Oh, I'm emotionally drained.
As of right now, I'm screwed.
On this episode of "Mine Rescue"...
Get it up here.
...a desperate gold miner finds his dreams of riches
slipping away.
We got.2 of an ounce.
It's unsustainable to keep going at that rate.
...as his greenhorn family...
In reality, I have no idea what I'm doing.
...struggles to mine,
We gotta get off.
while he juggles two jobs to survive.
Jared does shift work to help fund this so that we can stay
out here. It's a lot of stress for him.
And the clock is ticking for Freddy and Juan.
The forest fire ripped through here and destroyed everything
in its path.
We don't work on hot days because of the risks of fire,
but that is costing us money.
As one of the worst wildfire seasons on record threatens
to shut them down.
If we don't get anything back,
I don't know what we're going to do.
Zero.
I'm hopeful that Freddy and Juan can help us.
I may go check with the fire department
to see what the fire restrictions are.
Over the past couple of years, I guess there's been a massive
amount of fires in this area.
See you a little later then.
See you in a bit.
In the dense Cariboo Mountains forests of British Columbia,
Freddy and Juan receive a desperate SOS from
the wildfire-ravaged Genert Family Mine, a location that
will soon prove to be one of their most challenging to date.
I'm going to meet with Cheryl, Ray, and Jamie.
From the sounds of it,
they've been having a little bit of a struggle out here.
They have sunk every last dollar that they have
into this operation.
So, really, it's kind of sink or swim.
How you doing? You must be Jamie.
- Hi, I am. - I'm Juan.
- Nice to meet you, Juan. - Nice to meet you as well.
Hi, Ray. Nice to meet you.
Nice to meet you, Ray. I'm Juan.
- I'm Cheryl. - Cheryl.
- Nice to meet you. - How are you guys doing?
Oh, good. Better now.
Better now that you're on site.
So, Freddy's not here right now.
He's just a couple hours behind me.
We went to go check with the fire chief to make sure
we're OK to do the work we got to do here.
- Right. - So, is this the whole crew?
My husband, Jared, is missing in action.
He had to go back to work in Alberta, so that we could be
out here to mine. But he will be back tomorrow.
Inspired by what they saw on "Gold Rush," the Generts began
their mining venture 10 years ago.
Jared and I took our kids out camping and we did some
prospecting and we were hooked.
Over the next few years, they ran a series
of small operations.
As we've gotten more into it and we got more equipment,
we're trying to have a serious go at it.
But in 2024, an opportunity arose at
a larger claim when wildfires drove out the previous miners.
It was just so devastating to them
that they weren't able to come back.
We had heard the old timers were getting about an ounce
per 20 yards.
But the gold never materialized.
Since we've been out here, we've seen roughly
0.2 of an ounce. It's not really adding up.
To pay the bills, Jared and his stepfather,
Ray, have been forced to take second jobs,
leaving the mining to his inexperienced family.
I get six days off, and I'll spend two days of that
six driving, and then I get to spend four days at the claim
mining, and then rinse, repeat.
Ultimately, our goal would be to have everybody in the family
out here full time.
But with Jared and Ray having to work this season,
the rest of us have to step up and be more hands on
with helping out at the mine.
In reality, I have no idea what I'm doing.
I'm just trying my best.
Do you have any of the gold that came out of this area?
I do. I have some gold that we found.
OK. Well, it's pretty chunky stuff.
- Yeah. - There's some finds in there.
Do you guys have a goal for what you want to be able
to produce here? - Uh, yeah.
If we could get half an ounce a day-- if even 50 ounces,
if we could get this season to recover some costs.
Well, the reality is you're running out of time to go
out there and hit your target.
I want to do a four-hour test run.
Let's get some material through it and see what we got.
- Great. - All right, let's do it.
OK.
- Carrie, I assume. - Freddy.
I appreciate your time this morning.
OK. Well, it's super high risk.
If you take a look at the forest, you can look at any
of the areas around,
our forest is like standing firewood, right?
The 2025 wildfire season is already Canada's second worst
on record, with nearly 1,300 fires having scorched
British Columbia alone. 40% of wildfires in B.C.
are caused by human error, so one mistake can risk lives
and livelihoods in an instant.
