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Quality metal detectors have been around long enough that it isn't easy to find virgin ground, no matter what the target goal (coins, relics, nuggets, even jewelry). As previously mentioned, I got hooked on coin collecting when I was in 1st grade thanks to the influence of my mom and two of her brothers. I found my first coin with a metal detector the summer before my senior year in high school (1970). After school and three years in a good job, in 1979 I sprung for a Garrett Groundhog, thinking I would use it to make a nice profit hunting coins and nuggets the way Charles Garrett and Roy Lagal described it in their books.... Then life (many other interests) got in the way. Fast forward 36 (now 38) years when I was again bitten with the MD bug. A lot happened in the treasure hunting world in those 36 years. Detectors got a lot better, and the hobby (or even 'profession' for some) had blossomed. The low hanging fruit had been picked. There is still plenty of treasure in the ground, but most is not very close to the surface and/or severely masked by junk metal, meaning it's going to take new equipment and techniques and/or a disproportionate amount of digging to find the good stuff. But as always, there are exceptions. I mentioned in a recent thread last week that I had stumbled upon a lot where an old home had recently been razed, and it appears that the city now owns it with the intent of appending the land to an adjacent park. It's like stepping back in time -- a time when the detectors were few and primitive. And on my journey on this time machine I was allowed to bring along a Fisher F75! I felt like Cinderella at the ball. My previous post reported that in 3 1/2 hours on Independence Day I found two silver coins along with five Wheat cents, using three detectors to sample the ground. This past Saturday I stayed the entire time with the 5 inch DD on the F75, FA (fast) process, gain of 70, zero discrimination, 4H tones. I had twice as much time to hunt and I only stopped to get water and food which I brought along in the car. I again dug two silver coins (dimes -- see photo below) but this time 34 coppers, NO zinc, and only two clad (dimes). Earlier my Wheat to copper ratio was 50%. If that held up I'd have 17 Wheaties. I could only hope. Arriving home and soaking them, I was amazed to see 27 reverses with Wheat stalks. You'd have thought I spent the day on a combine in Kansas. Four Wheats per hour. Will I ever again experience such a high recovery rate? To emphasize, I hunted two rectangles in those seven hours, one along the city sidewalk, about 6 ft X 60 ft. The other was of similar area along one side of the now missing house. I wasn't finding 'spills'. One hole had three coppers and another had two nearly touching Memorials, but all others were single finds. The most enlightening thing to me is the depth of the coins. All but one (in that group of three coppers) were 4 inches or less. The Barber dime was in the 3 1/2 --> 4 inch depth range. The Merc was 1 inch deep! I don't think the ground where I found the Merc had been distrurbed or reworked recently. The sod looked typical of the area. Is this what it was like back in the late 80's and 90's? Many of you should remember. I returned the next day for another 5 hours but the glass slipper had fallen off and the coach had reverted to a pumpkin. I'll give a followup post on that hunt plus next weekend's planned return hunts. There has to be more there, but now I've harvested the low hanging fruit and what's left appears to be seriously masked with iron nails from the missing house.

I was detecting a steep narrow gulch with a vertical wall on one side and thick viscous thorn bushes on the other when a red eyed golden fanged rattle snake slithered out from a crevasse right at the level of my jugular vein. As the snake coiled back to deliver my slow painful death, I leaped straight up about 5', did a 360 degree pirouette, an delivered a stunning, precise, back hand blow with my GPZ7000 light saber and bonked the ol' snake right on the noggin. The snake crawled back into his hole in humiliated defeat and I continued detecting. I then found one of golden fangs that I had dislodged during the brief battle for my life. There my be one or two of you that question the truth of parts of my story so I have retained the services of Sourdough Scott to present photographic proof, should it become necessary.

All Winter/Spring in Rye Patch this year was a tough deal fighting the ground noise. We knew we had to wait till Summer for the ground to dry out for some spots that hold the deep gold. Robin & I, were on and extended road trip that started for a few days in Laughlin, NV and a hunt out in the gold basin area. Then a short drive to Las Vegas for a couple days and then ending up in Reno stopping here and there for a hunt on placers along the way. During this time, a couple Buddies where sending me pictures of their Rye Patch poke. Braving the heat and with night hunts fighting off the Rattlers with some impressive pokes! While in Reno, they told me to checkout weather for the upcoming weekend! What Spring time conditions in June! ? We made our hunt plans. I got home and unpacked Robin's Jeep and tossed my Detecting gear in my truck and the next morning bright and early hit the road with some heavy rains on the California side of the hill on I-80. Rains, gave way to partly cloudy in Nevada...new speed limit East of Fernly, NV is 80 mph, what! My hunting partners Rudy & Steve caught me in Lovelock filling my truck up and off we went...arriving at Rudy's last spot of deep nuggets at 11:00 am. Rudy, deployed out of Steve's pickup like a seasoned Veteran and was on his little patch as Steve and I, was still gearing up! He had two nuggets before we hardly had our detectors tuned, each around a foot deep. I knew the area and gave Rudy a wide berth respecting his 23" biceps ? as he swings and extra large pick with rocks flying in all directions on each swing of his pick. I soon, popped two deep nuggets and Steve yanked out a fabulous 2 dwt Chevron. We had to run back to the trucks as a heavy downpour of rain gave us a break for a late lunch. Soon after, hit it again, or should I say Rudy with a couple more nuggets before we headed back to camp. Next morning, was more of the Rudy show! He called me over to his chewed up 20 ft long deep nugget Patch for a listen of a target! I stuck my coil into a 6" scrap and heard the classic nugget tone...we both smiled at each other as I gave a head nod of approval ?. We now began a 30 minute dig through the shale. Rudy's pick at 15" had to give way for my special bedrock pick in the back of my truck. At 20" this target was screaming bloody murder on the GPZ, but so does a 2 dwt'er! Many breaks later and another 4" deeper we knew we were close. Rudy's pen pointer was pointing at the crevice in the bottom of the hole. Steve, finally works his way over to see what we are doing on our bellys with our heads in a big hole! I give way, as I heard his bench made pocket knife open up and Rudy moved his giant finger away from the pointed spot. A couple scraps and out pops the fruit to the effort of the dig! Over 8 dwts nugget, is sweet in any gold field new or old diggings. Steve and I, bowed to Rudy as the King of the short hunt weekend as he added a couple more before he finally let us pick up the scraps in his mini patch. He was laughing at our misfortune sipping a cold one in a lawn chair for a couple dinks! But, it's the hunt, the thrill. What a great hobby to keep your blood pumping...over 18 dwts on them coils. The trip home with a cold I picked up from Robin, hit me hard and so did the surprise snow storm on top of Donner Pass. Home safe and nursing my cold and wishing I was on the hunt, before the heat comes back to the high desert! Until the next hunt LuckyLundy

