If you’d like to learn the nuts and bolts of actual gold hunting, panning, and extraction, (even just the armchair variety) try a wonderful little book/pamphlet called, Gold Fever, The Art of Panning and Sluicing, by Lois De Lorenzo, and also, book/pamphlet, Diving and Digging for Gold, by Mary Hill, which packs more gold-lore per inch than any other bigger book. Warning: You could get addicted to the real magic kingdom of California. If you really go over the rainbow crazy about California gold, get a copy of Geologic History of the Feather River Country, California, by Cordell Durrell, a truly awesome book detailing an amazing volcanic history of upheavals that produced the northern California Sierra topography-and also the inspiration for the volcanic source of the Motherlode in my novel. Historical and modern Rich Bar Gold Camp is far more interesting than the original ‘1848 Marshall Gold Discovery Site’ at Coloma and if I ruled the world should be a historical monument as a true treasure of California (as is Coloma). By the way, I visited this gold camp, still being actively mined on the Feather River, and visitors are not welcome. Want to know what daily life was like in a real gold camp? The Shirley Letters by Dame Shirley (Louise Clappe) is a world-famous account (one of the most vivid accounts ever written) said to have influenced such luminaries as Mark Twain and Brett Hart. If you find yourself caught up in the golden spell of California Gold Rush History, I also recommend: History of Rich Bar, A Blue Ribbon Gold Camp, by Jim Young, which I used to model my camp called, Gold Nation, in my novel.
I first became aware of Gold Lake while researching an original copy (1882) of a historical text called, History of Plumas, Lassen & Sierra Counties, Farriss & Smith, (p 145) relates the original tale from which I drew my inspiration of the search for Gold Lake, as well as wonderful adventure tales and names of the real gold hunters. I was looking for a mysterious lake called Gold Lake. But, as I said, I wasn’t looking for gold.
This bottom layer of sand is called pay dirt. When you find black sand (magnetic sand) you will be close to gold. Just be sure you dig all the way down to the bottom of the sand to the bedrock. Sandbars are good places to look for gold.
#2017 gold rush series location crack#
Its specific gravity is 19.3, which is much heavier than lead (11.3), which means gold sinks to the bottom of any other material (sa nd and gravel) and will keep right on sinking until it is stopped by something solid, that is: bedrock or boulder, or (very often) a crack or crevice in a slab of rock. Gold is the heaviest natural element, heavier than rocks or sand.
Whether 1849 (when the California Gold Rush began) or 2017, gold is not found in any easy-to-reach location. Being a gold hunter is not for the fainthearted.