This time on Aussie Gold Hunters...
If that's a full ore body, that could be millions of dollars.
..the Gold Devils abandon their base
to chase potentially game changing gold...
We haven't solved the riddle, where did the gold come from?
..but the gamble could put
their massive, one thousand ounce target in jeopardy.
Are we wasting money?
We can't really survive on these little one, two grammers.
I'm getting quite nervous.
Shane Calegari and new partner Kate
double their efforts to bring in the gold.
Woah!
I've bitten off more than I can chew with the two plants.
But running two wash plants at once...
There's something seriously wrong here.
..leads to double trouble.
Got no water!
You're a plumber! How have we got no water, Shane?
And Alan and Salty...
Oi!
..tackle the extreme wilderness of the Kimberley region...
My legs are shaking.
..before hitting a run of nuggets..
Look at that beautiful piece.
Oh my God, that's the biggest nugget I've ever found.
..but risk getting stranded...
That's both our tyres. I know.
..in the outback.
That's it!
Well, back at Desert King.
I'm excited but a little bit nervous.
Mmm. I know we were finding
a lot of nuggets before, but I'm just hoping
that that hasn't run out.
Last time we found a reef
with gold bearing quartz. That's true.
If we can prove that that reef isn't just a little pocket
and runs for some distance,
I mean, that's just a game changer.
We could get to that thousand-ounce target real quick.
We've definitely got some unfinished business here.
Uh, when we were here last time a few months ago,
we actually pulled out over a kilo in nuggets,
which was fantastic actually,
so, that's why we're back here,
and hopefully we can get some more gold, um nugget style,
and keep adding to that season target.
It looks like Alex and Mel are just rocking up.
That's good timing.
Hey Paul. Hey hey.
G'day, Paul. How you going?
We're still plucking some nuggets out of the ground.
Oh good. Wonderful news.
And Darren's over there detecting now
and we've got the big loader here working,
so that's what we came here for.
Oh good. So the nuggets continue.
The nuggets are continuing.
Oh, thank God for that. So hopefully this is going to be it
to add some more gold and reach that thousand-ounce target.
Well, we had the quartz we picked some decent amount of gold out of,
and it would be interesting to see actually
how big that quartz vein is.
Because if that's a full ore body,
that could be millions of dollars.
Yeah, and we can just do some crushing and panning
and see exactly what's in there. Continue on with the detecting
and keep chasing this gold. Fun.
Find the big ones. Fishing in the dirt.
The Gold Devils,
Paul Mackie, Melanie Wood and Alex Stead,
spent half their season exploring some of their 10 leases
for the most profitable ground...
Bust.
..setting up their main operation at the lease
dubbed The Phoenix Project, which delivers consistent gold.
26.9. Wow.
But their ambitious $2.6 million target
is getting out of reach...
For us to make our thousand-ounce target,
we're going to need multiple projects on the go
at the same time.
..they've returned to their Desert King lease...
That is literally the biggest nugget I've ever pulled out of the ground.
..an area that has shown signs of massive unproven potential.
If that's what's come out the ground just on the nuggets,
and you've just found the source, we could be on a big winner here.
It's a bit of a change waving the old wand
but this is basically back to my roots.
The first thing I ever did was pick up a metal detector,
find a nugget um, and I was hooked, and I'm still hooked.
(DETECTOR BEEPS)
Right there on the edge.
(DETECTOR BEEPS) There you go.
Gold? Yep.
Beautiful.
A gram. Nice and prickly.
Nice.
One down, a thousand to go.
Where is she, Darren?
(DETECTOR BEEPS)
Little pebble. At least they're still comin'.
A gram and a half.
Another diesel token.
Where's his big brother?
Yeah. Where's Mum and Dad?
Where's the grandad nugget?
Now this is the fun part.
You do all the hard work.
Maybe I'll come down there and have a look.
Oh, it's there.
That's alright. It's a nice piece.
Yeah, I thought it was going to be a little chunkier than that
but...sounded good.
We just need some bigger ones. Yeah.
We're only slowly chipping away at this target
but we need to um get a move on.