Last week we had a brief cooling spell in sunny Yuma so I took the opportunity to get out with the Deus again. I was scouting a new area wearing my typical Yuma attire, shorts and T-Shirt and had not yet put on my gear and most regrettably had not put on my knee pads. I was pushing up through some steep terrain with loose gravel and big rocks. I took a wrong step and had one of those slow motion thoughts about this not ending well. It seems that gravity has some fairly predictable adverse effects on short, chubby, 62 yr old detectorists traversing tricky ground. I made roughly 3 rotations on the way down, coming to rest against some nasty rocks. As I lay there gathering my wits and waiting for pain to alert me to any major injuries, I wondered, not for the first time, why I do this, especially all alone. Nevertheless, I picked myself up and found I was bleeding pretty good from a puncture in fat part of my right palm. Then, I felt a searing pain from my right hamstring across my butt cheek to my scotumus maximus. Not cut mind you, just internal wrenching. I assume that's what the NFL calls a "groin strain". So I hobbled to safety and set about to stop the bleeding in my palm. It was only then that I noticed my left knee bleeding pretty good as well. I got some wound wash and squirted the knee clean, muttering "that's going to leave a mark". Since I didn't have the services of our favorite medic VANursePaul, I figured I better let the professionals at this one. I had my son take me to Sunny Yuma Regional Medical Center ER. Fairly quick work, XRays all negative, hand, knee and hip. 10 stitches in the knee, a script for Vicodin and I was on my way in just over 2 hrs. I'm pretty sure you're not supposed to mix my favorite analgesic "Dago Red" with the Vicodin, but the words "alcohol my intensify effect" seemed to suggest otherwise. So, last night I removed the last of the stitches and the knee feels fine, if not a little tender. The palm wound is still really sore and the "groin strain" is a killer. I walked a 1/4 mile this morning on flat blacktop in my neighborhood and the hamstring feels like an ice pick punching through my butt cheek to my nether regions. I'm losing my mind being hobbled and not outside outsmarting some gold nuggets. We have a bit of a cooling trend over the next few days, highs in the low 90's, so I'll be back at it, albeit a little slower and a little more careful. Hopefully, good news later this week on the rescheduled outing 4 with the Deus HF. So until then, as Sgt Esterhaus on Hill Street Blues used to say, "let's be careful out there".

Title chosen because I'd be banned if I wrote what I really wanted. Spotted a camper parked in the scrub not far from a well, so went to see who and introduce myself. No one was there so I followed the tracks as they were heading to the well. They went passed the well and towards the next one which isn't in a known gold area but is in an area that holds a lot of water especially after the rain we've had. Bugger me if the track didn't keep going and into a no go area. I knew I would either come across them heading back out or bogged. Sure enough, 4klms in and there's a Hilux duel cab bogged up to its eyeballs with a very relieved to see me NSW couple in their 70's. They had been there all day with nothing but a now empty thermos of coffee, no comms, no recovery gear, no food or water. And of cause I get bogged trying to get them out. As it was 4.30pm no option but to stay put for the night. I gave them what food I had as they had not eaten all day, plus plenty of water. They slept in their ute and I slept in mine plus in front of a fire when it got too cold. They next morning I hiked 17klms out to the road with the intent of getting a lift the 60klms into town and then a lift back out to the homestead to pick up my other ute and come get the couple and drop them at their van. I'd let them worry about retrieving their ute themselves. As luck would have it for them and me, a mining company offered to get us both out which they did with the aid of my 5 chains and two snatch straps plus a hell of a lot of shovel work. A very embarrassed but pretty shallow thankyou from the couple and a carton of beer and about 20 very greatful and heartfelt thankyous from me. And now the track is stuffed for about 100 yards. Unfortunately, the laws in Australia are written in such a way that makes it illegal for me to head butt them.

Got out Friday, and decided to use the good ol Boat Anchor 19 " coil on the ZED. After finding the Specimen Gold, and into it 2 hours, my Bungee broke, and I had to go to my backup bungee, and also switched back to the 14". I was using the High Yield Mode with the 19" coil, since the soils here are not to bad, and I seem to get a little more depth using the 19" with High Yield. Dave.

Steve has started a topic on the GPZ 19 coil and last Thursday I was using that coil in Gold Basin. Many of us have been to Gold Basin and we roughly know the conditions with gullies, benches, mountains and hills. Little of it is 'flat' but some of the benches are large and open. Some of the ground has been extensively worked with dry washers in the past and present. My area for the day was on a slope in a well known claim and I wanted to find a deep nugget. I've heard that they are there so I have the right equipment. As luck would have it about 100 ft from where I parked I got a faint signal. It was repeatable so I know I had to dig it. The area was up on a higher slope of a larger gully and had not been worked with equipment. I scraped and scratched and could still hear the signal. Time to dig. The signal got louder. I changed settings from normal to difficult and could still hear it ... maybe not a hot rock but it could be ?? I'm down now over a foot which exceeds most of my 19" holes so far and I can hear it getting louder so I go to the SUV and get my pin pointer, GB Pro and camera. Still too deep for the pointer and the GB Pro. Lu comes over with the 2300 and can't hear it either. Dig, dig more down next to a big rock ... is it the rock? GB Pro now jumps around on the numbers 42, 75, 15 ... I'm getting close. Lu says it is a hot rock. I dig and dig with my long handle pick and finally it is out of the hole. I scoop and scoop looking for color and then ... TRASH. It is an old, long 22 shell casing that has been damaged. Deep trash ... HOW? Never that deep before. Why? It is my theory that the shell fell into a squirrel hole. It was not a surface target that fell into the dug hole. I'll never know but it was one of my deepest digs with the 19 (18" or so). It would have been great if it was a nugget that deep and it is one of the reasons I will continue to use the 19. I don't think I could hear that trash with the 14. (Writing this perhaps I should have taken the time to try.) After my learning and disappointment it was time to fill my hole. I wish it was a gold story. Mitchel

