On a recent trip here in Sept of 2011, we took a trip up to Granite Mountain, where there is lots of history but very hard to locate. We took a trip up Machinery Road or Loader Road depending on who you talk to about a the name, where we took a huge amount of jarring, and tossing as well as shakin, rattling and rolling on our quads to an elevation of about 2900 ft. we were keeping our eyes peeled for anything on this road, as we tried also to keep our quads on the road as we did not want to miss anything.
On a rather smooth section and right before our eyes came this abandon log loader, and a site it is to see, the cab alone was more than two stories off the ground and this has been sitting by my guess about the late 60’s maybe early 70’s.
We climbed all over this loader, chain track driven, motor missing and a few things smashed but over all impressive. We climbed up out onto the massive steel boom only to discover the wooden boom still attached and hanging by cable, rotton and cracked in many spots but it went out at least 40 feet, overall height from the ground would be well about 60 feet to the tip of the boom
I love finding these old relics in the bush, sad to see the end of their lives rusting out however, as many man hours to build one of these beauties, and many many hours to get this beast way up the mountain as it took almost 70 minutes to get to it going 15 to 25 km an hour, so if you want to see this be prepared to be shaken like a milkshake and tossed like a squirrel in round cage, but the trip was very worth it.
Enjoy this small video as well
