We found a strange opening and I spent a few hours today digging the entrance hole out. It's full of bedding and rat chit a few feet deep with the bottom foot pretty compacted.
There isn't any mineralization around there at all that I've ever seen. Not even quartz. The rock its dug into is volcanic breccia type sedimentary i believe. It's fairly softish and crumbly.
There is an old cabin ruin up the canyon about 100 yards away but its barely visible now with only the bottom course of logs almost covered with earth. This cabin has almost rotted away entirely and most cabins I find are still standing somewhat. It may be way old. I haven't detected it yet but I will.
I took a rake with me today to open up the hole enough to crawl in and it was kinda sketchy. It opens up just inside the hole and goes straight for about 12 feet, then there's a small room to the right. There is alot of nesting material on the floor as you can see.
It was hammered out with steel tools as I can see the chisel marks scraping deep and its not natural of course.
It will take time to clear it out before I can find the treasure but I'll keep you up to date. Or not!!

Here's a pic I took of my wife poking her head in the hole. It was a tight squeeze. I had to take my gun off, and I usually never do that.

Wow, that's pretty cool!!

I'm really excited to get back there after today. Things like this consume my mind.
It's in an area we back country ski to about 4 miles behind us, but today my son and daughter in law came out and we got within a quarter mile of tbe canyon on snowmobiles. That was an adventure in itself hehe.
It's now that much less distance I have to carry tools which is just fine with me. I'd always rather ski since its so much faster and less effort but I'd rather not ski with pointy sharp tools hanging off of me.
My wife already said I can't enter it when I'm alone but I argued that the hanta virus will probably get me first.
My biggest concern was carrying tools in and I didn't really want to snowshoe the whole way so it worked out.

I got it about halfway dug out today. There's at least 2 feet of mulchy material in there. The deeper im digging, the more compact and dirt like it is.
Ive got the easy part done, now I need to finish the back half. I need a respirator and some goggles. The top 6 inches is super dusty and this paper sheetrock mask isn't going to cut it. I took some pics but I'll have to see how they turned out.

Interesting cave. Hope you find something cool!

You can see the thickness of the mulch. Easy couple of feet.
I'm pointing to where the canyon is with my finger, but that's the extent of my map.
I did catch a dastardly claim jumper named pepper the wolf dog in the hole when I got there. He didn't get away with much tho.

Wow I didn't realize what I was doing could potentially be a crime?
Geez that kind of sucks. Id never have guessed something like that in my wildest dreams. Everything people find must end up on the black market instead of museums. I read that in the UK the people are paid for it and its not discouraged at all. Something about this being a felony reeks of federal stench to me.
Sooooo...I guess I haven't found a cave. I was just kidding about all that.
I was just about to say that the cave I didn't find seems to have signs of fire setting? I'm new to this stuff but its just something I learned about wondering why there was black burn marks and blackened rock. Thought it was cool.

Well, a treasure trove permit isn't going to work. I've heard countless horror stories about the process and I believe every one of them.
Being ex army, i know how they operate, and I'd have a real problem bringing anyone in with their level of incompetency. They are like spoiled brain damaged children at most levels and I don't have the patience.
A more clandestine approach would be a much wiser choice.

I'll bite...
Which crimes are you potentially afraid of committing/committed?

Well I havent found anything yet so as for now I'm good to go. There may be nothing in there, but it does concern me some. I don't want to do ten years and face huge fines for stumbling across something.
I knew that Indian artifacts were protected and I understand that to a point.
I don't really understand why it would be penalized when there could potentially be museum quality relics found by citizens, but if found, a citizen may face legal action?
I never would have guessed that and it threw me for a loop.
I did alot of reading about it last night and continued to get the same info.
It just kinda bums me out and I'm just ranting I guess.

ah.... the dreaded Antiquities Act. Yep, nobody here is a big fan but the law is the law. If you really wanna see a true miscarriage of the Federal legal system pertaining to discoveries, definitely watch the documentary "Dinosaur 13". If you haven't already seen it, I highly recommend.

Yeah, and sadly the Gunnison USFS & BLM have a not so pretty reputation for that. Does it qualify under the antiquities act? ONLY IF YOU FIND ANYTHING. No markings? No remnants? Nothing left behind? Then I doubt there whould be anything to bust you on.

If all else fails, maybe ask Prof. Alexander at Western State? Just show pics, give no locations until you are confident that you're safe from charges.

Yeah, mums the word on this. I know better than to go down that road.
I've only got maybe one more day of digging to clean it out and I've almost got a new trail busted through after this last storm. We made it almost halfway and my wife got her snowmobile stuck about three times hehe.
I need to saturate the material really well with water to kill the dust before I can shovel any more, its so bad you can't see your hand in front of your face after the first scoop.

Update?

Not much new there and I'm not sure what I'm even looking at. I dug it out and took a bud there with his p.I. detector once spring thawed but it was full of flying insects and he didn't want to enter. I haven't been back since then but it looked like they were digging out the seam between two different breccias. There are quartz grains within. I found a bunch of other drill holes in the rock face all across there possibly from the same people.
The darkened rock is natural I believe, and moisture stained but I did find mineralization in the area so they must have seen something that interested them.
Or they wanted me to think that, and there's a big treasure chest near by!

very interesting. it would be interesting to be a little psychic and know what was going on there. i found a tunnel off gold camp road that followed a large vein of clay for about 25-30 feet. i dug on in through the clay for a while 2 separate days, but found nothing....... would love to know why someone spent weeks on that spot....i may never know. it too was covered with bugs that i just ignored. i think crusty took a picture of me in there with a swarm on the day he joined me.

Luckily these weren't biting insects hehe. I don't mind the bugs unless they are chewing me up!

Just FYI about the legal stuff. I have been contemplating and researching the "what if I find something". To sum it up is: Go find it and don't tell anyone where it is. Leave it there and go get a treasure permit from the forest service. Go back and recover your treasure. It may be hard to do but that is really the only legal way. Usually the forest service and BLM are reasonable with permits, worst case you will have to take an archeologist with you but the permit and treasure are yours.

I never found a treasure unfortunately but i metal detected the area and found alot of things left by the old miners there around the cabin ruins.
I even dug out a bunch of the tunnel and nothing.