Trip to Anchorage; any tips?
 

I plan to be in Anchorage for a couple of weeks in a couple months. It's a business trip so will be in workshops & meetings most of the weekdays.

Anybody have any recommendations about places not too distant that a person can do some Au panning & sluicing, and about sightseeing and good places to eat?

Re: Trip to Anchorage; any tips?
 

Google up the Alaska Mining and Diving website.

The sell all sorts of outdoor gear, including minelab and other detectors. Down the Seward hiway, about 20 minutes South of town is an old gold mine that offers daily detecting activities for about $10 admission fee. AM&D has a lot of stuff on gold detecting. They also have some week long trips out in the bush to old gold mine sites up around McGrath above Mt. McKinley. If you want an adventure that would last a lifetime Call Them Today and see if the few openings they have click for you.

I have no affiliation with AM&D.

Re: Trip to Anchorage; any tips?
 

Thanks. Will give 'em a shout.

Re: Trip to Anchorage; any tips?
 

If you get a chance go on the North Shore of Turnagan Arm to Portage Glacier. It is a receding glacier that feeds the Portage RIver. Go all the way up to the viewing area/reception center. Then drive back the way you came. About halfway back to the highway on the right there is a road that angles off and goes right down to the river. In November 2003 at that spot I did the initial developmental tests of our float gold recovery machine. Got very good recovery at that spot.

When you get back to the highway there is a parking area on the opposite side of the road. Walk down to the river and go back under the RR trestle.

Both places great panning potential.

State set-aside area. No private claims allowed.

I have one mile of claims on Willow Creek, which is a little ways past Wasilla on the Parks Highway. Willow Creek drains Hatcher Pass. Another good area.

Re: Trip to Anchorage; any tips?
 

"crazychicken"???????? There MUST be a good story behind this name.

Thanks a lot for posting this information. I really appreciate it. One thing I've been told is that July-August are the very worst times to work waterways that are fed by glacial melt...the heat = > melt = high and fast water that in cooler months is not there.

Re: Trip to Anchorage; any tips?
 

Willow Creek is snow melt from Hatcher Pass and he surrounding drainage. Depending of course on the weather the snowmelt runoff there is pretty much done by the middle/end of June.

If there is a lot of rain in the mountains then Willow Creek runs strong in the summer. In the summer of 2003 Willow Creek was extremely low.

But there are many back flows and calm spots around bends, behind rocks, tree roots, ect. Those "calm" areas are where the gold collects, not in the middle of the river. You should consider this wherever you are. It will greatly improve your chances of success.

Goldminer, if you can fit it in--go fishing. Even if you never have, even if you don't really like fishing. The fish are absolutely unbelieveable. Size-massive; color-like each one is hand painted; fight-like nothing you can imagine.

If you plan on wandering around outside the town limits-make sure you have a weapon. Some of the wildlife can be a bit aggressive. Concealed carry out in the field is legal. Not in Anchorage city limits though.

When I went for my river permits the geologist/naturalist asked if I had a rifle with me, that there where a lot of bears where I was heading. Told him no, I thought I would see what everyone else had and get one based on that. He took me to a display case full of bear skulls. Showed me one with a skull over a half inch thick. Said there are basically two unwritten riles regarding rifles and bears in Alaska. Rule one--carry the biggest rifle you can reliably shoot. Rule two--If a bear is charging you don't shoot him between the eyes. It will really piss him off.

Many people carry shotguns as bear repellent. First round bucksot, second round slug, third round bucksot, and so on. The idea of the bucksot is to blind them.

Re: Trip to Anchorage; any tips?
 

This is good info, I am going out to search some new areas today and get more familiar with my detector. I have been scooping up buckets of material from the creek but all the gold is like dust and it is hard to get from panning. I wonder what tool I need to get or if I should just look for bigger material somewhere.

Re: Trip to Anchorage; any tips?
 

Curtman-
This is not any attempt to commercialize this site or this thread, but take a look at my website www.rockyledgeminingsupply.com

Recovering fine gold is what we do. It might give you some methods direction or ideas.

And if you are so inclined ask any questions you want. I'll try to help.

That goes for anyone. If I can help-fire away.

Gold and PGM recovery is what I do.

Re: Trip to Anchorage; any tips?
 

crazychicken, thanks again for the help. I appreciate it and will heartedly take your advice under council.

