Madera Sugar Pine Then and Now and some exploring...

Yesterday, my wife & I went up to the Madera Sugar Pine woods on Chowchilla Mountain. My main goal was to explore the middle grade out of the Crows Foot as well as re-check my drawings of the tracks at the bottom of the Crow Peak Incline. I found a photo in the San Joaquin County Library system that I thought was taken at the Crows Foot and wanted to confirm this.

Here's the 1927 photo (taken at an angle) showing Shay #5 with a loaded train:

The original photographer is unknown.

And here's the approximate same place today:

We are looking Northeast. The original photograph was taken about 50 feet behind me, but cannot be replicated due to tree growth. The tree stump on the left is near the location of the water tank. That area was drastically changed when Signal Peak line was built so no trace of the tank site remains. I hiked the hillside on the right hand side of the photo and found level spots for cabins and debris from habitation.

Here's a photo at Crows Foot looking west:

On the left is the line that goes to Crow Peak Incline. This was the first line to be built.
In the middle is the line that goes past Signal Peak on the east side of Chowchilla Mountain. This was the second line built and is the subject of today's explorations.
On the right is the Granite Creek Saddle line that ran the longest distance out of Crows Foot (about ten miles) and was the last line to be built by the Madera Sugar Pine.

Here's a copy of part of Donald DeVere's map in Johnston's Thunder in the Mountains that shows the Crows Foot and its associated lines:


Here's the beginning of the middle line out of Crow's Foot:

The water tank was approximately in this location before this line was built.
This line has one of the steepest grades I've seen on the MSP. Next time I'm up here I'm going to bring my inclinometer.

To be continued...