In July, we took a hike to Monte Cristo, an abandoned gold mining town from the 1890s. It’s a little over an hour drive from our house to the “end of the road”. From there, it’s a 4 mile hike (one way) to get to Monte Cristo. It’s a mostly level hike, but there are some inclines that will leave you needing a short break. The biggest problem we encountered were the bugs. Bees and flies, mostly. Some of the bees were very persistent and followed us for a ways, constantly circling us. Very annoying.
Once we got there, it was quite a letdown. There are 4 or 5 buildings, but based on my reading, they were constructed in the 1950s, not the 1890s. There is one building that dates to 1890, but we didn’t see it. We weren’t near it and we were too fed up with the bugs to poke around the brush. The only real interesting thing was the railroad turntable, which although missing its rails, appears to be original.
The gold mine was operated between 1889 and 1907. This use to be a busy place, it had a few hotels, a school, stores and a few saloons. The town was connected to Everett by a railroad, to get the people in and the ore out.
This is about halfway through the hike to Monte Cristo. 
A building 
The train turntable 
