT and now ... I'm hooked. I'd absolutely love to tackle this in 2021 if possible. Thanks for all the links, Candace.

[MojaveGeek]

Hey, thanks for calling out Tom and Steve's work on the LMT! Indeed they scouted it out section by section. For obscure reasons (OK, cleaning my office in a covid daze) I was looking through old mid-90s issues of the DPS pub, Desert Sage and there were a couple of good TRs by Steve (he was a regular contributor to the Sage back then) on some LMT sections. I think most of their old issues are archived, possibly in plain text form (I have membership so may be able to see thing that are non-public, but I don't think that's the case).

You know how it is with those old miner trails. They rarely disappear (except for land slides) but sometimes you have to have a good eye to find them. I've been up a few Inyo canyons but I too dream of doing a bunch of the LMT.

[Candace66]

I was unfamiliar with the LMT and now ... I'm hooked. I'd absolutely love to tackle this in 2021 if possible. Thanks for all the links, Candace.

YW!  I've always been intrigued by descriptions of Beveridge.  But the trek sounds like it may be a bit too rough to be enjoyable.

I think the closest I've been to all this is when I attempted to climb Keynot Peak from Burgess Mine.  The traverse includes Forgotten Pass.  I saw the trail dropping down to the east from there.

...I was looking through old mid-90s issues of the DPS pub, Desert Sage and there were a couple of good TRs by Steve (he was a regular contributor to the Sage back then) on some LMT sections...

Duh, I didn't even think to look in the DPS archives! 

There are some LMT reports archived here:  Click here

[GowerGulch42]

I finally located the last section of the trail I had been searching for, between Pat Keyes and McElvoy. It goes quite a lot higher over the ridge and into the headwaters of Pat Keyes Canyon, and has some quite elaborate sections of dry stone constructed trail. The most interesting thing was a trail going from the Beveridge Ridge cabin up toward Keynot Peak. I can't see any mines up there but the path is quite clear. A mystery lost to time perhaps!

Edit: found that the Keynot Ridge trail links up with a trail on the west side of the peak, which connects to the Forgotten Pass Trail down to French Spring. The number of trails is staggering, as is their clarity on satellite imagery!

[GowerGulch42]

Inyo trails by Andrew Dunning, on Flickr

Here's all the trails I've found so far. Quite a few, and these are just the ones I can easily see on Google Earth (and other imagery platforms). Some of the alignments are my best guess because of tree cover, erosion, etc.