Colorful Mine Pit Is a Historic Site

Bordered by colorful cliffs, the Malakoff mine pit is more than a mile long, half a mile wide and nearly 600 feet deep. In the right light, it resembles Bryce Canyon in miniature.

Malakoff Diggins State Historic Park is the site of what was once the world’s largest hydraulic gold mine. As the story goes, an Irish prospector thought he discovered gold by the Yuba River. Despite his best efforts at subterfuge, he was unable to keep the secret from his fellow miners in the nearby town of Nevada City, 16 miles away. The miners tried their luck, found nothing and declared the site a “humbug,” a name that stuck to the adjacent hamlet and creek.

Several years later, when gold was really discovered, residents of Humbug deemed the name inappropriate and discrediting, so they changed it to Bloomfield. Alas, Bloomfield already existed farther south in California, so the town’s name changed again--this time to North Bloomfield. (Historians have yet to figure why the miners chose the name Bloomfield.)

You can learn more about hydraulic mining and the life of a miner at the state park’s excellent little museum. On summer weekends, rangers lead tours of the park’s historic sites and the restored buildings--drugstore, general store, barber shop, livery stable and more--of North Bloomfield.

You can also tour the little mining town on your own with the aid of the pamphlet “A Walking Tour of North Bloomfield.” Pick up a copy at the park office.

The state park has 30 sites for camping and three replica miners’ cabins, complete with potbellied stoves, for rent at $15 a night. Bring your own bedding and cookware. Call the park for reservations.

Hikers can choose from a variety of pathways. Rim Trail is a fairly level 3 1/2-mile jaunt overlooking the great mining pit. The path, a closed fire road, offers close-up views of the spectacular erosion, both human and natural, that shaped this land.

You’ll pass grassy flats bedecked with lupine, buttercups and other wildflowers, and thickets of manzanita, as well as slopes forested with sugar and ponderosa pine. Highlighting the trail are panoramas of the pit and its surrounding colorful cliffs.

The park’s Humbug Trail descends a mile along Humbug Creek to the Yuba River, where there are some U.S. Bureau of Land Management campsites.

Directions to trail head: Malakoff Diggins State Historic Park is 16 miles northeast of Nevada City on North Bloomfield Road.

The hike: From the park’s picnic area, join signed Church Trail to the cemetery. Pick up the signed trail to Diggins Loop Trail below the cemetery and descend rapidly through mixed forest to a trail junction. Diggins Loop Trail splits; the south (left) loop descends through a diverse environment of brush and conifers. A side trail leads a short distance to California Historical Landmark No. 852, which commemorates the North Bloomfield Mining and Gravel Co.

Another side trail leads to the dank and dark Hiller Tunnel, a quarter-mile spur (you need a flashlight to explore this). The tunnel is a segment of a much larger drainage tunnel that sent lots of muck and sediment down Humbug Creek and then on down to the South Yuba River.

Diggins Loop Trail circles Diggins Pond, which, at first, looks lifeless, but it’s not. Watch for sandpipers at water’s edge. Cattails crowd the shoreline in places, while just above the lake shore, slopes grow alder and willows.

Diggins Trail, somewhat overgrown with brush, continues its loop around the north side of the pond, then reaches a junction with Church Trail, which you’ll join and return to the trail.

California’s Gold Country / Diggins Loop Trail Where: Malakoff Diggins State Historic Park. Distance: 3-mile loop down into giant mining pit; 600-foot elevation loss, then gain. Terrain: Colorful cliffs, forested slopes. Highlights: Site of world’s largest hydraulic gold mine; historic walking tour through old North Blommfield. Degree of difficulty: Easy to moderate. Precautions: Trails are passable but not particulary well-maintained; check on conditions at park office. For more information: Contact Malakoff Diggins State Historic Park, 23579 N. Bloomfield Road, Nevada City, Calif. 95959, (916) 265-2740.