Barney Riley History . . . Anyone ???

[Rockcrusher]

I'm starting to get my ducks in a row for the Humboldt-Toiyabe route designation process and, since the East Carson River/Barney Riley Closure seems to be first on their list, I need some history.

I know from an 1889 and a 1948 reprint of an 1893 USGS map that the trail in from the California side is relatively new. According to these maps, the only access to the general area of the hot spring was from the Nevada side through Double Spring Valley and Young's Crossing.

This raises some questions . . .

How long has the trail been in use? Why is it there? Who rocked in the hot spring & when was it done? If any of you know the history of the trail, please let me know.

An inset of one of the maps I'm working with . . .
http://www.rockcrusher4x4.com/images/barneyriley.jpg

[jcreelman]

There are some maps free from the Keck library at UNR, available free online. Just downloaded Woodfords 24000 scale usgs 1927 data. But I'm not familiar with Barney Riley, so not quite sure where to look. I believe there are links to some other historic maps also available there, and I would help you out if I could, but just not familiar enough to know exactly what you need.
http://keck.library.unr.edu/

[Charlie]

I've seen maps that show an 'old' Barney Riley Trail that starts near the Hangman's Bridge. The area to look at almost always involves the Cottonwood Canyon area. As far as who did the initial construction of the campsite, from what I understand it was Fiddle Footed 4wheelers and they were allowed to do it by Forestry. I've met the guys a few times and they're nice folks. I've gone down there with members of the Northern California Xterra folks to maintain the outhouse (digging and moving the outhouse...nasty work) and make repairs to the table and clean out the fire ring. We always thought of it as an abandoned campsite of Forestry and tried to maintain it whenever we were down there, which until recently was about 4-5 times a season. Northwest of Loope Canyon Road is where Barney Riley Trail is located, HERE (http://maps.google.com/maps?client=safari&rls=en&q=loope+canyon+road+california&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&um=1&sa=N&tab=wl) is a link to it. The acces through Loope Canyon Road is doable, however I think you must have a special kind of deathwish to do it from the bridge.

Just an FYI, The Forestry folks were extremely difficult to contact and try to work with in that area. Several people have tried, but they struck us as being clueless and not interested in working.

[BigNorm]

I think I got edited out. But it's like Charlie said. I met the cruiser group too and got the same story a few years back. I think they need to change the name to Forest disservice. It's like Corrections. I liked it better when it was called Prisons. At least we weren't lying about it then. I haven't met a guy yet who could be corrected untill he wanted to be.