Yesterday I made the 3.5 hour trek to the MSP woods. My goal was to explore the railroad grades at the top of the biggest incline on Speckerman Mountain. I had hike the incline two years ago, but did not explore beyond the top of the incline at that point. Here's the Donald DeVere map from "Thunder in the Mountains" showing the grades that were supposed to be there:

I wanted to check these and see if there were any more spurs.

Here we are at the top of the big incline:

The brush is pretty thick in places.

For those who wanted to know what was on the incline, here's a link to my previous exploration two years ago:
Speckerman Mountain Big Incline

Here's a view of a more accesible part of the grade:

I would walk about 50-100 feet on these nice sections and then have to bushwhack another 50-100 feet through bushes 6-7 feet tall....

We've arrived at the site of the 1924 camp at the top of the incline:

It's about 1/4 mile back from the incline. The ROW runs diagonally left to right.

The area was quite brushy, but there were some artifacts to be seen if you didn't mind pushing through lots of brush. Here's an air hose connection and the end of a choker cable:


To be continued...



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/22/2020 12:39PM by Dave Peterson.