I bought a 1000 square meter residential stand in Bulawayo sometime in 2015. The Civil Engineer who helped me clear the place of trees told me that the type of rocks on the property could be carrying gold bearing veins. I took pieces of the rocks for assay and the results were promising. (See picture below for grades per tonne). Unfortunately one cannot mine on residential stands here. Now it turns out there are old mine workings nearby and there is a mine called Old Nickel also and it probably owns the mineral rights in the area. It motivated me to take an interest in finding out more about gold as my country is basically rich with all sorts of minerals all over. Bulawayo is generally a gold bearing town, there is what is called the Bulawayan Greenstone belt. So it runs even under my house and I sleep on gold ore that I cannot touch and spend my days on a desk job. It struck a cord of discontent in me that has brought me to the point of now being about to dig my 1st shaft 30 km from town where, with the necessary paperwork, one is allowed to mine. Initially I had bought a GPX 5000 which I ended up selling because I just did not have the time to walk around in the bush detecting, worse still neither did I have the patience.

I've been chomping at the bit to get outdoors, like everyone...so, after a few delays, my wife was sick (better not go yet) and so on and so forth I finally made it out on the road at 3am Wednesday morning (insert happy face here). The road was empty and conditions were clear, the drive up to lovelock was easy as 6 hour drives go and the gnawing pain on the left side of my lower back was tolerable. I checked into the casino at 9 in the morning and they had a room ready right away, things are going well...a good sign. I was doing a little research over the winter and came across this travel blog with listings for all the ghost towns in Nevada as a google earth overlay, the link is to a google earth KMZ file Http://www.forgottennevada.org if you have not seen this it's great information complete with history, gps cords, directions and photographs. So the first day I did a little touring around the towns of Tunnel, Mazuma and Seven Troughs, really interesting seeing the old relics in Tunnel and the canyon where the town of Mazuma was washed away in the 1912 flash flood. Thursday the weather was really nice, there was a little breeze, but low down in the washes the conditions were perfect. Later towards the end of the day I managed to hit a little section where the soil had eroded down about 6 inches to bedrock and within a fairly short span hit 3 little nuggets all sweet high/low with a slight warble, lodged in the bedrock shale and under a trickle of water. the first nut being the largest and my first piece of chevron gold the second piece slightly smaller and the last one was the baby (nice little happy gold family). Friday was perfect weather and only a slight breeze, I headed back to the same area, but couldn't repeat my previous days success. Saturday I hunted a different spot and it was pretty much a bust as the wind was really blowing. I took a drive up on top of the mountain (should have headed home) just for a look around and the wind was blowing so strong it was difficult to even walk. Sunday morning I headed home west on i80, light snow in lovelock and by the time the highway started to climb conditions were deteriorating and the road was getting slick. I kept finding my self dropping my speed down to about 35 and cars were blasting past me doing their best to get as close to the speed limit as they could, feeling bad I picked my pace up to 45 and (foolishly) set the c control at 40 as I was feeling like I was obstructing traffic and felt I was being overly cautious. One mini van passed me doing at least 60 and I thought to my self I'd probably be seeing his car again later down the road. High wind advisory was in effect and just as I crested the hill a really strong wind gust hit me from the right and i80 downhill was all ice...there it is and right away you know this is not going to end well. The back end of the jeep kicks around hard and I let off the gas, steer into it and s&!t, the damn c control kicks in I forgot that I'd set it earlier and my jeep is powering into the counter steer on ice downhill. Jab the brake zig zagging several times and the damn wind is blowing me across from the slow to the fast lane and I'm running out of room. One more zag and my backend slams into the guard rail hard, in my mind I can see the rear fender/bumper askew at an odd angle mentally I'm considering the replacement of parts. The one thing I'm thankful for is the impact gave me an opportunity, it stopped my zig zag death spiral...knocking me straight, no need to stop as I'm back in the right direction, jeep driving fine and nothing I can do about it now. I keep looking in my mirrors and can't see any damage, no clanking flapping things shouting to passing vehicles of my adventure, hmmm. 5 minutes passes and traffic slows to a stop, the guy behind me pulls along side to ask if I'm OK, I thank him give a shrug and a thumbs up just as the truck in front of me moves just enough to reveal the mini van that had passed earlier, blocking all lanes after careening front end off same said guard rail. As I slowly passed the unfortunate driver, the front end of the mini van struggled a small wave of acknowledgement, my jeep rolled silently past ignoring the gesture. I80 was closed and my nerves were slightly on edge all other routes home were closed as well, so I resolved to spend the night in Reno and checked into the el dorado. After finding a parking spot I began checking my jeep for damage, don't see any...fenders are fine bumper is where it was last time I looked at it. No bent metal anywhere...except the bottom right corner of the rear license plate is bent, the plastic plate holder is fine as it sprang back into normal shape after impact, a little dirt smudge on the rear plastic fender and smudge on the rear left Micky Thompson, but no permanent marks. The alignment seems fine and everything works normal, I'll have to inspect everything more, but all seems well...teflon coated. just bent the license plate, I could straighten it, but I'm thinking that might be bad luck and it adds "character." Things were supposed to improve on i80 late in the afternoon the following day. Monday trying to kill time until the roads open up I joined the morning Holden tournament and won first place, paying for my road trip. Feeling lucky I jump in the jeep as Truckie residents are being allowed through and my lucks on a roll so might as well see what happens, long story short I'm gonna play the morning Holden tournament tomorrow and see if I can repeat. After hitting the roadblock and giving cal trans my best poker face "Truckie sir" at state line my bluff was to no avail and they turned all the sinners around at the Donner road exit. I didn't bring a scale so I'll weigh my 3 little treasures and update when I get back.

