A field trip to the Lucky Four Mine Mt Foley, Chilliwack, BC Rick Hudson It’s been on the ‘to do’ list for almost a decade, combining the two things I like most – mountaineering and rockhounding. The Lucky Four Mine is located at 1,900m elevation (6,000’) on a ridge overhanging a glacier. Even in summer, access is iffy, and you can expect bad weather any month of the year. Perfect.

However, Muller’s field report says: “The zone is a coarsely crystal-lized mass of brown garnet and contains sheaves of curved, colum-nar, black crystals believed to be zoisite, dark green pyroxene, calcite and clear quartz. Some of the minerals are remarkable for their large size and well developed crystal form. A zone of giant quartz crystals about 6 metres wide, adjoins the main skarn zone on its northeastern side. The quartz crystals range from 10 to 35 centimetres in diameter and up to 1 metre in length.” What’s not to like about that? Rick and Robie are of similar minds. We all feel it’s high time we do something, and a spell of stable weather is expected at the start of October. We hope for the best and pack for the worst.

The old mining camp comprises four crumpled platforms clinging to a steep slope about 50m below the main adit at 1,800m. Below the platforms there is nothing but air, and a glacier far below. We make a note not to sleep walk.

The geology of the area suggests a large body of granodiorite intruded the local sediments (limestone, argillite and greywacke) in the Cretaceous (100 MYa), creating high temperature metamorphism about 50m wide over a considerable length, although it’s only exposed here for about 200m. The original sediments turned to schist and gneiss. The mineralized zone developed sporadic chalcopyrite, pyrrhotite, pyrite, arsenopyrite and bornite.

Clambering over loose, steep scree poses a risk to those below, and the snowfield next to the ridge is icy. Fortunately, we’ve brought crampons and axes, which makes it easier, and a rope to explore the cliffs. The steep ground is littered everywhere with

Massive iron-rich garnets form along the contact zone.

Level spots are few and far between at the mine site tent platforms are small.

chunks of quartz, minerals both identifiable and not, and 50 year old mining remnants. At the lower adit, which goes an undetermined distance into the mountain (“I’m not going in THERE!”) there’s evidence of sulfides. At the upper adit – a shallow cave in the rock that requires delicate climbing to get into – the contact sequence is more obvious. A verti-cal zone of quartz is sandwiched between garnet, which is itself sandwiched between what the geological report calls zoisite, but may be iron-rich epidote, (They are closely related.) Moving further up the ridge on the snow, we reach the crystal zone, which matches Muller’s description. Much of the quartz has been sheared off by ancient glaciers, or a century of over-eager crystal hunters. Removing a large crystal takes infinite patience. The min-eral is fragile, and the crystals are packed together like sardines. To get one out, you have to remove those around it, painfully slowly, unravelling the secrets of their interlocked complexity. You’d need a week and a lot of chisel time.

At the top of the slope is a coloured wall where malachite and azurite weep down the cliff face, giving some indication of the sulfides within the zone. At the saddle, a dip in the ridge pro-vides the only level spot for a long way in any direction. Rusted mining gear lies scattered, but the ground is a cornu-copia of geology, including impressive clear calcite crystals, and bright blue-green malachite.

How anyone hoped to make a profit here is beyond me. The nearest road is 1,200m below, you can’t get a pack-horse within a mile of the place, the mine hangs on a 45-degree slope, and it snows 9 months of the year. Just for our benefit, it starts raining that evening, the temperature drops, and next morning we can’t see 20m in any direction in the cloud. The descent is slow, steep, slippery and takes six hours to the car. Still, it was a great couple of days.

The lower adit drives straight into the cliff with an impressive 200m drop imme-diately below the entrance.

Rusting mining equipment litters the saddle - the only flat spot around

View from the lower adit takes in Jones Lake and the mountains around Hope

Massive quartz crystals in situ - some measuring 60cm across and up to a metre long.