Day 26: Rest Day

Got up today after about a sleep of 12 hours! It's a beautiful day and the sun is shining so I get out the gold pan and head up the local river to see what I might find! I walk up the Tarter River, which has its origin in the hills at the back of where we are staying. Didn't find a speck of gold all day but to my delight I had a nice haul of garnets. So you go out looking for gold and find garnets - there's a lesson in life in all this!

This gives me good practice panning and learning how to do it quickly. It was wonderful to go to a bend in the river or just scoop up a pan full of mud from behind a large boulder. You then take this mud in the pan and cover it in water and swirl it around to try and make sure the heavy stuff sinks to the bottom of the pan. Then in a matter of minutes one could quickly pan this down till only a 1/20th was left. As you get rid of the lighter stuff the garnets appear almost from nowhere. It's very, very satisfying and wonderful.

A day in the river, under the sun, lots of fun.

Back to top