Hi everybody, just wondering how many of us when learning or many other circumstances that come into play have made you walk away from a target iffy or not that plays on your mind that you need to return? Or have gone back and done well on the gold.

I couldn't stand it any longer. I had to go do a little detecting between storms so I pushed the Jeep out of the shed, aired up the leaky tire, topped off the brake fluid and rolled it down the driveway and got it started. I tossed in the GPZ and off I went. Then came back for my pick. Our rainfall here is now about 250% above normal and I came to a mud hole where there has never been one before. I eased the Jeep in, not knowing how deep it might be, and the left side sunk in past the floor board. I would have been ok but I hadn't yet turned my hubs in. I crawled out over the hood and turned the right hub in but since the jeep was listing about 35 degrees to starboard the down hill side was a different story. Needless to say I slid off of the hood head first into the mud pit. As I traveled on around the North side of the mountain I started encountering snow drifts and I finally came to one that slightly detained me but after about an hours worth of digging with my pick I was on my way. And then went back and got my pick. I arrived at where I normally park and started wading through the snow to the gulch that I wanted to detect in. This gulch is quite deep with vertical sides and normally runs very little water. Not this year. It looked like a major contributor to the problems at the Oroville dam. I figured that if I was careful I could stay on top of the boulders and work my way down the gulch and detect the freshly scoured bedrock between the snow drifts. That worked for about two steps. I wound up wading in snow melt water up past my knees. The sun and the temperature were both going down fast but I started finding little nuggets one after another. My fingers, toes and brain were becoming numb so I knew it was time to quit but I did find 7 nuggets for just over 3dwt. I got to thinking about all my friends at Detector Prospector. All you wimps that go to Arizona, Florida and southern California deserts for the winter. And the ones that are at home watching TV and sitting at their computers and those that are south of the equator that have no challenges whatsoever when nugget hunting. YOU ARE ALL CRAZY! In fact,as soon as this storm is over I going right back! to get my pick. Foot Note: Chris Ralph has posted a photo of a pretty nugget he found between the storms. He may exempt himself from my harsh judgement.

The July 2016 issue of the ICMJ magazine contains an article I wrote reprising my 2011 trip to Australia to hunt gold with Chris Ralph and Jonathan Porter. There was of course a lot more to say about the trip than was contained in the article, and in particular I have a lot more photos to share. I kept a diary while on the trip, and this thread is intended to provide a much more detailed look at the trip. I will keep posting on this thread in a serial fashion similar to what I did with my Alaska gold adventures with my diary providing daily details. It all started in 2010 at the old AMDS Adventure Forum when I made this post on a thread: "Hi murph, You know, for many years it was my dream to go hunt nuggets in Australia. I got Doug Stone's books and read everything else I could and dreamed of those monster nuggets. But as years went by I read between the lines and figured it is a tough go to find the big nuggets in Australia these days. The fact is you only read about people making finds, but plenty of visitors to Oz find no gold. There is always the home team advantage. It is not so much what you know as who you know, and I'll always have a tremendous advantage in Alaska just because I've lived here all my life. Though I do have a few contacts in Oz that might give me a leg up on the average visitor. Still, it may be that my chance to visit Australia is coming as my circumstances have taken a turn for the better. So maybe in a couple years?" That in turn generated a response from famed Australian gold prospector Jonathan Porter: "Steve I will tell you this, if you ever decide to visit Australia it would be my pleasure to show you around. There is still plenty of potential here in Australia, the auriferous areas are just too extensive and in some cases very inaccessible so there just has to be good nugget patches waiting for someone gutsy enough to come along and swing their coil over that first lump. I intend to get into some tiger country this year and could do with a good partner who doesn't need a gold fix every day, interested? - JP" It turns out that JP and ICMJ Associate editor Chris Ralph had been discussing the possibility of a joint prospecting trip in Australia. I had met Chris previously when I had invited him up to visit my Moore Creek pay-to-mine operation several years earlier. A few messages were passed back and forth offline, and I was fortunate enough to be invited to join in on the adventure. Trying to pick the best time as regards weather was a big priority, and it was decided that the fall of 2011 would be the best bet for putting a trip together. Australia is in the southern hemisphere, and so the seasons are the reverse of what we experience in the United States. Our fall is their spring and we timed it to hit cooler temperatures that would be warming while we were there. Jonathan's advice was critical here. We wanted several weeks to give it a good go and decided the entire month of September 2011 would work well. That gave us plenty of time to plan and make arrangements so we put it on our calendars. To be continued.... Photo courtesy of Aurum Australis

Here it is nearing the end of January and no one has come up with a "Year In Review" post or an introspective list of new years resolutions. Well, It's a dirty job but someone has to do it. So I guess it's up to me but be warned- I am the worst choice among us for the job. The reason being is I am a forward looking man. When I look to the upcoming prospecting season, I see warm days, deep blue skies, puffy white clouds, gentle breezes, and hours of mindless wondering interrupted only by the occasional unearthing of numerous nuggets. Big ones at that. When I look at the year in review I see batteries left on the charger, broken pick handles, flat tires, excessive heat, frozen toes and fingers, flies and mosquitoes and Sourdough Scott pilfering my Snikers bars. But what may be of interest is my last years detecting log. I have kept detecting logs for several years showing the date, location, nugget count, gross weight and notes on any thing that may be useful later on. Last year I used the GPZ exclusively except for a little training for some folks with GPZs and using a 6" coil on the 5000 to clean up some rich bed rock found with the 7000. The interesting part being my nugget count is up by the hundreds and the gross weight is slightly down. Not sure what to think of it. Oops! I nearly forgot the New Years Resolutions. I don't need any. The ones from last year are still in new and unused condition.

