As the Eagle River makes its way north towards the big lake it turns and tumbles its through a narrow gorge beset on all sides by sheer cliffs and rocky outcroppings that makes the river’s journey much more challenging. Its a beautiful and rugged landscape that looks more like something you’d find out west along some Rocky mountain stream. The topography also makes the river hard to walk due to the scarcity of level ground along its banks, resulting in explorers such as ourselves to hop-scotch our way across the boulders and rocks scattered across the riverbed. Soon we had stumbled across our first ruins, sitting conveniently alongside the river’s edge.

It were a series of concrete piers – six in all – that had been placed along the riverbanks here. They were set into the river in groups of two, one on each side. It wasn’t difficult for us to figure out their purpose as they were no doubt the remains of an old bridge or trestle that once crossed the river here.

The piers were about 5 feet in height and set atop a wide concrete base set into the river bank. Over time the river had done its part in eroding away those concrete bases, and it wouldn’t be long until the piers found their way into the river. Shown here are the three piers on the river’s east side.

On the east bank the outer two piers were identical, characterized by a narrow footprint set parallel to the river. One of these outer piers is seen here, along with its heavily eroded base. The middle pier was more hefty with a thicker profile.

On the west bank the piers were a great deal different in appearance. These were a tad shorter and stockier then their siblings to the east and were supported by more robust concrete bases. Though the river looked to be still having its way with them as well.

Here’s the northern most pier on the river’s west side. The pier itself looks to be sitting atop a large rock already present on the river’s bottom. How they got the thing to be stable here is beyond me.

Each of the piers were topped by the remains of some iron bolts, just like this one. Some had one, some had two, others had none. These were probably attached to the wood structure of the trestle / bridge itself which sat atop the piers.

Taking one last look at the trestle remains we could see yet another pier sitting further up along the bank. Whatever this trestle/bridge was for it most likely had some height to it. Though the west rim of the gorge here is only 40 feet tall, the east rim is more than twice that. If the trestle/bridge were to clear both rims (as I would assume it would) that would make the thing easily over 80 feet in height. Impressive to say the least.

So what was this trestle for? Its location puts it smack dab in the middle between the “old” Phoenix Mill to the north and the “new” Phoenix Mill to the south. Its west end points out towards the Ashbed Vein, while its east end is directed towards the KC line. My guess is that is was part of the old Phoenix narrow-gauge line to connect the Ashbed vein to the rest of the mine. I suppose it could also been used to transport ore from the Ashbed to the “new” Phoneix MIll that sat up stream from here. If that was the case the trestle would not have had to clear the entire east rim, just to the height of the mill itself.

If anyone else has some ideas, please share! For now..

To Be Continued…