Are there any fire restrictions right now?
Not right now.
But when you guys are out, if you're grinding,
welding, just know the risks. - Yeah.
Water is your best friend.
Get the trees limbed up as high as you can reach, 10 feet
or higher, because if a fire does come through, it just
stays on the ground and it just rages through.
Well, thank you for your time.
Thanks so much for coming by.
OK, well, let's do it.
Back on the Genert Mine,
the first two-hour test run begins.
First bucket.
Ray loads paydirt into the four-foot hopper
that feeds a 10-foot trommel, which washes pay into
an 18-foot sluice box below, where the gold should
be recovered.
We can't continue running like this.
It's costing us more money
than what we're getting in return.
Oh, no!
Everything just plugged up solid.
All the material's stuck in there.
That's not good.
They have to go in there.
The material gets stuck in the hopper, so they're having
to sit up there and wash it all down manually.
So it's not a very efficient way to run.
The stakes at the Genert Mine are shared
by the entire family.
So we don't know if it's running well or running
terrible or what we need to make it better.
Jared's parents, Ray and Cheryl,
invested $100,000 of their own money into the operation.
We sold our house in Alberta, came out here,
we spent that money, put it all into the mine,
and really haven't gotten anything out of it yet.
We're old enough to retire now, but we can't retire.
We've got a mortgage now.
Every weekend I get in the summertime, I'm back here.
The rest of the time, I'm at my other job driving trucks.
This is going to be our last chance out here,
our last kick at the cat.
Let's take a look inside the drum.
There's not enough water pressure to be able to wash
the pay down into the trommel, because there's actually holes
in the spray bar where it's pushing water out the side.
That sluice, it's way too violent,
has way too much water.
I'm going to do a little panning.
I just want to check the material that
they're bringing to the plant.
You know, honestly, it doesn't look that special to me,
but I just want to take a look, see what's in there.
Not even a piece of gold, not even one speck.
I'm worried that the material
that he's pulling out isn't really pay.
Holy [bleep]!
- What is he doing? - I don't know.
What are you doing?
We've got to get off!
Oh-whoa!
- Shut down on you? - Yeah.
Why don't we just go ahead and call it?
It's been about an hour.
Yeah, we can shut her down.
I think we shut it down right now.
We'll regroup and figure out what we can do.
Oh...
Let's pull it out.
Right now, I am feeling a little bit disappointed.
Yeah, you bet.
Our test didn't go as smooth as we had hoped,
but I'm still hopeful.
I have to go to my full-time job.
I won't be back here for five days, and I'm hoping that this
could possibly be my full-time job.
But right now, you have to pay the bills.
Miners in general are kind of hopeful and, you know,
gambling type,
but sometimes we need to give them tough love.
Coming into a mine site where everything has
an issue, it's frustrating. There were safety issues.
The pay doesn't look great.
And honestly, the plant's not running good either.
Coming up...
Two or three part-time jobs
to pay for your gold mining, it's unsustainable.
I'm going all-in. It's now or never.
That was a road.
Let's see what lives right here.
Holy moly!
Juano!
Later that afternoon,
at the Generts' Cariboo Mine...
Let's see what's going on.
Let's go check it out.
...Freddy arrives for the cleanup.
- Hello, ladies. - Hello!
The mine crew is now down to Jamie and mother-in-law Cheryl.
This is Freddy. Freddy, Cheryl, and Jamie.
- Hi. - How's it going here?
- Great to meet you. - Hi, nice to meet you.
- Jamie? - Yes.
- We're sure glad you're here. - How's the cleanup going?
- Going good. - I'm done.
Well, let's get it weighed up.
Well, here we go, Freddy.
Yeah, moment of truth.
The Generts need at least 0.06 ounces from the test run
to hit their half-ounce per day goal.
0.02.
Less than a third of what they need per day.
That's pretty sad.
It's sad.
Maybe it's lucky you broke at one hour, because every hour
you're running, you're throwing money away.
- Yeah, right. - And we don't want that.
Well, what we want is we're gonna go back, put our heads
together, and come up with a plan for you guys.
Thanks, Freddy and Juan.
You're welcome.
I'm a little worried now after seeing the amount of gold.
It's unsustainable to keep going at that rate.
