Saratoga Quarry Park Cache Traditional Cache
Saratoga Quarry Park Cache
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Difficulty:
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Terrain:
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Size: 
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GRAND OPENING DAY and first day of Saratoga Quarry Park operation Saturday, Oct. 31, 2015. Take a hike into history! This is a well-hidden cache. Hint: Go around....
SARATOGA QUARRY PARK
Saratoga Quarry Park is a brand new day use park in an old rock quarry on highway 9 in the Saratoga mountains for residents of the city and county. This park still shows remnants of its past as an operating quarry back in the early- to mid- 1900s. Old rusty mining equipment, concrete tunnels and loading structures remain. Follow an initial .8 trail network to the bell water feature and ferns by the water tank, a 1 ac. pond, hiking, benches, BBQing and picnicking at newly constructed, sturdy picnic tables. Once the trails are connected, you’ll be able to hike from Quarry Park to the Pacific Ocean, 43 miles away. Restrooms, water fountains and gravel parking are on the 64 acre site.
Check out the old historic quarry photos in the gallery.
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HISTORY
Saratoga Quarry Park has been the site of active rock quarries since the early 1900’s. Several private companies mined lime stone here in the early part of the century. A movie about an Alaska goldmine was reportedly filmed at the quarry in 1917. Because the quarry was equipped with rock crushers, gravel screens, chutes, and bunkers, it provided the perfect setting. Titled “The Wolf’s Fangs”, the melodrama featured local actors and was shown at the Foothill Club in January 1918.
Santa Clara County bought the Quality Sand & Rock Company in 1921 at this site and operated it as a quarry for rock and gravel used for maintenance of county roads. They called it the Congress Springs Quarry. There were two types of gravel. One was “blue rock” or “chert” that was perfect for road construction because it set like cement when water was added to it. The other type was a “plane” or “pea” gravel.
Infrastructure for the quarry changed dramatically over the years. The gyratory crushers and steam shovels that were used in the 1920s were later replaced by jaw crushers and bulldozers by 1954. Concrete-line tunnels were excavated into the hillside for conveyor belts that transported the stone from the blast site to the railway. Tunnels were later designed and built for the loading of semi-trucks. The county continued to operate it until the 1960’s when increasing complaints of truck noise, traffic, and an incident with a girl being injured by a gravel truck caused the county to close the quarry in 1967.
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Following the 1967 closure, the Site was used for parties, including the occasional wedding, until the late 1990s. During this time, the property was gated and restricted to the public, and only accessible to County employees who used the Site with their families and friends for recreational activities. In their own time, they installed and maintained picnic tables, BBQ pits, and sitting areas.
PRESENT
The City of Saratoga acquired the property in October 2011 and developed it as a park in 2015. The current land use designation of the Site is Open Space-Outdoor Recreation (OS-OR), which assures that the property will be retained as a natural scenic and regional open space area by restricting the property’s use. The City’s plan is to develop a comprehensive trail network “that provides the community with open space linkages for greater access to recreation activities and natural resources within and beyond city limits.”
Park hours: sunrise to sunset
See a Quarry Park tour: [click here]
City of Saratoga web page news: [click here]
Merc. News blurb: [click here]
Quarry Park map: [click here]
Does a leopard change its spots? Can you "spot" the container? 
You might find a clue somewhere
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
Ornz zr hc, Fpbggvr! 
Tb nebhaq fbzrguvat PJ, uhttvat gur crevzrgre.
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