Went prospecting today

[diverrick]

I just received the book "California Gold Camps" I think I read it front to back last night. Could not put it down. If you have the fever, this is not a good book to read. It is like a book about how good drugs are, when your on heroin.

So I get all fired up after reading the book and decide to go find Murderers Bar. According to the book a lot of gold came out of those gravels. Once I looked it up, I realized that Hoser John had already been there, so the plan was to work the high dry banks, where hopefully he had not been.

I hit the road bright and early all fired up .. Gonna be a good day, full of gold, Yada yadda.
I was thinking as I drove this is gonna be the spot this time..

First thing I ran into when I got there, was a pay to park area. That pisses me off to start with. and cannot be a good sign for prospecting. So I had to drop 10 bucks just to park the friggin' car, then hike down to the river. No one there so I have the whole place to myself. That is a good sign, maybe, maybe not.

I found a promising spot behind a large well water worn rock and shoveled off the overburden, classified the lower stuff down to a full bucket of fines then set to panning. NO sluices allowed of course. THis is Commifornia after all.

I got absolutely nothing, not even a speck, so time to move. So much for that sample hole.

I found another nice spot behind another huge rock. this one looked like a good place to dig. I found hard packed gravels about a foot down that I had a heck of a time getting each rock free enough to remove. I picked and pried. This spot has GOT TO HAVE GOLD, as these are packed gravels. I was sweating hard in the direct sunlight, and it was an awkward position to kneel in. Hot as I was in between two large boulders.

After three hours of scratching, I had a 1/4 bucket of fines, so I went down and panned them out. If nothing else just to cool off. NOTHING again!!! WTF?

Is it me? I NEVER find gold, even though I go all the time, I beep, I dig, I sluice, I used to dredge before they banned it, and still nothing. 20+friggin years of serching and still not enough to even cover the bottom of a small vial. My wife says I should just give up. But I have the damned fever!! I can't stop.
I don't know what I am doing I guess. I would think that after all these trips, even a blind squirrel finds a nut, but not me. Damn!! Wasted a whole tank of gas and a whole day AGAIN for nothing.
I think I did better when I didn't know anything. This is so frustrating.

 

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[diverrick]

I found a remote spot a couple of days ago that I only took a small sample Turned out to have enough show for me to go back. So today I went back. Found some nice looking bedrock. There were signs of someone crevicing. Some really nice pockets to work on. So I scratched, vacuumed, broke rock to get to the bottom of the cracks. Came home with one 5 gallon bucket ofwell classified material.
I have to pan it out at home due this being a dry sight right now. Would you believe it, I got totally skunked (AGAIN). I am going to keep going back until I figure out where the gold from a couple days came from, but seeing as it was not in the crevices, I am going to scratch off the dried moss and see if I don't do a bit better. Of course while panning this out this evening there was one small piece I just left it there as I panned the rest of the material out. When I was about halfway through, I looked and it was gone. It is now somewhere in the safety trough, so I'll have to re pan it all and find that little piece. I could not do any more tonight, as it kills my back to pan for hours. I'll pick it up again this weekend.
I guess if I keep bringing this much stuff home to work, I'll have to get my small recirc pump and sluice box set back up. That would be quicker for sure. I might also try a bit further up the bank.

 

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[timberjack]

Keep at it! I keep bringing promising looking rocks home, and, when i have time i crush and pan. Never know what you are going to find. but you wont find anything if you dont try, good luck!

 

[NeoTokyo]

I think you need to put down most of that equipment and say "*uck it!"

Grab a quality mask, snorkel, Estwing rock hammer, harbor freight nitrile gloves and a snuffer bottle (Sniping only bottles like mine, the nugget catcher and other variations are best) and do some underwater sniping. Follow bedrock, that is your dinner table!

This is damn near no mans land anymore since dredging stopped, in far out area's there still is virgin ground.

DO NOT GIVE UP! You just need to change what your doing for a little bit to take a break from the rest.
Still bring your sluice with you and your pans because you do find hot spots while sniping where it is more worth while to dig these spots out and sluice or pan rather than fanning and pulling material back.


If you find that you are doing better then you will want to invest in a quality hookah setup later on to reach into those deeper holes.
7' is about my max without air and I have to have something to hold onto when working though.
I have a weight belt now but sometimes its a PITA to hike in places.

BE CAREFUL WITH THE WEIGHT BELT IF YOU ARE DIVING WITHOUT AIR!
Don't go too deep, don't wear so much weight that you sink rather than settle.
Don't wear one if you are not comfortable in the water or with the water conditions or with your own swimming/breath holding abilities.
SNIPING CAN KILL YOU!

I have a nice GoPro video of a 5' wide Manzanita damn near beating me up as it raced down Lower Clear Creek.
Shortly after that a 10' long log that was around 20" around came down too.

Underwater sniping is by far my favorite way to prospect and almost ALWAYS gives me gold.