Post by rockpickerforever on Nov 8, 2016 16:54:43 GMT -5
Went up to the Mojave for a three day prospecting trip at the end of October. We initially went (original plans, 
) with the intent on working on our prospecting association's two claims. Instead, we ended up on the claim of another local group, as invited guests of two members that are already in both clubs. (Thank you, Andy and Joe!) BTW, we have started the three-month process to become members of that association. We will be returning for a longer period of time at the end of the year.
We left around 6 pm on Thursday, October 27. What a drive at that time of day, geez. We had to deal with people heading home from San Diego to points north, and then again more traffic as we skirted LA to the east (215). After going over Cajon Pass, and heading up 395 into Adelanto, traffic eased up. Stopped for dinner at a Jack-in-the-Box there (as a shareholder, I feel it my obligation to patronize them!), and sat for a half hour. Fished up about 8:30, they had locked the doors as they close all but the drive-up then. (Not in a real prosperous part of town, shall we say?) We did not reach our destination until after 11pm. A just over three hour trip took closer to five.
We pulled off the freeway just past the meet spot, and found a location about a 1/2 mile off the freeway, parked and slept until morning. Had some big thunder around 4am, and a few heavy, fat drops of rain, not much. I love the smell of the desert after a rain!! We drove back out to the freeway to where we were supposed to meet the rest of the group for this field trip at 9am on Friday. From this point on, we had some light showers on and off, but quitting before noon. Just enough to be annoying and get us wet as our leader was trying to decide where he was taking us. Maps getting wet, mud being drug into the truck - yuck! We only learned later that this person had never been to this claim before. That explains a lot!
Friday am. (This would be a sunrise, lol.)
Surrounding desert area, looking to the SW. 395 in the mid distance on the left.
A little later. The clouds from which all the noise and raindrops were emanating from. Did see a couple lightning flashes from inside the trailer before it got light out.
Definitely a volcanic area.
Piles of dirt graded off the road.
Picked up five feet from the trailer. This one will be crushed, see if it contains any gold.
Rain drops (and a rainbow!) through the truck windshield at the meet up location.
This is the mining enclave of Duisenburg, also known as the LDMA (Lost Dutchman Mining Association). You pass right through the middle of it on the way into our club's claims.
We found a likely spot to camp, within the boundaries of our club's claim.
We did not unhitch the trailer or set up at this time, as we thought we might move to another location before nightfall. Didn't happen, so we made camp where we were, and unhitched the trailer. Friday we spent the entire day, wandering the desert, picking up cool rocks. I am not complaining!
How you will most likely find me out there. Head down, rock pick in hand, rock bag over my shoulder...
My posture and foot out reminds me of the "Keep on Truckin'" guy!
Look, I found 1dave while I was looking for that, lol.
This was it for Friday night, the leader of the group went elsewhere.
Mrrockpicker ran across not one, but two desert tortoises on Friday! Took some pics and set it free! I was out picking rocks at the time, only saw the photos of these two.
This tortoise was obviously stuck for a day or two (see accumulated scats) on this little raised area.
Took some pics and set it free! I was out picking rocks at the time, only saw the photos of these two later.
Do you see it? A baby one!
Friday afternoon. The sun was mostly shining, beautiful!
Friday night was homemade spaghetti and garlic bread. Yum! (Sorry, no pics of the food 
). But I'll tell ya, it was good!
Andy came back into camp (had left us Friday afternoon), and invited us to go dig on the other mining association's claim, as his guests. He told us we would definitely find gold there. And so we spent ALL Saturday over there, digging and drywashing gold. We were going through 100 year old tailings piles.
They sure did miss a good bit of gold back then! It is possible we missed some as well, but we found enough to make mrrockpicker want to go back. Up until late afternoon, it hadn't rained enough to make drywashing impossible, so that was a good thing. Got just a few sprinkles at the end of the day as we were picking up.
We spent Saturday night back where we had left the trailer. Had a camp fire, and I fired up the generator in the trailer to use the oven to cook a frozen pizza. Ah, I just love roughing it, lol.
We didn't have a lot of time Sunday to do any prospecting, our goal was to leave by noon. Instead we - what else? - wandered around picking up more rocks. Mrrockpicker found a second baby tortoise, this one smaller than the first one! As with the first ones, we took some photos and let it go on its way. I don't know how may times you could go to the desert and see THREE desert tortoises. The rain must have brought them out. I know I have only seen two in the wild, one off of Ogilby Road north of I-8, the other in AZ near the mining area of Rich Hill.
Another baby, this one even smaller than the first! I would never have seen it.
This one I did get to see and photograph. Did I mention that it was small? 
And get my picture taken with it. (It was shy!)
Ventral side.
Hamming it up, lol.
Desert plant. Neat! Did not have a chance to look it up yet.
Wandering far and wide Sunday morning. View from the top of a nearby green hill. Our trailer in center. Not so far, we wandered much farther away than this.
Yeah, it was sprinkling, and I did not want to get wet, lol.
Just for fun. Rock painted as a shark along the RR cut, got a pic on the way out Sunday morning.
Almost forgot to post what we came for! This is the first cleanout.
Finished the rest after we got home. This represents seven to eight hours of straight digging and processing.
And one interesting shaped nugget. I think the aliens left it...
I've only put some of the trip photos onto this post, you can see more of the trip HERE (111 pics) flic.kr/s/aHskGu6d5k . (A few more of them, anyway.)
Now, I'll post just a few of rock pics here.
I think this one is wood.
A different one.
Some weird white ones, some strange kind of growth??! Mrrockpicker thought they might be feldspar, but they are harder than that. More like quartz in hardness.
Some cherty/flinty/wonderstone type of stuff. Love the purple color of a lot of these!
My fave. A lot like what jamesp was finding in TX, but only small chunks, no big boulders, no coatings on them.
This is the biggest rock I brought home. On a 12 X 12 inch stepping stone. Still have to weigh it!
close up
Hope I didn't OD y'all on photos! If you are so inclined, you can see the rest of the rock pics at this LINK flic.kr/s/aHskN1XcDT , all 111 of them.
Thanks for looking! Jean
