No problem Rockdoc, but 1st let me say I have no clue what "Banner" means
??
I damm near didn't make it down there for the gathering. I guess somebody "upstairs" saw a way for it to happen.
I loaded up the truck at 3:30 A.M. Sat morning an took off, it was drizzeling rain an by the time I hit the 40 interstate south of Kingman I was going thru a mix of heavy rain and snow.
Slowed down to about 40-45 and had to dim the lights to see.
I considered twice about turning around an going home, thinking what am I getting into
Something kept me going foward instead of turning around.
I was thinking about seeing all the guys again and I just love that atmosphere of a group of Gold Hunters at camp swappin lies at the fire at night.
And commin back to camp each day an seeing what all was found.
Ain't nothin like it, wish I was 20 again and could look foward to another 40 or 50 years of doin it.
Anywho, it went like this,
I started off covering side hills and some flat benches above the washes, that lasted awhile then the horrible temptation to get down into the wash came !!
Just knowing what would be ahead of me in the wash I was hesitant.
I've had a summer filled with diggin holes to China in washes for the ultimate piece of trash.
Started hittin signals thru some big rocks so that involved diggin around them to form a depression to turn then over into cause they were too big to just lift.
After doing that a few times and having it turn out to be the rock I got the drift of the hot rocks there an what they looked like.
Backed OFF on the power of the 3500 a bit to alleviate that syndrome an continued on with a few pieces of trash dug.
Then I hit an
Interesting signal at first, after moving 3 good sized rocks from digging the hole the signal turned to aawww f#$% another large trash piece
(overload) at about 7-8 inches down. Then I kept digging I was using the Ol Minelab Turdy-5-hundred with a 16" NF SL mono (love that analog) and even though
I cut a good sized hole I couldn't be quite sure exactly where the signal was from with the large diameter coil on.
So I called up the hill from where I was for Glenn and Mike to come down Glenn had a 5000 with the new 6x8 NF coil on it so that was perfect for getting
a direction on the dig.
Once I got that I started digging deeper in that direction at about 12-14 inches I started taking big scoopfulls 1 at a time out and waving it over
Glenns coil
waiting for him to say signal or not. Then 1 scoop had the target and I dumped some into 1 hand and it was still in the scoop,
then I picked out this good sized rock out of the scoop and just before I waved it over his coil I looked at him an said Tell me you don't have a signal anymore thats what he said NO SIGNAL !!
WOWSA WOWSA, in my brain I knew I had something good then in my left hand a dirty rock that gave an overload, brushed it once with the other hand an saw a glint of color, thats all it took popped that baby in my big mouth and it came out a muddy hunk of gold an quartz.
Then the dancin started ,... I looked like the ol timer in Bogarts "Treasure of the Sierra Madre" jumpin an praisin Mother Earth !!!!
Then I filled the hole went back to camp where Bunk was and said go get a new set of underwear I got somethin to show ya.
After that our "long distance bartender" Shep showed up with the "Cabo Wabo" the rest is history.
But I'm still recuperating
I'm callin it the Vampire Nugget because thats what it looked like a set of vampire dentures
Fantastic 
could it happen twice in a lifetime 
in AZ that would be wonderful 
Virginia City , Nv has a store where they buy and sell specimens of natural gold , awesome rocks are on display 
Congrats , it's up top 
i would find away to attach a gold chain and wear that around my neck just the way it is . Keep finding Jim
So casual. LOL I woulda passed out...
