G'day,
I thought it was about time to stop lurking and give y'all an intro...
I have just started prospecting mainly to keep me busy and by some miracle, find something that will keep the wolves from the door. Having been unemployed since March last year, I am going a little nuts being ignored by employers and worrying about losing my house.
Overall, I am feeling pretty useless and I have found that finding even the smallest speck of gold does wonders for my self esteem. It is as though every speck I find is like finding a small piece of my soul that has been eroded away over the last ten months.
I am pretty much out every day walking through the bush, staying up all hours at night researching this forum and the internet and trying to find somewhere local that I can legally prospect. I've been collecting gravel from drains, gullies, small creeks etc. and going through it with a pan from the Castlemaine Visitor's Center. My avatar shows my results thus far. I also have a couple of buckets of fine sand I have concentrated from the dried up panning dam at Forest Creek, but I am having a hard time separating the fine flour gold. At least I am gaining valuable experience with panning so that when I do eventually find a decent spot to pan I will be confident that I am collecting most of the gold.
I went for a walk up Fryer's Ridge the other day to find Belltopper Adit and after fighting through the bush for a while I managed to find it and have a good look around. I found a shaft a bit further up the hill and climbed down for a look. Unfortunately, after crawling through a narrow opening at the bottom, it appeared to be filled in. The shaft near the adit is WAY too deep for me to attempt to explore with no ropes or equipment of any sort but I wonder if anyone has explored it lately. I know people will be horrified to read that I am climbing down mines alone and unprepared but at this stage I don't care one jot for my own safety and I would be worth more dead anyway. At least the house would get paid off and my ill wife would be looked after financially. At the moment I am just a useless eater and oxygen thief...
I didn't bother taking my Aldi detector with me to Belltopper Hill and sure enough, the area had tell tale signs of being worked over extensively. I'm sure my $100 detector doesn't stand a chance against $6000+ machines so I will need to find an out of the way spot to have a swing. Maybe I'll grab a swag when this rain goes away (where's Summer!!!) and live like a hermit for a while until I find some colour.
Even though I am broke I scrounged up $100 for a detector. I was hoping to find enough coins to pay for it but so far I have only found 100's of old ring pulls, some copper pipe, a heap of lead and one 20c piece. Kyneton is an old town so I thought I would have more success. I guess I will just have to keep on going. I am an extremely patient man.
I am also an extremely lonely man. So if anyone in the Golden Triangle area doesn't mind having a fifth wheel tagging along I would be most appreciative if you'd give me a hoy. I am happy to drive anywhere and you can even blindfold me to keep your spot a secret
Anything I finds, you can keeps. A bit of companionship is worth more to me than gold, even if it doesn't pay the bills. The missus is unable to walk without excruciating pain after recent surgery on both ankles and she will never recover enough to join me on my forays, besides, my unemployment and her pain has taken it's toll on us and we are barely on speaking terms anyway...
Sorry for writing such a woeful, depressing introduction. I will leave it on a more positive note.
I want to thank everyone who contributes to this forum, especially the moderators. There is a wealth of knowledge to be found here and I am heart-warmed by all of your generosity. You have restored my faith in humanity. $20 a year is unbelievably cheap to become a member and I jumped at the chance to contribute. If I was able, I would donate more. When I find that fist-sized nugget I'll throw some more dough this way as thanks. Finally, I would like to urge anyone that has not done so to contribute their membership fees so that this site can continue to grow and the hardworking people behind the scenes can see some small token of appreciation for their generous personal efforts. Besides, I want more competitions etc. so I can have a chance at getting some free stuff, ha ha!
Good hunting all. I'm off to have a swing for some coins...
Malcolm
I thought it was about time to stop lurking and give y'all an intro...
I have just started prospecting mainly to keep me busy and by some miracle, find something that will keep the wolves from the door. Having been unemployed since March last year, I am going a little nuts being ignored by employers and worrying about losing my house.
Overall, I am feeling pretty useless and I have found that finding even the smallest speck of gold does wonders for my self esteem. It is as though every speck I find is like finding a small piece of my soul that has been eroded away over the last ten months.
I am pretty much out every day walking through the bush, staying up all hours at night researching this forum and the internet and trying to find somewhere local that I can legally prospect. I've been collecting gravel from drains, gullies, small creeks etc. and going through it with a pan from the Castlemaine Visitor's Center. My avatar shows my results thus far. I also have a couple of buckets of fine sand I have concentrated from the dried up panning dam at Forest Creek, but I am having a hard time separating the fine flour gold. At least I am gaining valuable experience with panning so that when I do eventually find a decent spot to pan I will be confident that I am collecting most of the gold.
I went for a walk up Fryer's Ridge the other day to find Belltopper Adit and after fighting through the bush for a while I managed to find it and have a good look around. I found a shaft a bit further up the hill and climbed down for a look. Unfortunately, after crawling through a narrow opening at the bottom, it appeared to be filled in. The shaft near the adit is WAY too deep for me to attempt to explore with no ropes or equipment of any sort but I wonder if anyone has explored it lately. I know people will be horrified to read that I am climbing down mines alone and unprepared but at this stage I don't care one jot for my own safety and I would be worth more dead anyway. At least the house would get paid off and my ill wife would be looked after financially. At the moment I am just a useless eater and oxygen thief...
I didn't bother taking my Aldi detector with me to Belltopper Hill and sure enough, the area had tell tale signs of being worked over extensively. I'm sure my $100 detector doesn't stand a chance against $6000+ machines so I will need to find an out of the way spot to have a swing. Maybe I'll grab a swag when this rain goes away (where's Summer!!!) and live like a hermit for a while until I find some colour.
Even though I am broke I scrounged up $100 for a detector. I was hoping to find enough coins to pay for it but so far I have only found 100's of old ring pulls, some copper pipe, a heap of lead and one 20c piece. Kyneton is an old town so I thought I would have more success. I guess I will just have to keep on going. I am an extremely patient man.
I am also an extremely lonely man. So if anyone in the Golden Triangle area doesn't mind having a fifth wheel tagging along I would be most appreciative if you'd give me a hoy. I am happy to drive anywhere and you can even blindfold me to keep your spot a secret
Anything I finds, you can keeps. A bit of companionship is worth more to me than gold, even if it doesn't pay the bills. The missus is unable to walk without excruciating pain after recent surgery on both ankles and she will never recover enough to join me on my forays, besides, my unemployment and her pain has taken it's toll on us and we are barely on speaking terms anyway...Sorry for writing such a woeful, depressing introduction. I will leave it on a more positive note.
I want to thank everyone who contributes to this forum, especially the moderators. There is a wealth of knowledge to be found here and I am heart-warmed by all of your generosity. You have restored my faith in humanity. $20 a year is unbelievably cheap to become a member and I jumped at the chance to contribute. If I was able, I would donate more. When I find that fist-sized nugget I'll throw some more dough this way as thanks. Finally, I would like to urge anyone that has not done so to contribute their membership fees so that this site can continue to grow and the hardworking people behind the scenes can see some small token of appreciation for their generous personal efforts. Besides, I want more competitions etc. so I can have a chance at getting some free stuff, ha ha!
Good hunting all. I'm off to have a swing for some coins...
Malcolm
