Mytimetoshine

[mytimetoshine]

nice bit of river, you have plenty of spots with potential there nice colour too...Im heading out tomorrow so hopefully will do as good ...or better ..lol

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Good luck out there AU Dave!

 

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[Asmbandits]

The curse is over! Lol good gold bro nice picker! That's some strange randomness for sure..

 

[KevinInColorado]

Great story, thanks for taking the time to share it all with us!

 

[The Gilded Lens]

Nothing to see here move along. Mispost

 

[mytimetoshine]

Went prospecting on Saturday to a spot I've been scouting out. There is no easy way to get there.

I got an early start and was on the freeway with coffee by 730. The plan was to go down a 4x4 rd to get to a very steep ridge and then hike down.

Now I have very little 4x4 experience so I knew there was a chance I couldn't make it Amal the way and the back up plan was to cut my losses and go to a proven spot. Well...I got about halfway down the rd and then it's started getting pretty ruff and there were some deep ruts in the Rd. I have a full size a Chevy with 4x4 but I I chickened out lol. Getting my truck stuck in the middle of nowhere with no cell service was NOT part of the plan. Plus nobody know i was there...

So I had to go back up hill in reverse to the last small turnout. I parked,got out of the truck cursed a few times and kicked the tires and my self for not making it. Then..instead of going with my plan B I said screw it.. it's gonna be painful but hey...no pain no gain they say.

I loaded my pack. Full size shovel, bazooka prospector and 5g bucket and started Down the rd. It was only about 1 mile and all down hill from where I parked. What could go wrong?

Made it to the edge of the ravine in short order stopped to gather myself and take in the epic view. I'm not much into topo maps so idk the elevation but I'm gonna ballpark it and say 1000ft. Or 2 inches wide....the river that is. The river is ripping like crazy and if you close one eye it was probably 2 inches across and the sound of the Rapids is just echoing up the canyon. Pretty cool...

It's steep but the trail actually has really good footing but man its an ass kicker for sure.

So I get down to the river and it's wild..the sound of the water is so loud and she was very angry. I found a little spot where I could set up my bazooka and after 5 minutes of rock tossing and dam building it was set perfect.

Naturally I test the dirt right next to the sluice first and color first pan so I just went at it for 4 hrs straight. I did 3 cleanouts. Screened each one to 1/4 inch then panned off the rest of the light stuff and dumped in the catch container.

So I'm packing up not really thinking to much about how much the hike out was gonna suck(because the cleanout looked great!) Lol.

Just as I was making my way to the trail I saw someone down there panning. He had two very very large pitbulls with him. I wasn't expecting to see anyone down there and neither was he probably so I figured I would not go say hi and just sneak out and up the trail. Neither he or the dogs saw me. I get 10 ft up the trail and I had to adjust my gear so I take my pack off and the damn dogs heard me...

They come barking up the sand bar and I'm all like !÷=%!!! These things are huge... there both giving me that stare...you know that stare when an animal is about to attack you? Yea that one...the dogs are barking so the dude whistled and hollered at them. But the water was so loud he had no idea I was there he wasn't paying any attention and wasn't going to be coming to my rescue..

I grip the shovel and think we'll I guess I can get at least get one of them maybe...buy that time one of them had started to kinda jog up the trail at me and I couldn't see him because of some trees so if I was gonna yell I better do it now. I screamed at them GET BACK! Twice as aggressively as I could and then followed it up with a NO! and they just backed up and went back to the water...

Phew! That was not fun at all. I grabbed my **** and got my ass up the hill.

After shoveling all day I instantly noticed the fatigue in my arms while carrying so much gear . I have cons in my bucket now too..lol

The only thing that got me to the top of that damn ravine was fear of pitbulls and adrenaline haha. Then... I look up the rd and man...it's steep too...

It's just one of those days where your sucking wind so hard, your cursing yourself up and down for punishing your self like this but at the same time your laughing cause hey...you wanted to be a gold miner well here it is. Steep rugged terrain and wild annimals..

I have never been so happy to get back to that truck lol... and I escaped on out of there with no injuries and no poison oak and some very promising looking cons!

Set a new record for myself! Yee-haw!

 

[Aufisher]

Wow! Awesome job with the gold and the pups!

 

[Asmbandits]

Jeez man you did fantastic! You must have been on a streak where you were digging, that's a beautiful pan! Congrats on the gold and not getting attacked!

 

[goldenmojo]

Great looking gold and a record tally. Good luck in your future diggins.

 

[mytimetoshine]

Sun:

I was wiped out from Saturday but was determined to get some more gold.

The plan was to meet up with Golden Mojo and head to an easy spot. I wasn't in the mood to hike AT ALL..lol

Still we were on good gold as I ran my bazooka again. Picked some easy diggings in between 2 large boulders and dug as deep as hole as I could.

Beautiful day good company and lots of rest breaks! I think we dug from 930 to 1230. Not a bad take for the effort.

 

[goldenmojo]

Even though we didn't dig for a long time it was a great day out mining with you. i will have to admit I was beat up from work myself and if we stayed any longer we never would have made the hike out of the canyon back to the truck. Hopefully the high water will drop and we will have other areas to work soon.

 

[mytimetoshine]

Made an appearance at the Save the bear river event on Saturday with my daughter Ava.

Pretty disappointed. There was quite a few more people there then a regular Saturday but...