You know, you'd have to get two or three part-time jobs to pay
for your gold mining.
It's not good to see that it's costing us more money
to get that gold out of the ground than the pay.
So I don't have a gold mine budget anymore.
It's gone.
So, what's the deal with the bucket
being in the hopper?
- The machine broke down. - Hm.
So, we weren't able to finish the test run.
Driving in here, it looked like there's a lot of equipment
that might not run.
I don't think any of it runs, Freddy.
So, one of the things I'm really worried about,
we got to get a machine coming out here
because we have to do prospecting.
Because the material they brought to the plant
was absolute garbage. - OK.
The hopper is another issue, and it should be feeding itself
instead of someone up there babysitting it.
And the sluice is completely inadequate.
It's too narrow.
It needs to be a foot wider.
- How'd the spray bar do, Juan? - It's not good, Freddy.
There's actually holes in the spray bar where
it's actually pushing water out the side of the trommel.
There's safety issues that I want to address,
like the stairs going up. - Yeah, OK.
Really, all this is for naught unless we can find some
material that's worth running. - Exactly right.
- That'll be my first goal. - All right.
To transform the mine into a profitable operation,
a three-inch water jet will be mounted at the back of
the hopper to break up the pay and drive it into the trommel.
Then, inside the drum, a new spray bar will be added
to the existing thread to wash gold-bearing material
into the sluice.
And finally, the sluice box will be widened an extra
12-inches to boost capacity by 50%.
Hi, dear!
After a 600 mile drive from the oil fields,
Jamie's husband, Jared, returns to the mine.
- Morning, baby. - Hi, baby.
- I missed you. - I missed you.
How's it going?
Uh...
It's not looking good.
I hope they can help.
I got into gold mining 10 or 11 years ago just because
it looked really cool watching "Gold Rush."
We went out to this old fella's claim on the Fraser River.
First, we had a pan, and we panned it,
and my eyes lit up.
Oh man, look at that!
That's when gold fever sunk in. It's a real thing.
But mining is amazingly expensive,
and things are pretty tight.
I can't continue pouring money in every year.
It's now or never.
How we doing?
- Hi guys. - How you doing?
- Hi, good. - I'm Juan.
- Jared. - Nice to meet you, Jared.
- Freddy. - Freddy, nice to meet you.
Nice to meet you, Jared.
Well, we put our heads together,
You know, we came up with a few ideas for the plant.
One of the first things that we want to do is,
we focus on that hopper.
We're going to put a jet in the back, so that material can
get fed down into the trommel.
Inside the trommel itself,
put a whole new spray bar in there.
Then we want to build a new sluice box.
OK.
The intention is, we're going to actually run
a little more material when we have that spray bar
in the back of the hopper.
And in order to do so, we've got to have
that wider box. - OK.
Yeah, I need to go prospect on this.
Yeah, yeah.
Because everything I see here is tailings.
Yeah.
So we're thinking about $5,000 in materials.
But the excavators that you have here,
none of them are up to par.
We found somebody that had an excavator that we could
borrow for a few days,
but we have to pay for transport.
And that'll be about $3,000.
OK.
So all in, it's going to be $8,000.
That's a lot of money, I know.
Er...
- I think we can do that. - Well, deal then.
- Deal. - Let's do it.
- I appreciate it, guys. - Yeah, no worries.
- Thanks, Freddy. - You're welcome.
- You're very welcome. - Thanks, Juan.
- You're very welcome. - Thanks, Freddy.
That was pretty awesome meeting Freddy and Juan.
I was giddy like a schoolgirl.
8,000 is a pretty big hit, but I don't see I have
much of a choice to do it.
If I want to continue, I have to do this.
To help get the mine on track...
Am I pulling on it?
Yeah, that's the one you're pulling on.
Jared's called in his mechanic brother, Sandy, to work
on their stricken excavator.
I'm going to be here on the mine helping Jared get some
of these machines running as best I can.
Pull that wire again.
With all the time and money that Jared's put into this,
I would just really love to see it succeed.
I think that goes to the starter.
OK. Go turn the key.
OK, ready?
Hey, thank you, guys.
Next, Juan spots a fault with one of the other excavators.
Your pin on your cylinder for your bucket's actually ready
to come out.
