The dredge and our gear, with us clinging on to the sides, bounced along until it got hung up on a large boulder in the middle of the river.

The catch being was that it was about 60 miles from Anchorage near Hope, and a good four or five-mile hike uphill to the claims.

Midway into my first tank of gas I was beginning to see color in my sluicebox. Needless to say, I was excited.

My brother Darryl and I had not had a prospecting adventure since January and we wanted to try out our new drywasher, so we decided to go for the weekend and check out some claims near Barstow…

On about the fifth time across one of these slopes, and down near the little wash...bam! I found a nice chunk of rock, laced through with gold. Wow! How had I missed this?

The sound got quiet when the fuse burned down into the clay. I waited, and waited…

We all love to see that first glimmer of gold when it peeks out from under the black sand in our pan, or feel the weight of a nugget in our scoop when we dig a good target. But sometimes things don’t go quite so smoothly.