Jumping a Ravine

A couple years ago on the way back from an adventure down a forest service road meant for a four wheeler and not my highway commuter compact in search of a non-existent road sign, my friend Bear and I spotted an abandoned gas station along the mountain highway that just begged for a closer look. We get out and survey the situation. Old awning over where the pumps would have been with a lone Manzanita growing beneath it with other scrub. A large pit filled with water that I can only surmise was where the tanks once were, a parking lot covered in dirt and a dozen or more 9ft+ Ponderosa, and the building itself not looking too shabby other than the glass on the door being busted out. Getting to it however...

That looked very deep!

The few places we had stopped in town, no one could quite remember how long it had been abandoned, but it was very clear why. This town boomed during the gold rush, and thousands of shallow mines were dug under the entire town, except apparently the old Wells Fargo building. Rumor says they would have shot anyone they caught trying it. I believe it. Eventually all those shallow mines collapse, and surrounding this abandoned gas station were small ravines, averaging 10-12ft deep, and of varying widths across. The building and lot were literally surrounded on all sides. We had to be very careful too, as vegetation obscured some of these. With a little persistence however, we found a relatively shallow area and only a single jump across... into a tree. It was easier for Bear, being far taller than myself. I was less than graceful, but unscathed.

Not the ravine we crossed...

Walking around to the front of the building we found it easy to access the inside, but despite being the middle of a spring afternoon we both hesitated. Not often you find a building abandoned long enough to have a couple feet of dirt covering its lot along with a small forest starting that doesn't have graffiti outside the building or smell like human waste. It didn't FEEL right. And we went inside anyway. Inside was a little musty, torn up, and there was graffiti inside... which somehow made us feel better? I'm not quite sure why but it did. Now past the initial nervousness we took stock of the scene. Abandoned refrigeration units. Piles of floor tile in boxes. Insulation dropped from the ceiling. Bits of one way glass scattered about from what we hope was the managers office and not into a bathroom.

Inside the abandoned gas station. I didn't wander too far in as flip flops are not good exploration shoes.

Considering the low light in the building and leaving my tripod in the car, I was very happy to capture this image and then get our butts out of there before someone called highway patrol on my car being 'abandoned' a few hundred yards away. Retrospect I should have been more worried about a trespassing citation than a parking ticket, but obviously not worried enough to go back again a few weeks later!