Picked up an SCD2300 for my son from a fellow member of this forum right before Christmas. Thanks Allen! Finally made it out for just a few hours today with my 9 year old son. Third target, a nice little picker! First 2 targets were the tiniest shot I have ever found with a detector. I am amazed at the response from the SDC on such a tiny target. We were working around a small bedrock outcropping and I was teaching him what to listen for and how to retrieve a target. After the first two targets were lead shot within about 12 inches of each other, the third target had to be shot also (within the same area). I wanted to move on and he said no way let's dig it. About an inch into the decomposing bedrock the target had moved. He grabbed a handful of dirt and had the target in his hand. The target was small and he was having a little trouble figuring out how to split the dirt between his hand and the scoop, but when he finally had a few small bits of dirt in the scoop I could see a glint of yellow. Once he realized it was gold he kept saying I told you we should dig that target! Dad you wanted to walk away! I will probably never hear the end of it. Well, he was right! We spent about 3 hours out in the Motherload on an absolutely beautiful afternoon. Temps on my truck showed 60 degrees. We moved to another spot that I found several nuggets at a few years ago to give the sdc a go to finish the day. Steve H. you, Chris R., and Steve W., and Mike G. were there the day I found the nuggets at this spot. First target was the tiniest piece of gold I have ever found with a metal detector. It does not even register on the scale. I didn't take a picture of the tiny piece cause it probably would not even show up in a picture it was so tiny. I am amazed that any detector could find a piece of gold so small. I doubt it will even register on my gmt. We had a great day and my son should be able to really use this detector on his own next time out. He took to it like...on... Funny thing he found some old rusty sardine cans and a broken old flashlight to take for show-and-tell at school tomorrow along with his piece of gold. Looking forward to getting out again!

Freezing Rain here in Kansas thought I would share my story if it's ok with Steve. Two Gold Coins It was July in 1985 I had been Metal Detecting since the early 60’s. I started with a Heath kit from Radio Shack than 2 Compass detectors Judge and Judge-2 , in 1983 I bought a Teknetics 8500 and converted it to a hip mount . In July 1985 after a summer rain my brother was hunting arrow heads in a plowed field and a Deer had ran across the field his hoof had flipped over a 1880 Silver Dollar. I got a call that night from him and he told me the story said he would tell me where it was for half of what I found. That was agreed to so the next day we met and he took me to a field by a small creek and I commenced to hunt it. He started to hunt for Arrow heads again and I went to swinging my coil hoping for another silver dollar the first hit was a 1882 Gold 5 Dollar coin I stared in disbelief my first gold coin and I would have to give him half. That was not going to happen As it is in Kansas in July after a rain it gets very hot and I was swinging as fast as I could to cover more ground I was beat and left worrying how to share a 5 Dollar coin, after all I had agreed to half and keeping ones word is what I have learned to abide by. The next day I was early at the site it was getting hot already There were a few coins found Indian heads, a seated half, and liberty head nickels, early Wheat's and I was getting overheated when a front came through with a cool breeze that could only come from heaven. Then it happened a hit and 1880 $5 gold coin appeared in the dirt, my worries were over I gave my brother his half of the Gold coins and I kept the rest of the coins that I had found. Later we determined that it was a picnic grove from a small town a half mile away that was 4 houses and a church away from being a Ghost Town . My brother still has the Silver Dollar he found and the $5 gold coin I gave him and I still have my first $5 Dollar gold coin KS Stick.

I keep on having strange things happen at sites I map dowsed for gold and minerals, one time for treasure. Just wondering if this ever happens to anybody else? This last time I am 95% sure I was talking to a ghost woman in the Maine woods and trying not to be attacked by her snarling white Labrador dog. She seemed to know I was searching for something? I was trying to find a gemstone deposit I had left alone in them woods 30 years previous when I had found this perfect dark blue pointed hexagonal crystal under a rock formation, long as my index finger, and flawless, sun shining thru it but could not bear to break it off...dammit...was in the right place at the right time for a change...might have been a dark blue topaz crystal I am thinking now... Somehow she knew I was looking to find it I am thinking? This woman looked just as real as anybody else that I see every day and ditto for her dog but I thought it was rather odd she was out in the deep woods wearing short shorts and the ferocious pooch NEVER once barked at me, just was snarling, growling, teeth bared, looked like it wanted to tear my face off, and unleashed, and she did nothing to calm it down...She also had a leather thing on her belt, by her hip, which she kept pointing towards me.It looked too small to be a pistol holster, am guessing it was about 3 x3 inches square. I had a heavy knapsack of rock busting tools and a 6 foot crowbar in hand but was exhausted from my hike up and down steep hills and trying not to fall down in the rocks along the creek. I was standing beside the creek, admiring the tumbling mountain waters when I turned around and the 2 of them were right behind me. She asked for my name and I gave her my first name. Then she says she was out for a walk in the woods to see who might be out there. I had got all my permissions arranged but she did not accuse me of trespassing. Just wanted to know what I was Searching for? I told her I was kinda lost and my car was parked by the ford. But she seemed to NOT know what a ford was until I explained it to her. So then she points up the hill behind her and says that trail will take you back to your car. I only took my eyes off her and the angry dog for a few seconds but when I turned back , she and the mean dog had totally vanished , no branches cracking, nothing...I took this event as a sign I should give up my search for the crystal deposit and hoofed it back to my car. When I went by the shop where I had to get the permissions, I related my tale. One of the workers lived barely 1/2 mile from where the incident happened and told me she didn't have a clue who the woman was? Dunno if I will ever get brave enough to go look for the crystals again now? Heck, how do you test if you are talking to a ghost vs a real person and that snarling dog? Heck, I couldn't move a muscle without that beast tensing his hind legs, looking to tear me to pieces... I never heard of ghosts guarding mineral deposits ,only pirate gold.... -Tom