From the website and signs posted l. Park at day use and walk to group campsites. We did just that.....nothing but regular campers.....we walked all the way to the end of the campground and then decided to mine for an hour. Nothing save the bear river anywhere in site.....

Found some 2 inch flood layer sitting in clay with a nice spot to set up my Angus Mackirk drop riffle. And went to town for 45 min. Classified to 1/8 inch,lots of clay..

45 min is about all Ava can handle, even then she was way more interested in making "muck pies" for dinner then she was about getting gold

Then she decided to get her shoes and pants wet so I called it.

Really wished I had driven to the far end of the campground rather then walk....what a bust.

As we were pulling out of the day use area I finally see the event table. At the far end of the parking...as if they were hiding...lol.. what a joke

Too bad Ava was very sad to learn this place will be under water to the tops of the trees...for NO reason.

The new dam is supposed to cover a 20 miles stretch of the river... that crazy... why not build it lower down where you could get the feet acre without covering so much beautiful river access Why cause they want to build homes there and feed them with the water from the dam
..it's a shame

 

[Asmbandits]

I was at the bear today with my daughter as well! Was up river from the campground. I didn't know about the event or I would have changed my plans and headed to the campground. Was such a nice day out today, beautiful on the river it sure is a shame as it's one of the prettiest rivers imo.

 

[mytimetoshine]

Last Saturday I headed back out to the same spot but with a different gameplan.

I decided to pack lighter and take the much longer but much flatter trail to get to the ridge of the area. It ended up being 2.65 miles one way.

Earlier in the week I borrowed Golden Mojo bazooka sniper for the trip. No buckets or shovel. I had just the sniper, gold pan and my pick.

I did my digging with my hands and the pick, filled up the pan and dumped it into the sniper.

Dug for about 4 hrs and cleanout 5 or 6 times. Panned it down and dumped the cons into some plastic freezer ziplocks. Everything fit in my pack and I tied the sniper to the outside.

So happy that the dogs didn't visit it me that day! Although I did see a large king snake on the trail.

Never would be complaining about getting .9 grams but the difference between the smaller gear was quite a bit.

Next time I think I'll bring the sniper and the shovel. A full size shovel is where it's at.

 

[Aufisher]

Outstanding! The Bear is loaded! Sniper in action!

 

[Asmbandits]

Dang dude, you should pull a weekend out there, camp out and move as much as you can. That channel in the first pick looks a lot like old diggings I've found in an area, seems to be paying off well, congrats on finding a hot spot!

 

[mytimetoshine]

Tons of old Diggins that's for sure!

 

[shofs]

Awesome gold and nice spot!
Also that's a very purple gold pan!

 

[mytimetoshine]

Made it out last Saturday with Golden Mojo for a couple hours.

We made our way down to the river right next to the bridge loaded up with the bazooka sniper and a full shovel.

We were making our way down to a new section of the river and the going was easy....easy that is until it wasnt. Lol

To our surprise the river was actually even higher then last time! Left us with a very narrow, steep, Moss and poison oak infested granite obstacle that looked insurmountable at my first glance. I was ready to turn around lol bit Mojo was determined.

I waited around on a nice flat piece of granite enjoying the river as Joe found his way up the rock. I was secretly hoping he wouldn't make it cause I didn't want to go. Lol.

But sure enough he hacks his way through the poison oak all the way to the to the top where there is a 2ft ledge with vegetation on it to boot.

Now this ledge is 30 ft up straight shot to the bottom where your unconscious body after hitting the bedrock will just roll into the raging rapids....

I thought for sure no way he makes it across that so I'm cool..I won't have to follow....NOPE, he crawls across the ledge and is now on the other side hacking poison oak down with his shovel while still clinging to the bedrock 30 ft up.

Fu--! I cannot believe he made it up that. Joe can be quite the mountain goat when he wants to but now I've got to follow lol..

So I'm crawling this ledge in shorts and I'm sure it's full of poison oak. Branches in my face and my 30 lb pack in one arm dangling off the edge. All the time death inches away. Joe hadn't made any progress since I started the climb I got right behind him and was expecting to see a nice easy way down but nope, smooth bedrock. I got just close enough to where he could finally hear me say screw this man I'm outta here. I was scared to death and now I've got to turn on a dime and dangle my pack over the ledge with the other arm.

Made it down and darn near had to change my shorts!!! Well that did not go as planned.

As dangerous as that was my plan of trying to cross the bottom on smooth wet angled granite wasn't a good one either. I think it's safe to say that it was impassable with the water this high.

We were forced to abandon the plan and just go dig up near the bridge.

Still not bad for "bridge gold" oh and man I got eaten alive by mosquitos. Couple days later I literally had poison oak on top of mosquito bytes lol.

Always a fun adventure with you Golden Mojo. See pic of Mojo in action! Lmao

Edit: I'll have to also note that during this trip, Mojo at one point actually said he was bored. Man I'd hate to clean up after your parties!

 

[Sample Pan Dan]

Yep that's mojo, part goat and half crazy...I love that dude!

 

[Goldwasher]

Lol that is awesome....I think that area is out for a while without a boat..
Snows still coming down and when you get the view from the valley. There is a lot left to melt still.
YAY for a good spring finally....sorry it cut you guy off though. For the effort it might be time to look for a way in off of the trail on the north side.