So the pin itself has this little plate that holds the pin
in place. It's broke off, so...
We can knock that pin back
where it needs to be and get it on.
It's extremely important that this excavator works correctly.
Without it, there's no mining.
So it's got to be tough for you to work a full week
in the oil field, then come out here
and work at the mine site, huh?
All that travel, all that time, and...
2,000 kilometers a week, and then...
trying to forget about the stresses out here so I can
focus on my job at work.
And Jamie, you know, the first day that we did
a test run, it was kind of cool to see her,
that she actually just jumped right in there and wanted to be
a part of it. - Yeah.
We had up to 300 head of goats at one time.
That's a lot of work.
And she'd be in there wrestling goats with me, holding them
down so we can give them injections.
And yeah, Jamie's always been
been one to give 'er.
Yeah, once she knows how to do it,
she's going to give it 100%.
And she'll probably really excel at it, too, I'm sure.
Yeah.
You know, at the end of the day, you know, if you can enjoy
your time with your family.
And I think a lot of people would kind of strive to try
to do that one day, right? You're that close to doing it.
- Yeah, we are. - You're that close.
Well, let's finish this up, huh?
Yeah, sounds good to me.
Let me try to open this up just a little more.
Ah-ha-ha! Popped right in. There's some good news.
That's good.
Thanks, Juan.
- So hose on and then pass you the hose? - Yeah.
Excavators fixed,
Juan begins work on the washplant's
new water chute.
I cut a hole right here. We're going to put
that jet on the back of the hopper,
and we'll put a diverter plate.
So he was going to wash all that material down
into the trommel.
Go towards you a little bit.
Toward us? Come out a bit? Yeah.
Right there.
So, I got the jet all done.
I got the deflector plate on there.
So now when that material piles up, this will push it all
into the trommel.
It's going to actually increase their production by a lot
because now they'll be able to feed it instead of having to be
up here and washing it down by hand.
- This will do it all. - Oh, cool!
We got the job done, but the reality is,
Freddy and I still have a lot to do here.
Well, you want to show me where you got that pay
you ran on the first test there?
Yeah, it's just up here.
In British Columbia,
Freddy starts his gold sleuthing
at the mine's old cut.
So they mined right in here last year?
Yeah.
I was told they were getting good-sized nuggets out of it.
So I thought, "well, that sounds good."
But there just wasn't enough.
We got 0.02, not enough to pay anything.
Something was weird about that.
Mm-hmm, yeah.
Don't trust what they told you
unless you really know the people.
Trust what your own eyes tell you.
OK.
But I can see what you were chasing there.
- That red stuff. - Yeah.
A lot of times those surface red layers are red because
they are the surface gravel, and they got oxygen to them,
which allows iron to rust, right?
So usually your surface gravels don't carry much gold.
OK.
The rest of it's tailings.
That's been stacked up there by somebody
that was in here before.
In 1858, discoveries on the Fraser River ignited
the Cariboo Gold Rush.
Strikes at nearby Williams Creek in Barkerville made
fortunes with over 3.8 million ounces
worth over $12 billion in today's money.
Old timers say the claim Jared is working
produced more than 1,800 ounces of gold in the '90s,
valued today at over $6 million.
One way to tell you're in tailings is there's
no rhyme or reason to the rocks.
Virgin material that got laid in there by water, all your
flat rocks are laying flat for the most part.
In tailings, everything's just haphazard.
You know, how it was dumped.
It's never been reworked by water, so that's one
of the quickest ways to tell.
Let's go look for some virgin ground, huh?
All right.
What I think we need to do is find a little bit of elevated
ground, and look down, see what we can see.
This is all tailings.
This is all tailings on this side, too.
Let's have a look from this high point.
Well, this isn't a great feeling.
I thought I had something down here.
Well, you can see that gravel face over there?
Yeah.
Well, to me, that looks like glacial till.
Glacial till is the debris left behind by a glacier.
Thousands of years ago,
millions of tons of ice bulldozed its way through
the valley, crushing rocks into fragments
and freeing the gold inside.
As the glacier melted back, the gold was left scattered
throughout the ground.
A hypothesis that that hillside right there,
you know, it's not really structured with the main hill.
There's a chance that's a glacial moraine.
