Pennies From Heaven At The Old Dick Mine Traditional Geocache
Pennies From Heaven At The Old Dick Mine
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Try your hand at prospecting for copper, silver and gold.
The mine is located near Annidale. This is just one of the many ways to get there:
Make your way to Main Street in Hampton. Cross the green bridge and go past Kredl’s on Hwy. 121 East. After a while, turn left onto Hwy. 855 North, heading towards Springfield. Go past Mama George’s. Turn left at the stop sign near the Shell station and get on Hwy. 124 West, then make a right onto Hwy. 870 North. At [N 45° 43.324’ W 65° 44.782’] turn left onto the East Scotch Settlement Rd. Travel approx 2 km then turn right onto the Irish Settlement Rd. Stay on this road for only about 1 km before turning left onto the Annidale Rd. It’s a dirt road. After 4 km, stop at [N 45° 46.699 W 65° 46.592]. You should see a faint, old road on your right going into the woods. This road goes to the site of the old mining office building. Park here. The Old Dick Mine, also known as The Annidale Copper Mine, is a series of trenches, old pits and shafts. The trenches and pits are still exposed. The shafts cannot be explored since they are covered with debris and/or flooded with groundwater. The mine site covers a large area with trenches, pits and shafts on both sides of the Annidale Road. The best preserved shaft is Shaft #7 located on the east side of the Annidale Road. It’s near the site of the old mining office. Once parked, walk along the old road. Adjacent to the road you can still see all the trenches, now covered in moss. If you dig around in the trenches you can still find samples of the copper. After walking down the road for about 85m, bushwhack to the cache on your right. The cache is located near Shaft #7. Like any old mine site, please be careful around the shaft. If you were to fall in it would be very hard to get out and the water is very cold. GPS WAAS accuracy was 4m when the cache was stashed.
Original contents of the cache: • Logbook (with pen & pencil) • Stainless steel 8 in 1 survival tool-card (in protective case) • Gecko “Beanie” • Hands free earphone with built-in microphone • Ring collection (6 different styles) • Universal cell phone case • Harmonica (new & unused) • 4 piece manicure set • Temporary nail tattoos • Handmade leather coin purse • Magnifying glass (check out the rocks and minerals)
For many years this cache was hidden on the other side of the road near the largest open pit. You could find lots of great mineral samples just by walking in to it. Recently, someone has bought the land and put up a small hunting camp. They have also cleaned up the area which had become a dump site for household items. They put up a chain barrier to prevent vehicles from driving in. Like I said, there were lots of great samples on the driveway in.
On our first visit to the mine, Ursa Minor and I met a geologist student working for the DNR. This mine site may be over 100 years old, but people are still keeping a watchful eye on the area. The blue flagging tape in the area indicates recent claim staking activity.
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
Ovepu ybtf naq zbff. Gjb svfg-fvmrq cvrprf bs gur pbccre ber ner orfvqr gur pnpur.