Yellow Kid Trail

Dogs Leashed

Features Wildlife

The Yellow Kid Trail goes through the New Almaden Mine area that was a hub of activity in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, when cinnabar (mercury ore) was mined here. Mercury was extracted from the cinnabar by the Mine Hill Rotary Furnace at this site.

The Yellow Kid Trail starts at the Wood Road Trail, where the ruins of the old Mine Hill Rotary Furnace are. It is a very wide open trail and intersects the Hidalgo Cemetery Trail after about a tenth of a mile. Views of the unpopulated Santa Cruz Mountains can be seen. At the junction with the Hidalgo Cemetery Trail, to the left, in the distance, the ruins of the on-site mine supervisor's house can be seen. To the right is the site of the old Spanish Town where the Mexican, Spanish, and Chilean miners lived.

Crossing Hidalgo Cemetery Trail, the trail remains wide and well traveled as it enters terrain covered with thick bushes. After about a quarter of a mile, one arrives at the site of the entrance to the Main Tunnel of the New Almaden Mine. Continuing another few hundred yards, the trail enters thicker woods, and one comes upon the site of the Yellow Kid Tunnel entrance to the New Almaden Mine.

After the site of the Yellow Kid Tunnel entrance, this trail narrows to a singletrack path. The Yellow Kid Trail then ends at the next central trail junction, after a few hundred more yards. Here it joins Castillero Trail and English Camp Trail.