Summer of 99

Goldwasher

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May 26, 2009
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Sailor Flat, Ca.
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SDC2300, Gold Bug 2 Burlap, fish oil, .35 gallons of water per minute.
Primary Interest:
All Treasure Hunting
Summer of ' 99

I was at Denali National Park, Alaska. I worked in Alaska every year From April to late September from '97 in Cordova for Ocean Beauty Seafoods, '98 '99 '00 and '01 I was in Denali My favorite summer was '99 I worked for a sub-contractor of the National Parks Service. I was 22 and employed as a " Natural History Interpreter " I got paid $ 15.00 an hour to sit at a drafty cabin and every two hours I taught 60 tourists about Gold mining in Alaska and then if they wanted they could buy a bag of dirt and pan it. 90% of them did. We got our dirt from a claim north of Fairbanks. Every few weeks we would get a load of dirt that we had to put in these canvas pay-dirt bags myself and two guys would have to fill the bags that had been emptied by previous panners we hated that part of the job. The bags WERE NOT SALTED!!!!! they screened material they were working at their op and screen it to an inch minus for us. We had a chalk board with spot price on it. Trending down from Like $ 280.00 to I wanna say $240.00 spot through the summer. I'm telling you I sent hundreds of people back to the lower 48 with 2+ DWT nuggets that they got out of a $ 12.00 bag of paydirt. Most of the pickers were average .2 grams. If someone got a crappy bag we would just give them another one. Upper management had no way to keep inventory on an unknown product. I think they just paid by the scoop I had nothing to do with it. Most people broke even and were ok with it. When someone a few pans down scored a nugget they were all happy for them. My favorite summer ever. I made thousands of people smile, hopefully educated and spread the fever a bit. I personally tought approx. 180 people a day how to pan for gold for four and a half months. With rusty 10" pans...I can pan better than 99.3 percent of people ever:laughing7:. I will tell you something else...even pre 9-11....airport security has a huge interest in heavy film canisters secured with duct tape:headbang: This story was inspired by a picture of myself a friend sent me from that summer...I washed those pants twice that summer to try and be realistic... ha ha I'm wearing a watch 'cause there were no cell phones to watch the time with, when I knew a bus was due I would throw my watch in my pocket.
 

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Nice story... I wish i was one of those s.o.bs. that got great amounts of gold from your place back then. Wow that was 12 bucks well spent. :hello:
 

Cool story! That same year of life, I was digging ditches and driving a delivery truck in the family plumbing biz. Not nearly as cool!
 

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Goldwasher Thanks for sharing that and from you generous offer of last week taking a few of us to your claim. You are still in the business of instructing the uninitiated.

GM

Thanks to HangtownDiggins Also.
 

If I remember you mentioning, that when you cleaned those stations that there was some color to be found for the motivated. What a great story and thanks for sharing....
 

Hence the duct taped film canisters. We got to play a bit near Fairbanks when we would go get dirt. Was definitely fishing around Denali rather than panning. The closest gold bearing areas were not that close. Cleaning out those troughs every few days was way more consistent. I wish I had a pano-meter to count how many swirls, shakes, and dips I did that summer with a ten inch rusty pan.I had never said the word suspension so much since high school. Nowadays I would throw a sluice at the output of the trough and let her rip and blue bowl it back at my cabin....:censored: all that pannin' crap:tongue3:.......:occasion14:
 

A Better TIme It Was For Sure Goldwasher. How I wish I had been in prospecting back in the late 60"s and early 70"s as a much younger man.
 

Photo Caption ; .......... " What the hell am I doing in Alaska ? How'd I get myself into this ? "

:laughing7::laughing7: :hello:
 

I was an old salt by then:laughing7:
Photo Caption ; .......... " What the hell am I doing in Alaska ? How'd I get myself into this ? "

:laughing7::laughing7: :hello:
 

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