A moraine is where the glacial till has become piled up to
form a ridge where gold is more likely to be concentrated.
You can see right down below us here,
and you've got the road there.
It could be good. Who knows?
There's only one way to find out, though.
Freddy's hunch?
An old-timer's road, which cuts through the glacial moraine
outcrop, could hold virgin pay.
At one time, there was a lot of gold here,
but they gutted this valley.
Maybe there's some pockets of virgin ground under the road
that nobody took the gold out of.
Hopefully, we can do a little bit of potholing
and try to figure things out.
Make sure we're not right on the edge.
In the mine's boneyard, Juan and Jamie construct a new
18-foot sluice, which will help them recover more gold.
Kind of push it to where you want it, more or less.
Oh, OK.
And then you push in, twist to the right, let go of it,
and it locks.
Want to try this one real quick?
The magnets grip the steel like a clamp,
keeping it square at 90 degrees.
Is mining something that you really enjoy or that
you really want to do? - Yeah, it is.
And when my kids can come out, that's even better.
Wyatt is just about 21, and Morgan is almost 19.
Doesn't seem like you're old enough to have kids
that age, so... - So, there's...
Well, there is a story.
I had Wyatt when I was 20, and then on my 21st birthday,
I was diagnosed with
relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis.
And I was told if I wanted to have more kids,
I needed to do it because the medication I was about
to start could cause complications during my pregnancy.
Yeah, you kind of picked priorities.
You wanted to have kids, so you went for it.
- Yeah. - I get that.
I would have never known that she had health issues with
her motivation and her work ethic, but, you know, it just
shows that she really has the drive and she's committed
to doing this mine.
We should probably get back to work then, huh?
- Yeah. - All right.
I came to look at this spot.
We can stay to the side there and at least get a trench
in here and see what it looks like.
OK.
On the other side of the claim, Freddy locates
a spot to test under an old mining road for virgin pay.
Maybe they didn't touch it, so let's see
what lives right here. - OK.
Hey, Juan, you got a copy?
Go ahead, Freddy.
I see that excavator showed up.
Yeah, 10-4, do you want me to bring it on down to you?
Yeah, if you wouldn't mind.
With the Genert's unreliable excavators, Freddy and Juan
truck one in that can dig to almost 30 feet.
What do you think, buddy?
Sweet machine.
Thanks for bringing it down.
- Yeah. - This is a huge machine.
That's awesome.
See if I'm tall enough to get in this guy.
My hope, this was their road
when they dug these pits beside us.
This was the only spot I could see that we could have a look at
in the time period we're here.
- Well, let's try that level. - OK.
Zero. Not a color in it.
- That's disappointing. - Yeah.
Really disappointing.
I just had a chat with Freddy.
There might not be ground there, basically.
Ugh...
What I want to do is get some material from down deeper
in here and then have a look at it from a greater depth.
At the Genert Mine, Freddy rolls the dice on one
last option, finding gold at bedrock.
Well, this is definitely virgin material.
I just don't know how much of it's here.
- We're down to bedrock here. - Yep.
We took those pans about five to six feet, right?
But now we're down 12 feet or so.
OK.
So I got some in the bucket there.
Let's pan it and see what's in it.
When I pan, I like to take,
you know, not just the same spot.
Yeah.
I'll pick around through that material.
So we get a little bit more scientific test.
Holy moly!
That's the stuff dreams are made of right there.
I'm absolutely amazed
that Freddy was able to find something in here.
I'm hopeful there's a few thousand yards
of material there. This is incredible.
Well, that is what I wanted to see.
We'll run a second test and see what's in it.
How you doing, guys?
Good, how are you guys?
Good, doing good.
With 24 hours left before the second test, Juan enlists
Jared and brother Sandy to help with the next fix.
If you guys could help Freddy and I, we need to get that
spray bar out of the trommel. See if we can break it loose
here on this end, to get it unthreaded.
- You good with that? - Perfect, yeah.
Awesome. Thanks, guys.
See you in a bit.
So the problem with the old spray bar, it was actually
pushing water outside of the trommel, and it really
wasn't cleaning the material properly.
With this new one, it's going to allow us to be
able to concentrate that water where it needs to be
and get that material washed.
You stick that in there.