Robin & I, planned to met our Friends in Las Vegas! After carefully stuffing everything from her high heels, camping gear and detectors into her Jeep Grand Cherokee Overland, we hit the road to the Luxor Casino for a weeks stay. Needless to say, my Partner Mike and I, planned on leaving the Wives back in Sin City with our $, for a couple days of chasing nuggets on the Arizona side of the river. We met up with another friend, who Winters in Glendale, AZ and hit the hills in and around Gold Basin for a fast hunt of some old patches. Mike, didn't let us down and we scored several nuggets with some great Weather and comradeship...it's the hunt and the sweet sound of a nugget under your coil. Nuggets are just the bounus! All good things have to end and we headed back to Las Vegas and our Ladies and finished our Las Vegas gambling, drinking & eating spree. Now, to re-pack that Jeep to head down to 29 Palms to hunt the Dale District with Robin. She has never hunted there with me, but seen the nuggets I'd bring home and the many stories and pictures of some very special nuggets. Well needless to say, she was nursing a very fun last night with her Girlfriend on our drive South. We arrived and I stopped and tossed the Jeep empty and then loaded up our mining gear and hit a nearby patch...Robin, was moving awful slow, lol. So, we went back to our gear and I setup camp before it got to dark. Set the tent up and made it almost as comfy as that Kig size bed back in Vegas, lol. Next Morning, she looked like she didn't sleep a wink. I made some strong coffee to knock the last of her Margaritas out of her and gave her a pointy finger and I set off for the hunt in the chilly desert morning with her sipping coffee. Well every now and then I'd pop up on a hill and I'd think I could still see her sitting there? Couple hours later I look over that way again and see the hatch back of the Jeep was shut, well she must be feeling better and she is hunting? Well 4 hours and no good, but I was hungry. Headed back to camp for a fast sandwich and I hear her say any luck! Robin was in the front seat of her Jeep reading a book! I told her no luck, and there is no gold here, lets load up and drive back home! She was happy and she had that Jeep nearly loaded before I finished my breakfast, lol. Yes, all that stuff fitted into that Jeep! Well until the next hunt...good or skunked, they are all fun! LuckyLundy

Silly me, I didn't think you could do any worse than getting skunked, but today proved that there is something worse. Somewhere along the way, in a very rough and steep hydraulic pit I lost my detecting pick. I didn't just leave it laying, it somehow got brushed out of my pivoting hammer holder on my belt. Too darned wiped out to go back and look today, I'll make a special recon trip tomorrow and find it. I just hate "do it twice" type things.

I took my well worn Polaris 500 out for some exploration in an area that produced gold last year. It had been giving some fuel problems so my son replaced the carburetor and all the fuel and vacuum hoses. It ran fine at home, so I thought it was good to go. I got out to gold country and about 3 miles out from camp it crapped out from a want of fuel. I could get it started and running only if choked. I had no tools with me and decided to walk back to camp and futz with it tomorrow. This morning I packed basic tools and plotted a walking course that would at least take me past some spots that had produced gold last year. After numerous hills and gullys I crossed a gully that had some exposed bedrock so I detoured and noticed signs of digging in a portion of shallow overburden. Sure enough someone had scrapped a signal and given up thinking it was just hot bedrock. I pulled 2 tiny bits of gold out of the same hole and noticed that this particular gully ran NW in the direction I needed to go anyway. As I got further up the gully I could see that the oldtimers had handstacked portions of the gully and someone in the near recent past had detected it, marking target spots with a few stacked rocks. I can only assume they detected it with a VLF because I started finding gold with the Zed in the deeper sections and in the banks under handstacked rocks. After 3 decent nuggets I was stoked and forgot all about that crapped out quad. As always good things come to an end. I got to the end of the gully finding all the gold pictured below. I climbed a high spot to get my bearings and found that the quad was only 1/2 mile away. I got down there and futzed with the quad and found that I could get it going with minimal throttle and choke locked. I poked along until it died again with no sign of restarting. After futzing with the fuel lines a while longer I found the newly installed hose had pulled the fuel return cock fitting out of the carb. I jammed it back in, she started right up and ran like a scalded dog. So, if my quad had not crapped out and forced me to walk over some new ground, I probably would have come home with a few crumbs. Although, I still have high hopes for the area I intended to explore, you just never know. Bye the way I was running the Zed WFO, HY Normal, Sens 20, Volume maxed, Threshold at 1(only because there is no 0). Very quiet ground to work in, minimal trash. The lack of threshold is making some tiny nuggets pop through, maybe its just me, but I'm really liking these settings. Until next time, keep er low and slow.

The unpleasant effect of unloading your truck with all your gear! Now, I don't mind loading it up with the same gear and I more than enjoy the hunt for nuggets. My poor truck is always stuffed with gear and I'm glad I had the forethought of purchasing a Dodge Mega Cab which is also packed with stuff I don't want to get wet during the trip! I've also, slept countless night in the back Cab as the seats fold down big and flat. But, unloading it is a chore that I must be medicated for! I had a fun Veterans Day Week hunt in the High Desert...can't wait to load my truck up again, but...Until the next hunt! LuckyLundy

They say as you grow older, you grow wiser. I think I have found the secret to eternal youth. Shun wisdom. I am planning one more grand prospecting adventure before I get stormed out of the high country. The thought of a vehicle breakdown and a long walk home used to never occur to me but for some reason nowadays it does so I thought I would do a little deferred maintenance on my old Jeep. The first item is a pesky water leak. I poked a stick in the bottom radiator hose this spring when some idiot planted a Manzanita bush right in my way. A quick wrap of duct tape has worked well all summer but now the leak is getting to be a bit much. So this time there will be no half a--ed repairs. I Put on two layers of tape. While I was repairing the hose I noticed the tie rod end had wallowed out the tapered hole in the steering knuckle. This could very likely be part of the cause of a violent shake that always develops between 68 and 74 mile per hour (that and three miss matched tires). Two flat washers and a new nail in the castle nut fixed it right up. Now on to the brakes. Last week I discovered, at a very inopportune time, that some one had apparently siphoned the break fluid out of the reservoir. This necessitated finding a very large, very soft , very close tree, very fast. in such circumstances three out of four aint' bad. So I topped off the brake fluid - again. The next little detail is the headlights. It seems they have developed quite a sense of humor, going out at the most hilarious of times. I'm not much of an elektricalishon so I'll just plan on being home by dark. The last item is the starter. It's been acting up lately and won't engage if I'm not parked perfectly level. So I'll simply ask Sourdough Scott if he would like to ride along. I'm getting wiser all the time. I hope Sourdough isn"t.

