Aussie Goldhunting

Well I’m trying but it’s thin on the ground nowadays.

It’s been a semi-family reunion in Australia with Tone and Jet visiting Georgie and Adam, who have moved out here for a while. I’ve tagged along but the girls have gone back home for work. Love you kids.

I dropped Jetty off at Melbourne airport yesterday and drove on up to Maryborough, which is central to the Victoria goldfields which boomed in the 1800s. There’s still gold about but not on the surface so much. I’m here to get some!

I’m staying at a motel on the edge of town and it’s cheap and pleasant.

This morning I drove down to Coiltek, a shop out of town that specialises in gold prospecting equipment, and hired a metal detector and a pick. I’d been in touch with them for a couple of months before I came out. By 11am I was out in the bush, with my gear on and sweating like a dog.

I took a reading on my GPS on where I’d left the car as it is so easy to get lost in quite featureless land. I got buzzes on the detector straight away but it was iron parts used by the prospectors 150 years ago during and after the gold rush. Thank you Neil.

There were nails, screws, wire and flakes of thin iron sheet littering the surface and just underneath.

The sun is so much stronger down here as there are holes in the ozone layer over Australia, and carrying round two litres of water, the detector, a pick and assorted implements was bloody hard work. Pronounced ‘bladdy’.

Under the canopy of eucalyptus trees the land was silent, like someone was there and watching me. It was hard work digging into the ground whenever there was a buzz. The machine is sensitive and detects tiny fragments of metal, but I wasn’t getting gold.

By two in the afternoon I was starving and opened up my supersize tin of Heinz baked beans. What a treat!

After lunch I followed the old mining patches, hoping to find gold that the old timers missed.

No joy, and the heat got intense. I’m glad I did my research and knew what to expect and what to do to avoid ending up like this poor baston …… pronounced baaarstad.

I still had that feeling I was being watched. It was quiet, no birds, no people, no animals. Then I looked up and caught sight of this bugger …. pronounced bagger.

A kangaroo clocking me and keeping very still. I moved quickly and he bounced away in seconds. A ‘wow’ moment.

Towards the end of the day I came across some old works which relied on horses to drag around grindstones, making deep circular tracks whilst the stones ground the gold out of solid rocks. Fabulous history.

After 6 hot and sweaty hours graft I decided to call it a day, and got back to the car. I hadn’t seen a soul, apart from Roo, and had no gold; but I’d loved every minute. My haul was impressive, but all iron. Never mind, I’ll try again tomorrow.

Night night my matey dears. X