Mytimetoshine

[mytimetoshine]

Ive always wanted to sample the sands there, im sure you know about the color being found and I hear there is a ledge somewhere around there that is a source supposedly.. Curious to hear what comes of the samples you took.

No,actually never heard of any SF gold. Got a link to the story?

So I bring back a plastic cup full of the scraped black sand. Panned a large tablespoon nice and slow. And Bubkiss....... oh well. First 2 shots are Ocean Beach sand and the next 2 are American river sand. There is a noticeable difference even though it is slight. Not sure what it means but, in theory the material from Ocean Beach would originate in the Sierra mountains? ..

 

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[SchoolOfHardRocks]

Interesting side by side. It makes sense, when i think about it. The American River sands are larger (less traveled) and looks like more black sand. Sucks no gold, but I'm sure the process of finding out was fun! - I know I had fun watching

 

[Asmbandits]

No,actually never heard of any SF gold. Got a link to the story?

Looks like I am mistaken, I have a book called "Buried Treasures of California" written by a W.C. Jameson that mentions two stories, one of a treasure buried at ocean beach and the story after that is the one that refers to the gold in the sand and ledge but it is listed near Arcata. I got the two locations mixed up my bad. Even though thats the case I swear ive still heard from somewhere about color being found somewhere at ocean beach..

 

[Sample Pan Dan]

I knows there's good beach gold in Oregon and Washington, I've never heard to much about here, but I guess anything is possible. Gold is where you find it.

 

[Asmbandits]

I knows there's good beach gold in Oregon and Washington, I've never heard to much about here, but I guess anything is possible. Gold is where you find it.

Exactly, With all the gold bearing areas not too far away Id think it could be possible that there would be some trace of gold on the ca coast. Another interesting bit form another book I have called "A Guide to Treasure In California" by Thomas Penfield, Here is a Section taken from that book that would support gold near Ocean Beach.

"In 1851, A rich quartz vein of gold was discovered on the Marin side of the golden gate, and the Golden Gate Mining Company was formed. It was the cold and foggy season, and when the vein disappeared a few feet below the surface, the company abandoned the claim and walked away. Many have insisted that the vein merely pinched out and would reappear again. Efforts to locate the old vein have failed, and it is believed that it might have been covered up when the Golden Gate bridge was erected."

 

[mytimetoshine]

Had plans to go Snowboarding Sunday which fell through at the last minute so I headed out for a bit.

I wasn't planning anything and I thought it might rain so I just took it easy. Decided to bust out the mini rocker to test it on a heavy black sand clay material that is similar to a better spot I've been thinking of packing it in too.

Got to the spot at 10 and there were 2 guys already there. There sluice kept getting dry as the water was dropping. They seemed to be puzzled and frustrated. They kept looking at me as I was sitting down on my bucket easily rocking away.lol. The sun was out and the sky was clear and blue for what seemed like the first time in weeks..and I started to wish I had done something more challenging, but that's Ok, I accomplished a test run that I've needed to do for some time now, so no lost time really.

Now the material was a bit much for the rocker. I cleaned out after 2 -2g buckets. It was taking a long time to process but less then it would take to pan it. Which is the whole point. It was almost ideal. I bough and use the rocker to work bench material that is next to deep water where sluicing is impossible. While I had brought my bazooka I was pretty sure there would be limited room to set up if any and I was right. Those 2 guys were on the only sluice spot and they even had to build up the dam mostly from scratch so it was a perfect trial. When you can't sluice this thing will beat just about anyone panning, the draw back is the weight an awkward shape makes it tuff to pack... Always trying things and learning from it.


As the other guys packed up and cleaned up. One found a nice picker! About .1 and round as a bee bee. I ended up leaving at 3 and had only ran 7 buckets... not as good as I had liked but still might work. Anyways got my first .03 of the season! Lmao

 

[Jeff95531]

Gotta start somewhere. That's .03 more than I got so far this year!

 

[GrizzlyGremlin]

Love the macro shots! Beautiful character!

