Post by rockpickerforever on Dec 9, 2015 16:22:33 GMT -5
Mrrockpicker and I went out to Potholes with members of our prospecting club for TG last month.
We drove out the night before Thanksgiving, arriving around 10 pm. Got up the next morning (it was cold! I know, I keep saying that!), but cooked up a batch of breakfast burrito (enough for three days worth), than went to work. It was still cold, lol.
This hole is close to where we have dug this claim on previous visits, and others have had luck here as well. Digging into the side of the hill, on a bench about 15 feet above the level of the current wash below. Hoping to find some good stuff around these rocks.
Dry wash set up, old Treasure Emporium (thanks for the info, phil!) Since we had a late start, and had to stop for TG feast, we only ran this amount of classified buckets on Thursday. (Ran same amount of buckets on Saturday, but three times this amount, three cleanouts on Friday. Hell yeah!!) Went back down the hill in the near dark to do the cleanout at the end of the day.
Black gas motor is blower for the drywasher, the yellow jumper battery powers an additional 12V motor with a counterweight under the drywasher for some additional shaking action.
Who is that masked man? It's just Bob. Don't want to breathe the dust, spores for Valley Fever present here. One member contracted it here a few years ago.
View from up at camp, on the north rim of the wash.
This quartz crystal was found in the wash, just in front of the truck.
View to the east from camp, towards the All American Canal and Yuma Proving Grounds. The mountains in the back right are in AZ.
View to the north east. Not a big turnout, as you can see. The club did bring porta potties in this year, for the people roughing it. This is our panning set up. Ended up only panning some of the concentrates out there from the first day. Got dark, and the water was cold (do you see a theme here?). NBot to mention that we were working into the dark, doing cleanout on Saturday using a flashlight. The rest of the cons (concentrates) we brought home and panned the following weekend.
We did find just this one chunk o' gold in that one batch we panned out there, wrapped around a piece of quartz.
Had some clouds Thanksgiving afternoon. Got a few sprinkles one day, but didn't amount to much.
White discovery post on the claim.
More scenery. Kind of barren. jamesp says it is because the aliens ate all the vegetation, lol.
Heck of a lot more pleasant in November than Easter when we were last there. 70 degrees vs. 100+.
Line of RVs in middle ground camped at Senator Wash.
Sunrise on Saturday, 11/28/15.
The only sunrise pics I took.
Back to the hole. Quite a bit deeper than it had previously been. Hanging rock on left of hole.
One way to know you are not digging in someone else's tailings pile, go where no one else has gone before..
These rocks are sharp, one of them bit me in the back of my finger.
View looking up to camp on the north rim. We understand they got something like three inches of rain in one hour a week or so before TG. You could tell the bottom of the wash had been moved around by flowing water.
Found some round cobbles here, out of place. All the rocks in this wash are sharp, not tumbled. Found out later that a previous owner of the claim had bulldozed some material brought in from somewhere in the area over the edge of the hill. Some good pickings on the slope, but you had to be careful. (Y'all know I am something of a klutz...) No mishap on the slope.
Close up.
Back to the hole. This large boulder was pretty well undercut by the time we were finished there. Mrrockpicker took a pry bar to it and knocked it loose the last day, so nobody coming along after us would get under there and get kilt if it fell.
The hole underneath.
Not a big rock you say?
Big enough, methinks! It came off the wall to the left. We have found gold in the trench to the right before, digging into the hill.
Wouldna want to be under that.
This is the cons brought home.
This is all we got from them. Major disappointment.
This last Saturday, we went to our rock club's show at the Lakeside Rodeo Grounds. Our prospecting club had a booth there, they were selling t-shirts, caps, etc, and doing panning demonstrations. They also sell practice bags of sand that have had gold added. They come in different denominations, but I spent $25 for this one.
And the take. $25, didn't have to spend money for gas to AZ, nor bust butt for three days.
(Speaking of gas, $2.499 when we left home 11/25, $1.989 a gallon in Yuma several hours later. )
Yeah, think I'll be buying more practice bags, lol.
Before coming home on Sunday morning, I got to go pick rocks for a few hours. There is an area to the north of the claim that is just covered with rounded boulders and other stuff. That's where I went hounding. Here's a few of them.
Some pet wood. This may be palm. Not very pretty.
The edge.
A coral.
An interesting... sagenite?
Some striped quartzite?
Maybe a rhyolite? Softer, anyway.
This one is interesting. Makes me think of crocodile.
This one a fossil of some kind. Looks like it has a shell. Or maybe a brachiopod of some sort.
This one kind of cool. Don't know what it is but has little black spots. Animal, vegetable, mineral?
More coral.
More fossils, corals, jaspers, what have you. s525.photobucket.com/user/jeanatrandjproductsdotcom/library/Potholes%202015/Potholes%20rocks
Will let you go wander.
Not a lot of gold this trip (or the last one, or the one before...) but had fun, lots of fresh air and exercise. My hands are just now recovering.
Thanks for looking.