IdahoPeg

So the pup and I headed out to some of my favorite bench areas above the creek; good thing I checked the depth of the water at the crossing before trying to take the side x side through like I normally did in previous years....mid-thigh high, so carried gear and pup to other side and hiked just under a mile to first site:

A granite nob that's been hit by myself and several friends the past couple seasons, but it still keeps squeaking out little tiddlers:

Got a couple there, then moved one to another spot where several more were found after moving some of the old-timers hand-stackings:

Don't need a gym membership when you do this as a hobby! :-)

Anyway, hit a few more areas with some success, but the creme de la creme (or should I say, creme de la crumb?) was this area I dug for hours and cleaned out at least 25 tiny bits....what fun the Monster was having! (To better get in under the roots etc, the Goldbug2 would have been better, but we managed)

The next day and a half hit a couple more spots and ended up with this for my Bench Tour Total.....a lot of work(i.e. fun) for 1.4g lol!

Pup and I had a great few days at the cabin.....but it's time to get the zed and 2300 out again, so off to California later this week! 

Cheers and Happy Hunting! 

p.s. kiwijw, I was inspired by your posts! :-)

Finally got the GM1000 out on the lode mine gravels I have access to. The small coil picked through the iron and trash easier than my GB2 did, and with it being so hot it was REALLY nice not having headphones on. Dug lots of crap, but eventually got a couple nice specimens. Tomorrow, up to one of my favorite benches if I can get across the creek! :-)

OK, I know people are probably tired of looking at my Fly-Poo gold, but check out the amazingly tiny piece in the middle that the GM1000 heard no problem this afternoon up at my "old reliable" bench!  Again, I  had to take out some brush and dig down a little to get these 6 little guys.  Anyone who knows me, knows I love my GB2, but I think I'm starting to love the Monster more....it's such a fun machine! ?

Picked up my GM1000 from Gerry on Friday, then after doing chores up at the cabin got it out yesterday and today. Used the larger coil for scouting out a new spot and after a couple hours of no decent targets yesterday, went over the same area with my GB2. Still nothing, so at least I didn't miss anything in that area, but I wasn't real comfortable with the Monster yet. So today, after yacking with VA Nurse Paul last night and Scott T today...both singing its praises, I put the small coil on it and went to my "old reliable" bench to see if I could squeak out another baby nugget. Moved rocks and dug up some sagebrush....initially hunting with trusty GB2 to get a target, then compare it with the Monster. Wow, it could hear the Fly-poo AU I find up there, and the disc was pretty reliable! I found 3 pieces using the GB2 first, then once I was more comfortable with how the Monster responds, it sniffed out 6 more! I noticed on some "iffy" signals that the Goldbug heard, the Monster picked them up a bit better. I was using manual 10 sensitivity and All Metal/deep, and as others have mentioned, it does false if you hit a rock etc. Not using headphones and having no threshold hum was actually nice for a change too.  Pretty cool machine....tomorrow I'm going to hit the hard rock gravels and see how it does. :-)