Curtman,
The gold you are referring to is called "flour" colors (-40 mesh). IT is the gold that used to be called "dust". Flour gold is very hard to extract unless a person has a set of screens down to maybe 230, and works the screened lots separate. You also need a controlled environment with a bit of dish-soap to keep the particles from floating if you're going to wash 'em to separate them out. A lot of guys use what's called a "Blue Bowl" or a Desert Fox type of water wheel, but this equipment is an investment ($60-$250.00). Prospectors who use them NEVER throw their "concentrates" (or "Black sands" away. They work a lot of dirt and save these fine "heavies" until they maybe have one or two 5-gallon pails full, and then set up in the off-season at their leisure, and work all of 'em.

A guy can separate out flour colors out of small lots of black sands by a drying, spreading out, and lightly blowing process, but again the sands have to be finely screened and worked in lots so that there is not much difference in size between all the particles. In this way, a color is going to be maybe 3-4 times as heavy as a partical of sand. This enables sand particles to be lightly blown away.

Flour colors easily float so a lot of them are lost during a mining process unless equipment is used that is specifically engineered to separate and trap the micron size particles.

I sometimes separate out fine colors with mercury but a guy has got to know what he's doing. Outdoor use only - no people or animals down wind. Mercury is deadly poison and will vaporize into the air at room temperature. Before every attempting to used mercury it is important to know how to safely store and handle it or it will get away from a guy in a heartbeat (that's why they call it "quicksilver"), and escape into the environment which is a bad deal. My advice is don't mess with it.

I haven't looked at crazychicken's links yet but will. If's its something that will work more efficiently than what I use now, I'd sure be interested.

Re: Trip to Anchorage; any tips?
 

Anchorage ? They use to have a nice golf course on North Bragraw.

Re: Trip to Anchorage; any tips?
 

goldminer:hello:

Thanks for replying. We went out yesterday to an area I knew to have gold in the past, the detector made a lot of noise but the only thing we dug up was the head of a bolt. I am not picking up the language of the detector very fast. I will keep up the education and learn the machine better.
We picked up a bunch of material and brought it home, it seems to have much gold in it but it may be fools gold. I see this real fine stuff that floats on top of the sand and but not on top of the water, it is bright gold on both side and likes to congregate together. I am not sure if it what you describe or not. I will take a picture of it when the sun comes out and post it. I would also like to send you a sample of the sand and see if you could tell me if I am being faked out or if their is content worth going after. If you would be ok with this don't post your address, maybe just Private message me with it and I can send you a small box that the USPS has priority mail and it will only cost me a few bucks. It is well worth it to me to know what I have or do not have. :yippee:

Crazychicken? I would send you a sample also and see if there was any ideas you have. Thanks for the replies guys and I will post a pan full of stuff later in the day.
Curtman

Re: Trip to Anchorage; any tips?
 

Send a small amount to the address on my website. I'll digest it and recover it by the SX method and return the Au to you if there is any.

The metal, if there is gold, will be in excess of 999 fine.

Keep in mind the economics:
1 ounce, Au, per ton of material = 31.1 grams
so
1/2 ounce per ton of material = 15.5 grams

and so on.

A one pound sample @ one ounce per ton equals 31.1 grams divided by 2000.

I am not trying to discourage you at all. Just part of the education process.

Sure hope it is full of good stuff.

Re: Trip to Anchorage; any tips?
 

Thanks but I don't need you to send anything back, I just want to know if it is gold and there is a cot effective way of recovering it in that fine form.
I will send all I can in one of them boxes from the post office so there will probably be very little weight of gold at all but just to know it is real is a good thing.
Thanks

Re: Trip to Anchorage; any tips?
 

Any gold that I recover will be "sponge". If you have a small microscope view it at 50 power or more.

I'll return it to you just so you can see it. All done without a furnace or torch----and without cyanide or Aqua Regia.

What you see will be gold recovered from liquid--ionic stage to metallic.

999 fine

That is our end-product as described on the web site.

Regards

Re: Trip to Anchorage; any tips?
 

Hey Halophyte....

I played golf once; a 9-hole course in GTMO. Score was 147 but it was a positive experience. I learned it's easier and less stress-provoking to pick the ball up and throw it.

Re: Trip to Anchorage; any tips?
 

I find it's a ot more fun to shoot them with .22 solids. They really fly. You can even put English on them to change direction. Don't use hollowpoints and don't use cheap Walmart balls. You don't even need a golf course, they don't have any sense of humor anyway.

Re: Trip to Anchorage; any tips?
 

Curtman, did you ever get the results back from your sample?