Cycle News is a weekly magazine that covers all aspects of motorcycling including Supercross, Motocross and MotoGP as well as new motorcycles
Issue link: https://magazine.cyclenews.com/i/126303
~ aJ:JOOOOOOOOOOoOOOOOOOOOOO~ n 'I. , B ~- iJ . ' &A\(s\and 8' cecotto o Robert:'200 Road R:~~v e oayton \nt'\. spee '_ . 8 oaytona ""arch '\2th· f\n\sh ers 8 sunsdav, and 5th p~a~e 8 p\u 4th 1- '% , 8 0 0 8 OlD &.1'DOl .• • 8 onD~ '-, ~a kin g an inspection of the now-silent tumbler at the pumice quarry. 1. Owl Can yon campground 2. Rainbow Ba sin Road 3. Opal Mounta in 4. Inscription Can yon 5. Pumice Quarry 6. Murphy'. WdJ 7. Ccclgardie " bea n." camp 8·, 8 8 8 8 8 ®. 8 8 8 " 8 8 8 1 1 8 ,.' 8 1 1st Greg Hansford lnternational Lightweight *0 Road Race ~0 Daytona Int'l. Speedway ,~,I Saturday, March 11th ~8 o e 8 8 8 8 -8 DAIDO/D.I.D motorcycle chain: used by more ~~~~;~=:~i~rs DA I DO : QI ' G 'C\) CORPORAT ION Uncolnwood. IL . So, San Francisco. CA Headquarters: 885 Centennial Avenue Piscataway, NJ08854 ~ Ptv:Jne(201)885-1800' ,'l u 1 1 , " QOOOOOOOOOOOOooooooooooot:1flJ ha ve ever seen. We fo u nd likenesses of Desert Bighorn Sheep , pictures . of Th'u'nderbirds, papooses, animals and design patterns tha t could on ly mean somethi ng 10 th e a rt ist. Many of the inscripti on s are in colo r. The only deseCration of th e la va walls I co u ld find was where some fool had carved his na me a mo ng th e petrogl yphs a nd dated it 1923. Seems th ere always has to be one dummy around , doesn't there? After spe ndi ng tim e at the canyon , we .struck out to the east a lon g a d irt road , sto pping for a b reak nea r a b lown -down win dmill. Then we took a right tu rn to the south toward a n abandoned pu mice q ua rry . At the quarry rhere a re still intac t b uildings a nd we , made a carefu l inspec tio n of th e n ow-silen t tu m b ler th a t was spun to break up the chunks of pum ice into fin e powd er. The powder the n filtered d own th rough th e wire mesh of the tumbler a nd into a wai tin g tru ck. Sure must have been a lot of ch oking dust in the air abou t th e rotating machine" Talk about a ir pollu tion l . , Sou th of th e pumice quarry we • came across a shallow pit between two hills . The pit is a ll 'tha t remains of Murphy's Well . 01' Murphy didn't do too badly for him self. While other menin the area were grubbing in the ground for gold , Murphy was hauling preciou s water 10 th eir d iggins at $1 a barrel. That was pretty good money in th ose days. There's more than one wa y to get rich in th e gold country. We angled sou theast from Murphy'S ' Well to th e site of Coolgardie Camp , th e loca tion of one of th e few placer (washing th e paydirt with wat er) gold mining .op er a tions in th e d esert . Discovered in 1896 , Coolgard ie Camp had a pe ak population of about 600 men and d arn few women, One claim could boast t ha t it yielde d $100 a day, bu t most of th e gold trickled from the ea rth in sm a ll am oun ts. As a matter o f fa ct , Coolgard ie was ca lled a " beans" cam p during the Great Am e rican Depression because about a ll the gold a m in er co uld wre nc h from th e ground to ta led on ly eno ugh ' 10 buy him his dail y bea ns . Noth ing is left of Coolga rd ie now except a bunch of hol es in the grou nd . . It was ge tti ng bri sk with the eveni ng ch ill when the three of us wended our way ba ck to th e base ca m p. The su n , was going down be hind the western hills and onl y th e tops of the beautiful Ra inbow Basin hills wer e cloaked in sun light. W e 'd tra vel ed a n i n te re s t in g, exciting 60 miles on our trusty two wheelers and were pleasantly tired a nd satiated . I took a few last pictures of the sunset and then we sat around th e campfire in the des ert even ing with a warm drink at hand. We talked over th e da y and plotted our n ext adventure . There's much to see and enjoy in the desert , and we had a no ther day befor e we had to re turn to work . The three of us weren't abou t 10 waste it. • - Ha nd Was ha b le V.n Leeuwe n Em. DI. tri butor Goody• • , Smith GogOI.. Repr..enung Leater Wheels Kerker Extwuata ~ 101121 Ma gnol ia Bt. .. North Hollywood. CA 11101 213-1I!HiOOO St ay So ft O thma n Distri buting Co . Box 356 San L uis Ob sip o . CA 93406 , (8 051 54 4·6 181 • Rid in g • Ra cm g • S tree t GlO VES Dealer Inquiries In vited 39