 

[mytimetoshine]

Rain.... we need it but damn it I have gold fever and now thanks to winter cabin fever as well.

Studying the doppler radar all week,lol. Rain would be unavoidable Saturday so I decided to make best use of the time scouting ground and driving a route I've wanted to do since I moved up here.

Slept in till 10am took my time getting ready and picked up some breakfast and coffee at about 1230.hit 50 east bound and in 10 minutes I was in Placerville. Parked the truck to scope out the map while I still had signall.

Merged onto Mosquito ridge rd at 115.... I was surprised at how many house were out there! Even on the other side of the bridge, tons of mailboxes!.

It was pouring rain and I was nice and toasty in my truck with a full belly and a large hot coffee

Made it to the turn off on Rock Creek Rd and that's where things got Interesting. Mailboxes started to get far and few between and some open space that at the least wasn't obviously private property. Canyons are steep but very intersting. .. Quartz stringers and outcroppings galore. A season creek at every sharp turn in the Rd and then Rock creek bridge was spectacular. Some very old no trespassing and graffiti written on the bridge but I haven't looked at land status.. it was beautiful! Saw a really nice STEEP granite creek that was calling my name...Beautiful country!

 

[Au dave]

bit of a climb down MTTS ....but that might be good for pickin as others won't botjer

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[Jeff95531]

Rain.... we need it but damn it I have gold fever and now thanks to winter cabin fever as well.

Studying the doppler radar all week,lol. Rain would be unavoidable Saturday so I decided to make best use of the time scouting ground and driving a route I've wanted to do since I moved up here.

Slept in till 10am took my time getting ready and picked up some breakfast and coffee at about 1230.hit 50 east bound and in 10 minutes I was in Placerville. Parked the truck to scope out the map while I still had signall.

Merged onto Mosquito ridge rd at 115.... I was surprised at how many house were out there! Even on the other side of the bridge, tons of mailboxes!.

It was pouring rain and I was nice and toasty in my truck with a full belly and a large hot coffee

Made it to the turn off on Rock Creek Rd and that's where things got Interesting. Mailboxes started to get far and few between and some open space that at the least wasn't obviously private property. Canyons are steep but very intersting. .. Quartz stringers and outcroppings galore. A season creek at every sharp turn in the Rd and then Rock creek bridge was spectacular. Some very old no trespassing and graffiti written on the bridge but I haven't looked at land status.. it was beautiful! Saw a really nice STEEP granite creek that was calling my name...Beautiful country!

Damm! I didn't want that story to end at all!

Dopler and TWC say chance of prospecting 80% for Mon-Wed.

 

[Asmbandits]

Rain.... we need it but damn it I have gold fever and now thanks to winter cabin fever as well.

Studying the doppler radar all week,lol. Rain would be unavoidable Saturday so I decided to make best use of the time scouting ground and driving a route I've wanted to do since I moved up here.

Slept in till 10am took my time getting ready and picked up some breakfast and coffee at about 1230.hit 50 east bound and in 10 minutes I was in Placerville. Parked the truck to scope out the map while I still had signall.

Merged onto Mosquito ridge rd at 115.... I was surprised at how many house were out there! Even on the other side of the bridge, tons of mailboxes!.

It was pouring rain and I was nice and toasty in my truck with a full belly and a large hot coffee

Made it to the turn off on Rock Creek Rd and that's where things got Interesting. Mailboxes started to get far and few between and some open space that at the least wasn't obviously private property. Canyons are steep but very intersting. .. Quartz stringers and outcroppings galore. A season creek at every sharp turn in the Rd and then Rock creek bridge was spectacular. Some very old no trespassing and graffiti written on the bridge but I haven't looked at land status.. it was beautiful! Saw a really nice STEEP granite creek that was calling my name...Beautiful country!

That bridge is where I parked and went up stream rock creek the very first time I went prospecting, If you go up a ways there is un claimed land but a lot of claims right there near the bridge. The is a GPAA claim below the bridge also. I didnt find anything but a bunch of poison oak that trip that got so bad I had to go to the hospital lol.