A while back Mr. Tboykin was gently admonished by the adult members of this forum to use better judgment concerning the situations he gets himself into. I didn't reply with a post as he had my full sympathy and understanding. I also like to nugget hunt "where no man has gone before" (and few women). I had just spent a long day of detecting an area of cliffs beneath an ancient channel exposure. This required standing on a size 2 ledge with my size 12 feet and hanging on to wisps of grass while I swung the 7000 over my head and below my feet. It was getting late and I was totally worn out so I headed for home but I still had one more bit of climbing to do before I could get to where it was easy going. This climbing maneuver was going to tax the limits of my athletic abilities and failure would mean, at best, a painful fall and the likelihood of breaking something or several somethings. I realized I was going to have to place my left food about waist high and be sure it had a good purchase then grab a questionable hand old above my head with my left hand, launch myself up with my right foot and while in mid air, turn my bu-- (tail) 90 degrees and land on it. I should never have looked down. I saw visions of Ravens picking the eyeballs out of my living but immobile body and bears not leaving enough DNA for proper identification. However the fright gave me a slight boost of adrenaline and I was able to complete the maneuver. With some grace, I might add. I have learned my lesson. Next time I go detecting ---I'll park my Jeep where it's easier to get in.

They say it takes you a year to find your first nugget with a detector. The way I see it I have a lot of catching up to do with the crusty old guys and so I better get to digging. I figure if I try hard enough I can beat the odds, but we'll see. I've been researching a local gold region the past few weeks and have made two trips out in search of pocket gold. Lots of mining activity going back to the 1800's, several claims, creeks with plenty of color to pan. Most people there go to the same spots to look for gold, and the source has never been found. To stay legal I'm focusing on BLM areas, and to stay fit I'm going way off the beaten path. First trip I skunked but dug up some memories that are worth every drop of sweat. The latest one almost ended up very badly. I located what I thought was a vein of white rock (hoping for quartz) using Google Earth. Then correlated this with historical mining activity, claims, and geology of the specific creek I was focused on. I had been waiting all week, Saturday I couldn't get out the door fast enough. I had a frame pack, GMT, .40 S&W, water, food, and tools. My Jeep got me within 5 miles of the "vein." The rest was on foot. First few miles were a washed out mining road, there was a rainbow of green, red, and white rocks. Looked good so far. I knew the second half would require beating the brush. Uphill. Thousand foot elevation gain based on my topo map. It was brutally slow and I had forgotten my machete. Luckily I was able to grab the tree branches to "Tarzan" up the mountain side. Halfway up my first water bottle was empty - who needs a gym when you have gold to find? The brush was thick, I was covered in sap when I hit the clearing. The woods opened up to reveal the "vein" was actually a landslide. The rocks were a mixture of rhyolite, calcite, and some serpentine. Some boulders but mostly scree. I could see the source of the landslide at the very top of the hill - black bedrock with layers of exposed "lasagna." I had come this far, so before declaring defeat it was worth checking out at the very least. But things got dangerous. Fast. The slope was severe enough to require going uphill in switchbacks, not for lack of leg strength, but because with each step a cascade of bowling-ball sized rocks would slide downhill. I had blinders on and was focused on getting to the top of the hill. I knew it was steep but not how steep since I wasn't looking downhill... A habit I picked up due to a slight fear of heights. As I approached the top I paused for a breather. The slope was too great to sit, I had to lay on my chest to keep from tumbling down. There in all its glory was bedrock at the top of the mountain. If I could just make it to the tree line I could bypass the cliff face. My water was almost gone, my shirt tied around my head to keep the sweat from hurting my eyes. I made my first mistake - I looked down. It was several hundred feet to the bottom, and I could see my zig-zag pattern cut into the rocks where they had slid all the way down. One misstep and I would have found myself smashed up in the trees at the bottom of the mountain, no cell service, no other human within miles, and no way back to the road. I had to keep going up, there was no way I could go back down the way I had come. I only had 30 yards to the top of the landslide where the tree roots were exposed from the crumbling rock. But those 30 yards were almost vertical. Every foothold seemed to give way just as I put my weight into it. So I dropped to my belly and crawled. My pick came in handy as I could jam it into the underlying rock for some traction. The trees were ten feet away but the closest root was 5 feet over my head since the bank was undercut. I'd have to stand up and try and grab onto the root. As soon as I lifted my chest off the ground I felt the ground give out from underneath me. I was sliding down the cliff. My left foot caught a slight hold on a boulder and I lunged with all my strength. I stretched out my right arm with the pick in hand hoping to catch that root. THUNK. The sound of metal on wood. I hooked the point of the pick on a 2" thick root that held as the rest of the ground slid down the mountain. Luckily there was no one below me... it was enough rock to bury a truck. The boulders crashed into the way to the trees 200 feet below where I was hanging. It could have been me... I pulled myself up into the web of roots and got my feet on solid ground. Heart was pumping but I did pull out the GMT and went about my detecting at the top of the landslide. Turned out to be a bust for gold, but at least I can mark that location off the list. I found another way back down, had a close call with some target shooters (another story for another day) and hugged my wife extra hard when I got home. Nothing makes a man more thankful for what he has than confronting his own mortality. And at least I have a good story to tell around the campfire at Rye Patch... GL and HH, tboykin

