nero_design
Greenie
(Location: Australia - Sydney - 2008)
Bit of a long story here but you can always skip it and just look at the pictures. For such a small prize, there was a fair bit of pain involved in claiming it.
I was exploring the entrance to a hand-dug gold mine shaft (dug from between 1853-1871) with my Detector, looking for gold nuggets when I picked up a very strong and somewhat large signal. I'd already driven a few hundred miles to get to the location and then sought directions from locals when it became obvious that my government maps were at least 10 years out of date. This was my third trip out Prospecting and I felt that I was understanding my detector at last (Minelab X-Terra 70). I then drove with my Canadian wife for a few miles into bushland on a 4x4 track in our city car. Not the only stupid thing I'd done that day. The huge rocks and steep muddy inclines over the mountains were clearly not designed to accommodate a car. Just trail bikes and 4x4s. When the road became blocked, we parked the car and used a Google map which I'd downloaded onto my iPod to make a good guess where to walk since it showed the shadows of the mountains and the valleys. Several miles on foot in 43C degree summer heat with nearly 500 flies in my face and bugspray in my eyes, my wife gave up and asked to wait on the top of a valley crest whilst I went on ahead. I left her with the camera, a knife, all the water (which i would later regret) and a book and continued on down into the valley.
The sun was setting when I found a mine shaft entrance concealed nearby on the side of a hill. It wasn't marked on the maps but a strong signal at the entrance wall in the red clay had me hacking away for almost a half hour to find the target. The clay had dried and was cement-like and I already had bandages on my fingers to protect the bulging blisters I had developed from digging earlier. I stopped after a while and rescanned the target. It was clearly worth digging being right next to a mineshaft. The maps I had brought along showed there were gold mines a mile away and I was headed toward these when I had stumbled across the shaft. How could I go home without knowing what it was? Well, I dug again until the pain stopped me. Then I slid back the bandages and sliced open the blisters on my fingers to relieve the pressure. This is normally a very stupid thing to do if you want to avoid infections. But I was somewhat delirious in the heat. The sweat kept dribbling off my nose and lips and the bugspray was constantly running into my eyes. Apart from being carcinogenic, it felt like tobasco sauce or even lemon juice in a paper cut.
I heard a thud nearby and stopped to listen. Nothing. I bend down into the entrance to the shaft and began to dig again. I heard a repeated thudding nearby, almost in rhythm to my pick axe. Now I was facing a rather spooky looking hole in the ground. There's a rumored Big Cat stalking animals here in this area. And the sun was cresting the valley and creating an extremely spooky atmosphere. I thought about the mythical Tommy Knockers - gnome like creatures who were quite real to the people that had dug this shaft.... who would signal danger with a knocking on the walls of a mine shaft. The hair went up on the back of my neck and I heard the thud-thud-thud directly behind me. I leapt to my feet and spun around, only to be facing a rather bewildered looking kangaroo which reared back in fright and then shot off downhill towards the creek. The Thud-thud-thud as it bounded away amused me and filled me with relief. I laughed, crawled back into the earth and began to dig again. I struck something harder than the soil around it and unearthed a large iron pick axe of the much older variety. Broken where the handle sat, and left behind over 140 years ago. I actually laughed out loud because I'd completely exhausted myself. I felt something crawling on my left hand and looked down to see a tiny scorpion trundle across it. I grabbed a 2-ounce specimen jar and managed to get him into it so I could photograph it later and then turned my detector back on after stuffing the rusty old pick axe head into my backpack.
I'd not even stepped out of the shaft entrance when I picked up another signal. It was as sharp as the one I'd triggered on the Pick Axe yet more positive. I switched from Prospecting to Coin & Relic Mode and it gave a much higher number, indicating jewellery or a good coin... or possibly an iron free nugget. In just a few scoops of soil with my mini-shovel, it was out of the earth and in my hand. The reddish soil had left a very slight rose tint on the surface but the coin was a Gold Sovereign dated 1884. It even had the profile of Queen Victoria on one side. The other had an image of Saint George slaying a Dragon. The cuter profile from her younger days. I was excited but carefully wrapped and pocketed the find. I went down to the base of the valley and explored the waters edge. I was so thirsty but had left my water with my wife. The cicadas were screeching in the trees and there was no way for her to hear me. I found several false targets (a slag from minters left near the water) and contemplated drinking from the creek which looked so refreshing but the scores of animal bones littering both sides of the creek made me wonder about poisons (often used by miners) and the Big Cats seen in the area. There were shafts sunk all over the place beside the creek. A beer can suggested someone else might be detecting there. The remains of a recent fire on the pebbly shore suggested a lurker. I looked around for signs of the legendary Panther before cutting my way through a wall of blackberry bushes over 5 feet high and returning up the hill to meet my wife and photograph the scorpion. It took me two hours to climb back up the steep incline to find her. I'd take ten steps uphill and then stop for a few seconds. Then take another 10 steps and stop again. Each time I'd open my arms and feel a slight breeze. I couldn't see from the sweat. I staggered uphill till I found signs of my previous route. Eventually I found my wife. She was surrounded by a species of occasionally lethal stinging inch-long ants but they were ignoring here since rain was starting to sprinkle. I wrapped our electronics in plastic bags and we continued together. It was at least another hour and a half uphill to get to our car. I tried to photograph these Jack Jumper ants but the sky was darkening and my shots were blurring due to my unsteady hands. This was the hardest trek I've ever made in my life and I honestly wondered how I made it back. I was overjoyed just to be able to see my car. I'd also been picking up quartz samples along the way and arrived a few pounds heavier. The two iron pick-axes and collection of rock in my backpack didn't help. In all, I had the equivalent of three house bricks on my back. It was dark when we got to the roads and it took us another three hours to get home. I let the scorpion go and placed the camera on the ground to get a steady shot before we left. A picture my wife took showed hundreds of flies on my backpack - probably waiting for their turn to try and land on my face. You had to breathe through your teeth to avoid inhaling them.
When I returned to the city, I placed the Sovereign into an ultrasonic cleaner and all the red earth was blasted away in a dramatic cloud of red debris, revealing some lively details for so small a coin. I had no idea what the coin was worth and had not actually handled or noticed a Sovereign before. This one had been minted in Sydney in 1884 from local gold found just a few miles from where I was digging that day. I've looked online and found the same coin (and year) selling at auctions with reserves ranging in the many hundreds and even thousands, depending on the condition. I haven't had this one appraised yet although the delicate rims are far less dented than those I've seen elsewhere and less wear to the surfaces. It's actually a lot more reflective than it appears in my photographs. I took it into the Prospecting store where I bought my detector and there was some swearing before it was explained to me that one of the Prospectors there had been trying to find a Gold Sovereign for twenty or thirty years without luck. These coins are around 22 carat if I'm not mistaken. This is my best find so far. Though not necessarily my favorite. I would never go back there without some sort of motorized device to get me back out of the valley again.
[size=9pt]The little half-inch scorpion which I retrieved and then released when I got to my car. Wondered if it was some sort of an omen when it crawled across my hand.[/size]
Images linked from my Photostorage to save forum webspace.
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