Gold and where we find it

 Our little bit of gold from all of our digging when we were in Quartzsite.  It's pretty and every little grain adds up but oh its a lot of work digging.  We now have about five hundred dollars worth that we have dug ourselves or paid for by buying bags and pails of dirt with gold salted in it.  That is not really a lot for the number of years we have been at it but it is something to do and one of the few hobbies that can actually pay you back -- maybe--

We are now back in Yuma and are going out on the California side of the Colorado River to dig.  It is pretty and very quiet out there except for the occasional braying of a wild donkey.  The mountains in the background are either the Cargo Muchacho or Chocolate mountains.  Both are prettty and challenge most peoples idea of a desert.  I always thought desert meant dried up and flat looking ground but it is full of hills, mountains, washes and lots of greenery if you take the time to look.    

Neighborhood Birds

 I have been feeding the hummingbirds but haven't got any pictures of them.  They are just too fast.  I did get the Gila Woodpecker sitting in the Ocotillo bush.  It amazes me that birds can perch in the prickly bush.  There are even bird nests in there.  The yellow rumped warbler was hanging around too.  Both of these birds were trying to get to the sweet  juice in the hummingbird feeder.  The Gila woodpecker hangs upside down on the bird feeder and tries to stick his long bill into the feeder.  It doesn't work but some of the juice does come out with all of the teeter tottering the bird feeder does from the bird hanging on for dear life.  The warbler was doing the same thing.  

Some other little warblers and finches showed up and were also trying to get something from the feeder.  I put out a pan of sweet water hoping to get the birds to go there instead of trying for the hummingbird feeder.  Some of the birds have used it but then they still try to get at the feeder so I give up.  Of course the hummingbirds are quite put out by these big birds trying to get at their food.  They actually will try to scare off the big birds.  It's pretty funny to see the tiny hummingbirds chasing the bigger birds around the Ocotillo bush.   

Back in Yuma

 We are settled back into our spot in the foothills of Yuma.  We don't stay in an RV park instead we rent a lot.  Renting half of a lot is very popular here and can be less expensive than a park.  If you like to use the pool, play cards, shuffleboard, pickleball, etc. than you are better off in a park.   Our lot has a storage shed with a washer in it and room to store some of our stuff.  Normally, there is another RV next to us where the truck is parked but our Canadian neighbors aren't able to come yet.  

The park our friends stay in usually is at least half full with Canadians but it is looking pretty empty so far.   A few people we know aren't coming down opting stay up north in their house instead of down here in their RV.  They have already had a few blasts of winter up north.  I'm sure they are missing the heat that we are enjoying.  The temps here are in the nineties but that changes this weekend when it will drop to the low seventies.  

Roadrunner - MEEP MEEP

 This roadrunner showed up by the rig next to us.  He hung out by the door to the RV like he was waiting for a handout.  I think this is the first time I was able to take pictures of one so close up.  He was used to people and I think someone was feeding him.  They like hamburger so not a cheap thing to feed.  They are the size of a chicken just skinnier.  I also wanted to take a picture of a dead scorpion but he was pretty squished from being run over on the road here in the park.  It was one of the small white ones called a bark scorpion.  Don't ever leave shoes out on the ground and shake them out good if you do!

We are getting ready to move to Yuma for the winter.  We found a little gold while we were here in Quartzsite.  I'm not sure if it would cover the bottom of a small glass vial or not but it's better than getting skunked.  We hope to continue our gold prospecting in Yuma.  The place we like to try there seems to have a little bit bigger specs of gold.  

Sunrise over the Claim

  

 We have been getting out to the gold claim way before sunrise.  It's a little scary when we get there because you don't know what creepy crawlies are where you want to walk.  So far we haven't seen any.  We get our equipment set up and have coffee and then as soon as it is light enough we start running dirt.  The sunrise was pretty coming up over the mountains so I got a picture with the phone.  I'm not impressed with the camera on the phone.  It doesn't capture all the colors that were in the sky.  

I had to take a picture of the cacti.  It is two saguaro cactus with a mesquite tree acting as a "nursery" tree to them.  The cactus grow better while protected by the tree.  The dirt is the driest we have ever run because it hasn't rained a drop in months.  It has also been so hot in this part of Arizona that they have broken all the records for the most days in a row of over a hundred degrees.  It finally is only getting in the nineties.  Yeah!

Drywashing for Gold

We have been going out in the desert just about every other day to dig for gold.  We belong to a local club that has several gold claims.  We get out to the claim before the sun rises and get our drywasher set up.  We are usually ready to start shoveling dirt into the drywasher by sunup.  We found this hole that was dug with the dirt piled up alongside it.  We decided to run the dirt from the pile and have been finding some tiny specs of gold in it.  We fill up the top of the drywasher and the rocks slide off to the left and the dirt goes down the chute and pours over the riffles.  The bellows underneath puff air over the dirt and blow the light material off and piles it to the right of the machine.   We shovel and run the machine about twenty minutes and then do a clean out.  The material that is left we pan out to find the gold. 

Everywhere we dig is a little different.  This pile of dirt has a lot of black sand which is heavy and can clog up the riffles in the machine and then the gold can just run onto the ground instead of being trapped in the riffles.  This means we have to do a clean out sooner than we like.  The longer we can run the more gold we are likely to find but with the amount of black sand here that isn't possible.  When we are done for the day we move the machine and rake all the rocks and dirt out.  I take my metal detector and detect over the fanned out material.   I like to make sure we didn't lose track of a nugget.  No luck so far finding anything with the detector.
 

Quartzsite Hot & Dry

 Our temperature gauge inside the RV shows the temps and humidity for the outside, the top numbers, and the inside temps underneath.  So it has been getting up to 104 each day we have been here in Quartzsite, Arizona so far.  It may drop into the 90's by the weekend.  The humidity is next to nothing so I try to let the steam from the shower escape out into the RV to try and bump it up more.  We drink water almost non stop.  RV air conditioners are not very efficient so they only cool the place down about 10 degrees.  Usually, that is ok because if its in the nineties then it is only in the 80's in the RV and we don't mind 80's.  At least it cools off as soon as the sun goes down so by the time we go to bed it is a more comfortable 80 degrees.  

The dryness is a problem in some ways.  It can mean bloody noses if your not careful.  We like it dry outside because then the dirt is nice and dry for our gold mining.  We use a dry washer to run dirt through like a sluice but with no water.  It's a dusty business but we have found a few specs of gold so I guess its worth getting hot and dusty.  We've been going out at 5AM while it is still dark.  We get all set up and are ready to run by daylight.  We last about two hours and then the sun and heat and the shoveling do us in and we have to call it a day.   It's great exercise but won't make you rich.