 

[Asmbandits]

Also that exact spot is full of history, I watched a youtube video about a big battle right there with the Indians that has to do with mercury mining.

 

[mytimetoshine]

As I knew it would rain Saturday, I knew it wouldn't on Sunday

Slept in again and got a late start but there was no hurry, I was working my home location and at 2000 cfs there wouldn't be any release. I got to thinking.. man its nice not having to get up at the but crack of dawn to try and beat a noon water release. Of course I'm limited to high bank material but that's not necessarily bad.... always something new to learn.

This would actually be the first time I've prospect ed during these months Jan to April so it's all new and a learning experience.

Guess what? There's gold up there! The river is up, and I still worked a spot 20 ft up the bank. I've been fooling around with this Ultramafic rock that is common to the area. The surface of this material makes it a perfect natural sluice. It's also very brittle and easy to break up. A sledge will work but I've noticed if you take a standard crevice tool or pick and "rake" it. The stuff just comes apart. It holds a TREMENDOUS amount of black sand. That's the good and the bad....

Loading material into my pan and 1/2 classifier I would carry down to the bank and dump it. With the HEAVY black sand and some clay, the only way to pan is to do about a 1/4- 1/3 pan load at a time. Even then I would have to hit the back side of the pan HARD, just to get it down to a teaspoon of black sand and gold.

I only lasted 2hrs.... got hungry and tired.. lame, lol

Take was less then expected but isn't it always? I had a good time and funny thing is there were 2 Canadian geese keeping an eye on me all day. I've never really noticed them in this area before but its probably the time of year. There were 2 of them perched on the bedrock about 50 up on the other bank... just watching me like gargoyles..lol when they took off I figured that was my que!

 

[KevinInColorado]

.07 from 2 hours with just a pan is pretty solid actually...nice job...and you learned more too so I'd call it a very successful outing :-D

PS great gold pics too!

 

[mytimetoshine]

.07 from 2 hours with just a pan is pretty solid actually...nice job...and you learned more too so I'd call it a very successful outing :-D

PS great gold pics too!

Thanks Kevin!

 

[mytimetoshine]

Well, with fever burning hot I was able to take advantage of the beautiful weather we are having and bring it down a degree or two.

Sat:

Met up with Golden Mojo at HD and got to the spot at about 1030. I wasn't enjoying the ride in. The road isn't bad but when your not in control and all you see is death out the side window, makes for some anxiety..

After we parked I decided to explore a small cave I'll call it where obviously someone chased a vein in while Joe made friends with some other ls and handled some business. Pretty cool as I haven't seen stuff like that before.

Made our way down to the water and I started working a spot that looked great but as sometimes isnt... first thing my trusty pick broke when i mistook bedrock for cobble. That pissed me off. Then i took test pans of several different materials in the immediate area and came up with 3 specks. Went downstream to where Joe was at with my tail between my legs and elbowed in near his diggins.

I was getting color in every pan but very very small stuff which wouldn't be a problem except we were right below a rapid and the waves...jesus Christmas! The waves! It was like trying to pan flour gold in the ocean..lol there was one half way decent spot to pan but not enough for 2 people. On the way out someone got there window broken.....this is the reason I haven't come here before.... Are there any rules to window breaking? Is it just hate for miners? Is there a strategy to avoiding it?

Still had a good time and what a beautiful day!

 

[Sample Pan Dan]

Lmao!!! Glad to hear you tell this story, as I heard it from Mojo today. I understand you had quit the sphincter tightening! :-0
Come on now, its not that bad a road.... and Mojo pays attention most of the time!!! Hehe. Bummer on the pick, and bummer on the days take, but gold is where you find it. Mojo thinks the broken window, was just becuase the guy was parked like a jack ass.
I had a great day there today.

 

[GrizzlyGremlin]

Hey Shine, do you ever crevice those cracks out? Some of those cracks perpendicular to the stream look super juicy.

 

[mytimetoshine]

Hey Shine, do you ever crevice those cracks out? Some of those cracks perpendicular to the stream look super juicy.

You mean like this?