Friday, September 2, 2011

Summitville Mine

We took a road trip with the Mossman’s to see the Summitville Mine operation.  This was a gold mine about 25 miles south of Del Norte.  Back in the 1980’s the mine was reopened and used a sodium cyanide solution to leach out the gold from the ore.  Summitville is knows for the environmental damage cause from a damaged pad liner and the release of some 85,000 gallons of contaminated water into the nearby Alamosa River.

Back in the 1998 Summitville Mine was designated as a Superfund site and clean up began.  Recently Colorado Department of Health and Environment received $17 million from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, to build a water treatment plant up there.

The drive was pretty going further back into the mountains.

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The water treatment plant is up and running.

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Right after the Summitville mine there are some old structures that are weathered, but still standing.  So interesting.

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Going away from Summitville was just as pretty as the ride up there.

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We ended up in Del Norte. On the last stretch we saw this unusual house.

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What were they thinking?  Is that roof-line part of a dragon’s tail?  And why all the odd shaped pieces of wood above the windows on the right?

Oh, well, it was a very nice afternoon drive and got us away from the campground for a while.

Remember, you are loved.

2 comments:

  1. I bet the people in that house can't help but giggle every time they pull into there driveway.

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  2. The builder's name is Kevin I will hold off on his last name for his privacy I suppose. He is a nice enough guy but clearly rather eccentric. Is a local rancher kind of a neo-hippie type I think.

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