Nope.
- Heavier body. - Yeah, get up here.
There you go.
We're putting these pipe nipples on so we can reduce
the water flow, so we have a nice even flow across
the whole bar to get a good wash.
And I'm using the end of the old spray bar so that way
we know that we have the right thread pitch to be able
to screw it back onto the plant, and we know it's going to fit.
This is an awesome new spray bar.
Juan did excellent.
You gonna start throwing her in?
- Yeah, I think so. - Oh, OK.
- This is heavy. - My end's light.
I got the heavy side for sure.
Yeah, I'm sure.
OK, let's set her down.
We're gonna see if this side's heavier.
- This side's way easier. - It's the same.
Oh, look at that. It's tight.
Like we're professionals or something.
- Hi, Freddy. - How's it going?
Going good.
Right now, you got a little bit
of a safety issue here. - Yes, yes.
There's no stair treads in the frameworks on them.
Yeah.
So, I was repurposing your old riffles.
We'll tack them in. Why don't you try that?
You're going to start it,
click, and then go chk-chk, too-too,
about an eighth of an inch, and then you stack
your dimes, OK? - OK.
Here, we stack one, we stack two.
"Stacking dimes" means making each weld smooth and round,
just like coins in a stack.
We just stacked nine dimes.
Nine!
OK, this is the last weld right there.
Stack those dimes.
Get a little closer.
There you go.
- You got it. - Did I?
- Yeah. - Thanks, Freddy.
You're welcome.
I feel pretty good.
Freddy said I did OK.
I think this skill is really important to have out here.
If Jared and Ray are gone
and we need something welded, then I can do it.
We're making a wider sluice box to give them more area for that
gold to fall out, so we can spread that material out wider.
It's going to be a lot more efficient sluice box than
the one they had.
With hours remaining on the final day of fixes
and the critical sluice unfinished, the Generts get
a welcome surprise.
Ray's taken the afternoon off to lend a hand.
Ray is incredibly hardworking.
He is gone most of the days during the week, but he tries
to make up for the week he wasn't here.
He just goes and goes and goes and goes.
- How's it going guys? - Good.
We're here to help.
You guys want to cut some riffles?
We do.
So, our sluice is 35 and a half.
Right now, I'm just getting this fairly close to the pitch.
We'll have it in the sluice box.
That way when I weld the ears on for these jacks,
I can get them straight up and down.
The jacks will make the sluice adjustable for the type of pay
they are running.
Well, all finished.
Looking good. Let's get her up to the plant.
Right now, it's all hands on deck.
We're going to get this thing in, get this test run done,
and head on to the next mine.
- So we'll riffle this up. - OK.
So we're going to put it in like shingles.
Sluice build complete, Freddy gives a quick tutorial
to mechanic brother Sandy on how to configure it.
So now we take our miner's moss.
We don't overlap this stuff.
OK, now grab one of our heavy riffles.
So we'll go right up to the top with that one.
Done.
You can start walking that end this way.
- You good? - Still all right.
Last task before the test run, the sluice installation.
- Oh, we're going under that? - Yeah.
- OK. - Oh, we're golden.
We've learned a ton since
Freddy and Juan showed up here.
Words can't express the gratitude I have
for those guys right now.
What do you say? Let's start a test run.
All right. Let's wash some rock, guys.
Let's see this run.
Overall, the fixes were great.
And we know we got virgin material here.
We'll just run a second test and see what happens.
What do you think, guys?
Looks like we're ready to run.
So why don't we do a two-hour test run, huh, Juan?
Yeah.
I'm excited to see how she runs now.
In British Columbia...
All right, let's do it.
It's the moment of truth at the Genert Family Mine.
There's a lot at stake here for us with everything, so I'm
hoping with the improvements, the sluice and the spray bar,
that we should improve, and I'm really excited to see
what's in the box after we run.
That's good.
Well, let's make some gold.
First bucket.
So far, everything looks great.
Already it's more material than we were running the first
go around, huh? - Awesome, awesome.
Now we're not having to stay up there and hose it all down.
It's washing itself down.
I think this test run's going pretty good so far,
These fixes are awesome
above and beyond what I could have ever expected.
But we've all learned a ton with Freddy and Juan here.