I don't think many here know me well but I recently took a trip West from my home in NC in search of gold, gems and hopefully some fun. My first destination Sumpter Oregon where I trained on the GPX 5000 with Gerry and his crew. I drove my Subaru which was my literally my home for about 24 days and I had the back seat down and slept in it at night. Not the most comfortable but the most affordable. The training went great but would have been better had the weather cooperated as we got rain most of the 2nd and 3rd day so lost 2 days in the field. Even so the training was great and Gerry did his best to train us indoors. The last day of training Gerry put a lot of different nuggets and quartz with Gold on a table and went over them with several different detectors to demonstrate the strengths and weaknesses of each. Very educational it was. He treated us all to pizza and Beer that last evening. The one day in the field was very challenging as the area we went to was steep. The only ones to find gold during the training that I'm aware of were 2 of the ladies who I believe both used Fisher Gold bug II's. I think there were around a dozen people in the class. I did take the time to visit the Sumpter dredge which is a real sight to see. It's bigger than the dredge on the gold rush show and the buckets are definitely larger on the Sumpter dredge. Since I was in Oregon already, the next place I wanted to see was the White's Factory in Sweet Home. I had discussed my interest in visiting with Tom and he further enticed me with a change to go fishing which sealed the decision. So I visited the plant but neglected to take any pictures but I enjoyed the tour very much. Though some of the components were hand soldered most of the components were installed by a robot of sorts which was very impressive. The area around Sweet Home was very beautiful and scenic. Looked like an awesome place to live. Tom held true to his promise to take me fishing and though we didn't catch but one trout Tom was catching Small mouth after small mouth and nearly skunked me. He's a great young man and White's should be proud to have employed him. Next on my agenda was to try to find some gold so I went ten miles more up the same valley we had been fishing and tried my luck for a day and a half or so at a GPAA claim. Unfortunately no luck there but I did run across an odd critter in the moss when I was digging some bullets: From there I went to Southern Oregon and visited an area that contains Oregon's Gemstone. They are called Sunstones as they often lay on top of the soil and glisten in the Sun. This area of Oregon is the only place on Earth I'm told where these can be found. There is a Free Collection area and also some pay to dig mines nearby. I picked up pocket full both by just picking them up off the ground and by digging a nearly 3 foot deep hole. Picking them up was easier but I did find a couple large one's in the hole. I also went to a nearby mine and paid to get some off a conveyor belt were I pick up some with more color and got several pocketfuls in an hour. Pictured are the one's I found at the free site. Next I went to Northern Nevada to a couple of Opal Mines. The Royal Peacock and the Rainbow Ridge Opal mine both are in the same area. I met a nice couple at the Royal Peacock mine and their 2 young sons. The boys seemed to be trying to help me out but at the same time were finding Opal after opal even some of the rare black opals. They were doing awesome and they found most opals just looking on the surface. While back at the free nearby campground they invited me to share their dinner and got a tip to try the Rainbow Ridge mine which they passed along to me so I went their as well. Overall I think we all did better at the Rainbow Ridge mine, at least I know I did and the boys once again stole the show and found some huge fire Opals along with the many other opals they found. I have to think they (the boys) may have found several thousand dollars in opals. But backing up some the morning before we went to the 2nd mine I got a chance to teach them a little about how to use a metal detector at the campground and let them run around with it (the Eureka Gold) for a while. They seemed to quickly pick up on how to use it and found several items all junk but they were pretty excited to find a shell casing. Attached below is a pic of me and my young friends at the Opal mine In NV This is a little edit about the Virgin Valley Opal mines. This link and links within this link was the best info I found online about the Virgin Valley of Nevada: http://www.goldnuggetwebs.com/VVOPALS/ From Northern Nevada I drove to Rye patch where I had hoped to go to the same place that I had gone to in 2005 and done well but though I remembered how I had got back into the general area from Imaly Nv I couldn't remember how to get to the exact place and never did figure it out. So I just found a likely place and detected some for a few hours but no luck. So I moved on down the road hoping to find the spot but got too far away and met a guy on the road and stopped him and he was heading up the road to a mine and directed me to a place called the Rabbit Hole. I had heard of it being a good place to prospect prior so followed him there and he went on. I spent the next 2 days there looking for nuggets. It was really out of the way and I don't recall seeing any vehicle go by there so I was back there all along for those 2 days with the local critters, mostly rabbits but some Antelope as well that came down to the little pond at the Rabbit Hole to drink. I found many 22 bullets and a few larger lead bullets along with other metal trash but no nuggets. There were some open pit mines and lots of tailing piles but I couldn't find a single nugget. The rabbits help keep me entertained. They came from all directions and met around the pond. They pretty quickly got used to my vehicle and just ignored it and hopped right by me. The Rabbit Hole was OK but since I wasn't finding Gold and had had to drive about 10 miles to find Cell phone service to let my wife know I was still OK I headed off back to Rye patch was was maybe only 20 or so miles away in an attempt to try to find my old prospecting spot again as I had found gold there in 05. I found a similar looking place but it wasn't the place I was looking for but I still stayed there a day and a half or so. I found no gold and found it rare to hit on any target unlike the Rabbit Hole. I covered several miles trying to hit the more likely looking places but no luck. It was getting hotter. I hadn't seen even one vehicle parked any where I went in the Rye patch area. It was just me and my shadow out there searching around. I had really wanted to make it to the Veterans outing but it was still more than 3 days away. It seemed to be getting hotter and I was missing home and my wife and dogs and a bed to sleep in. But at least at Rye patch I did have pretty good cell phone service. I was however concerned about it being really hot near Reno area and heard that the outing would be more of a highbanker kind of prospecting instead of using a detector and the combination of things made me decide to start heading east toward home. I thought I might go to the diamond mine in Arkansas but as I neared that area the weather forecast was for it to be in the upper 90's so I flew on by and headed home. Terry

I certainly don't recommend going in old mines as I well know - better than most - how dangerous that can be. However, I recently had the very special opportunity to do some detecting in the Original 16 to 1 mine in Alleghany, California. It is a mine that is open, well maintained and worked by miners every day, so the dangers are not the same as old abandoned mines. I hiked all around for hours with some of the miners, but only saw a tiny fraction of the 35 MILES of drifts and other workings in this old mine. Much of their mining is done with metal detectors as the gold tends to be coarse. I took my SDC 2300 and even found some gold in an old heading where they had recently taken some gold out of the vein. I found a couple pieces and they actually gave me one - it fell apart after I dug it and so they just gave it to me. The miners had the latest equipment - the new Minelab GPZ 7000 on hand for their work - anything that will get depth and see mossy of dendritic types gold. The big 14 inch coil however is a limitation on the irregular walls of the mine. I knew they had the GPZ, so I took in my SDC 2300 as an alternative and I believe it was the first one in the 16 to 1 mine. I kind of convinced them that its small coil had some advantages and it also ignores some hot rock within the mine that sounds off on the GPZ and VLFs. All in all it was quite the experience and adventure, and the 3rd time I have been underground at the 16 to 1. I mentioned this stuff on another forum, but I thought I would share a photo and make a separate thread because of the interest in the topic.