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As we first walk into the mine, the dust problem described on the previous page isn't too bad.  Our feet are causing most of this dust in the air on my lens.  

The mine's layout becomes apparent, there was a haulage level where the small mine cars were parked under chutes that received silica-sand from steeply rising stopes that stayed in the rich high-quality silica deposit which dipped very steeply:

Here is one of the chutes coming into the haulage level:

But where we were headed was the place where a test-bed was being prepared to do the water-flow studies already alluded to, and that required moving through several long and very dry drifts.  Note the purity of this silica-sandstone, it is bright white, just a bit off-white, in many locations (also note the excellent lighting, and the ventilation was very good too -- I care about air, I breathe):

In several places the boundary between the high-quality silica-sandstone and the lower quality layers was clear:

The coal seam (mined here and elsewhere for 50 years to feed the bay area industrial revolution in the last half of the 19th century) is quite a contrast to this very light-colored rock:

With the complexity of this layer evident to anyone, no wonder it has been the subject of much scientific work.  That is an original mine-timber in the next photo:

A third rock type found here is an organic-rich black shale, and in this next photo our guide indicated that the complexity in the upper layer of this shale was evidence of bioturbation (disturbance by burrowing worms):

Speaking of complexity, the shale in one place seems to have been squeezed down into a fault as it moved (or was it instead squeezed up the fault, or has it experienced both up and down movement?  That is why there are still geology schools sending bright students here to figure this out):

It is with regret that I now move on to a lighter subject, apparently there is epsomite (or another white feathery mineral) precipitating in this roof (the white spots), and raining onto the floor as the soft strands become too long to support themselves:

So here are several plucks of this stuff on the floor.  Interesting.  To me.  But I love evaporite chemistry (one of my personality defects).  The next photo looks like another ceiling shot, but it is a floor shot (a vertigo-prevention tip):

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