Our first stop was at an 1800's mining arrastra. This was a crude, stone mill for extracting gold from the surrounding ore. Because of all of the gold in this area, there were 18 of these in this vicinity.
This was a mule drawn mill, but Doug played the part for me.
Quartz and ore were piled into the prepared hole and heavy stones were dragged around and around, grinding the rocks into a wet powdery substance. Water and quicksilver were added during the process because the gold would bind with the quicksilver and drop to the bottom. After the grinding was finished and the gold was all extracted, the quicksilver would be separated and the gold was then formed into ingots. (blocks)
After this interesting stop, we drove through a couple of campgrounds in the Gila National Forest. There is no way we could ever get the motorhome into these, but it was fun to see them.
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