The West Coast Goldrush started in 1864. It started as a trickle and turned into a flood, as people from all over the world poured into this isolated bush clad wilderness. Many of the early miners and their families had to endure terrible hardships. There were many stories of those who struck it rich.
Here, at the entrance of the Gold Claim I stood, contemplating whether I should submit my plans for an early retirement from my work back home. After all, the good news is that the early miners didn't find all the gold. After an instant crash course in the skilful art of goldpanning, D2 and I began to pan for those little grains of real GOLD!!!
The work was made easier that day as the sluice gates were all still working properly, bringing rich alluvial soil from the mountain creeks flowing down the sluices.
My 1st few tries were horrible. I actually threw away the Gold!! I was not able to swirl the gold specks to the surface.
No " kung fu" as Chinese people would say. D2 didn't fare any better. Not until our expert gold panner, a nice fella, gave us both some close up demo of the "kung fu" that was somehow missing in our methods......that we both STRUCK IT ! GOLD!
Real GOLD ! Our separate gold was carefully removed from the pan and kept in a glass vial each. See me SMILING....I calculated that our Gold find should appreciate in tremendous value
over the next 200 years. Not too bad as a family heirloom for our future generations!
Today, the two precious vials of GOLD hold pride of place in my library shelf.
2 comments:
Just this 1st week of November 2007 the price of GOLD has shot up to over US $800 per Kg!!
I had dabbled in the Gold futures market of New York Exchange back in the late 70's. The price of Gold then was hovering around $200.
Just imagine if I had kept all my lots of future trades until now! I might not be as rich as Warren Buffet or Bill Gates but would have enough to give most of it away!!
The price of GOLD has broken through the $ 1000 barrier in January 2008. The price of oil has shot sky high too....went past $ 100 a barrel for a while.
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