Tomorrow's gold weigh will determine
whether or not we stay here.
Sluice is running pretty decent.
Yeah, it's not bad.
By adding this extra wide sluice box,
it allows us to run more material.
When you put material into the plant,
it's got to go somewhere, right?
We don't want it building up where it's coming up
the sluice box.
So you got to take care of it.
Sandy's going to get that trackhoe here
where he can take care of the tailings.
Now start turning.
There you go!
- Last bucket, Jared. - Yeah, sounds good.
Get my granny glasses on.
Yep, she's got gold in her.
There's definitely some mustard in this box.
- Hey, Jamie. - Come have a look.
- Lots of fine stuff. - Get in there.
- Oh, yeah. - See it? There.
- A little bit bigger here. - Over here.
Nice work, Mr. Dodge.
I think this has significantly improved.
That's the biggest piece I see, but all through here
is gold.
So yeah, get her cleaned up,
and we'll meet you in the morning.
All right, see you guys in the morning.
- Thanks, guys. - Yep, awesome.
I'm thrilled to see a light at the end of the tunnel.
I'm more excited than I can express with words.
- How's it going, guys? - Good.
- How are you doing today? - Good.
Get her all cleaned up?
Yep.
This is what we ended up with.
Better than what we had in the first.
I guess we'll see.
All the rumor is, and the testings have shown
that this might be the ground that we've needed
all this time.
I think we've got good ground now.
I think we're going to do well.
During our first test run, it was a 0.02.
That was for a one hour run.
So on the final test run, we did two hours.
We would have gotten 0.04, which is still only a hundred
dollars worth of gold for two hours.
Your goal right now is about half an ounce daily, right?
Yeah.
let's see what we got out of two hours.
Yeah.
0.33, third of an ounce.
Almost three times what they need
to hit their daily goal.
That's really great, guys!
That's a massive increase, you know,
and the great thing is that now you're actually on decent
ground that's actually virgin instead of going through
the tailings that we were doing in the beginning.
And with the plant running the way it is,
we're able to run a lot more material.
But you got to keep prospecting because that whole
mine's tailings piles, right? - Yeah.
Who knows what's under them?
I'll be able to recognize those tailings
a little better now. - Yeah.
You actually have a real possibility of making
this work. - Yeah, we can work with this.
You kind of mentioned to me earlier that eventually this is
something that you want to do as a family, right?
- Yep. - Yeah.
Well, with gold like that, that's no longer a dream.
You know, that actually could be your reality.
Yeah. That's amazing.
I think if we can keep this up, I won't have to be
a mechanic anymore. - Oh, you still will be.
Mechanic at a gold mine, yeah.
There's lots of gold in this area, so look around.
- Don't run tailings. - Well, thank you very much.
- Thanks a lot, you guys. - Thanks for everything.
- You're welcome. - Thank you.
It was amazing to ride around with Fred and learn some stuff.
They're leaving me with hope for my future, so I'm chomping
at the bit to get out there
and get the rest of that pile run.
Well, you guys take care.
- We've got to hit the road. - Bye.
My confidence has skyrocketed.
I'm able to do things that I wasn't able to do before,
so I'm really grateful for that.
Jared really wants to be kind of a family mine.
Now he has that option.
I really enjoyed working with this family.
They stepped up.
I taught Jared how to spot the difference between tailings
and virgin ground.
That's a biggie, because if you run tailings, you go broke.
You know, the sky's the limit for him now.
Hey Freddy and Juan, thank you for this season
and everything that you guys taught us.
We ran the rest of that virgin material from under
the road the next day.
We ended up with just about an ounce from it, but I'll be
honest, we're not going to go back to the same claim.
With the amount of tailings,
it was such a big risk to go after it.
Now Ray and I actually bought our own claims.
That's something like 600 acres of our own now.
And with the knowledge I got from Freddy, I'm confident
I'll be able to go out there and prospect that.
This season really gave me a taste of stepping up
and the things that I learned from Freddy, like learning how
to weld, stacking dimes. I'll never forget that.
I'm going to get her to weld up the exhaust
on the excavator.
Anything that breaks, if I need any welding done.
So the future's looking good. Confidence is high.
We're not giving up. Thank you again.
Yeah, thanks, guys.