The Logan Site

Last weekend I had the pleasure of visiting a locally renowned stone pile site in Melondy Hill, called 'The Logan Site'. I had not been there before, and had only seen photos of it on the Rock Piles blog, prior to my venture out there. From all accounts, as well as my knowledge of that general area of Melondy Hill Forest, I was anxious about the area being devoid of wetland or headwater. Imagine my pleasant surprise when I found a wonderful swamp with a seemingly 'dug-out' feature at the run off side. My understanding is that this headwater feeds into Lander's Creek, which runs into the Susquehanna just below Middle Bridge.



I was ecstatic to find this headwater. It is nearly identical to the headwater in the Steam Mill State Forest, about 6 miles away, which also is near a large cairn site. I haven't posted photos of the Steam Mill cairns yet, but stonepilewhisperer has posted some photos on his blog at http://hi-torstone.blogspot.com (sorry - links don't seem to be working right now).

The majority of cairns and stone piles at the Logan site are NE of the swamp. However, there are a few stone piles/cairns and one boulder with stone on it that are WSW and SE of the swamp.

This was the first cairn I found and, I believe it is the tallest (I'm working on getting my hiking/measuring stick made - can you tell?). It is the most southwestern cairn of the field, save the exception of one rock pile that is right next to it.




This is a close up of the top of the cairn, showing two round, red rocks that face in the direction of ENE (my reading was 80 degrees true). It's almost like the 'eyes' of the cairn are looking into the swamp. The bulk of the Logan Site cairns are to the northeast of this cairn, 500 ft. away. I also thought the flat rock in between the two red rocks was interesting - it almost has the shape of an animal's head.



This is another photo of the first, large cairn on the south side. I didn't notice this when I was out in the field, but now looking at the photos, the rocks at the base of the south side seem to be 'supporting' the somewhat tapered off side of the cairn. I have seen a lot of rock piles around here that are well stacked on one side and taper off in a looser structure on the other side.




This is a boulder with at least two rocks on it that was to the southern-most point of the site (that I observed). One of the two rocks on the boulder seemed very different to me and I took a close up of it - in the second picture below.




This rock pile looks like a marker pile to me because of the rock on top (this is very similar to the marker pile in my last post, located at an elevation of 1841 ft and is almost 4 miles to the south of this site). Although I question using the terminology 'marker pile' for this particular pile because of where it is located (in the cairn field). It looks like the rock is pointing at the cairn behind it. I took a waypoint of all the cairns and rock piles in a very un-scientific manner (it's easy to get confused out there with just one person), and thought I'd be smart and map them when I got home. When I put it on the map, this pile came up over 150 ft to the SSW of where I thought I had remembered seeing it at the site! I definitely need to go back out there and re-map the site when the leaves are off the trees!



Here are some photos of the cairns:












This one has an odd 'new' look to it - I don't recall if it looked this way at the site or if this is just my camera giving the stones a brighter image:



Nice tapered off side on this cairn:



There was some tampering at this site, which was (year 2000) documented by Don Windsor. Evidentially, a cairn once stood here, and now there is a hole with stones all around.



This stone is right next to the hole. I am trying to educate myself in geology, but currently, I have to admit I'm quite ignorant in the subject, so I don't know what type of stone this is, but I don't recall ever having seen anything like it around here before.



And one last bit of possible tampering - I noticed this rock pile or cairn...


...and right next to it was this:


Now, I wonder where they got the stone to put around that surveyor's pin??









On the way out, 3/4ths of a mile to the south of the Logan Site, I found this small cairn, right next to a dry creek bed. I don't know how I missed it on the way in - I walked right by it (I think I was more interested in the dry creek - imagine that!). Looking at the photo, I can't help but notice the open L shaped stone in front of the cairn. I've been seeing a lot of those around, too!