We're all hands on deck and just looking for the nuggets now
and as much fun as that is, with the amount of money
that we've sunk into this project, we really need to be finding
those big nuggets.
You know, I probably stress a little bit more than the boys
because I'm the one that keeps an eye on the books.
Ugh half way through the season,
we're only at 250 ounces.
At this stage, I'm getting quite nervous.
(DETECTOR BEEPS) Uh, that's a decent signal there.
Just in the winrow there.
It's gonna be gold this one.
Come on, be a nugget. (DETECTOR BEEPS)
Sounds a bit better.
It is a nugget.
Nice one.
Only a gram and a half.
Aargh.
Well, the nuggets are still coming but they're small.
We don't want small, we want big.
All that's weighing on my mind is are we wasting money?
Are we wasting diesel?
Is this a waste of all our time when we could be operating
on a different project and actually turning over the tonnes
and turning over the gold?
We can't really survive on these little one and two grammers.
You got a fish for me yet?
Nothing yet, mate.
Yeah, well, hurry up. I'm hungry.
Come up and have a look at this new spot I picked out.
Yeah, sweet mate.
What have you got?
I've got this pinnacle here, middle of nowhere,
looks like an awesome geological occurrence.
Oh, that's a formation.
Unreal, isn't it? And it's very hard to get to.
Doesn't look like anyone's ever been there before.
Is there a track there?
Nah, there's no track. Closest one is, yeah, a few K's away
so might have to punch our own track in,
which is always a good sign.
Means no one's been out there with a detector.
It's Alan Williams and Salty Davenport's
second week in the remote Kimberley region
as they head off-road again
in search of virgin ground near the site
of the first gold rush in Western Australia.
More than 23,000 ounces of gold was found in the area,
but the rush was short lived
and the country too remote and treacherous for many people.
Today its rugged environment still discourages
all but the most intrepid prospectors.
It's a good feeling, mate, half way through the season,
half way to our target.
We need to keep going though because if we have a few days
or even a week with no gold, we're going to drop below.
Yeah. Pretty quickly.
Just going to be going backwards. Think that's it here.
Yeah, this is the one.
Beginning of the end of the road, eh?
I'm just seeing stakes and potholes
and everything that can pop our tyres.
Hopefully the car's up
so we don't go through any tyres.
And you're not going to let me find another way, are ya?
Nah.
You're not going to talk me out of this one.
Alrighty.
This is it. This is it.
Sharp eyes, mate. Got to keep a good look out.
Which way? That way?
The path of least resistance is what we're after.
No such thing out here.
It does feel good getting off the road though.
See, I told you you'd enjoy it.
I know, mate. I love it.
(THUMPING) Oh, what was that?
You're not looking good, mate. Argh!
What? What?
Don't.
You're joking, alright?
Oh, you're kidding!
That's one tyre down already.
Oh man!
Yeah, look, alright,
was bound to happen. Bound to happen.
Look how quick it's gone down, mate. Let's get this done.
The longer we're standing here, the more time we're wasting.
Yep. Alright, let's chuck this one on.
Definitely not an ideal thing to happen.
We've only got two spares, and I was kind of hoping
we'd get down to where we needed to be without this happening,
but luckily we've got everything on board to get us through this.
Fingers crossed we don't do another one.
Get outta here.
Changing a tyre is never fun but hey,
it's all part of this adventure. It is.
You're not going to get to these spots
that haven't been searched for gold
by sticking to the main tracks.
Get this done and get a wriggle on.
Good job, mate.
Seamless. We've just got to be super cautious now.
We've got one spare.
Yeah, and we've still got a fair bit, a fair way to go.
Going at this slow pace, it's going to take a while.
Yeah, I'd rather go slow and get there though.
I might get you to hop out and walk, walks us through.
This part up here is looking a bit sketch.
Yep. Thanks bro.
Can't risk another puncture. You always want one, one spare.
Yeah, looks good, looks good,
can't see nothing. Beautiful. Keep coming.
Nicely done, nicely done.
Hang on. Whoa, whoa, stop there.
Stop. Hold up. Stop there, stop there.
I got some bad news.
I don't know how or when
but we've done a second one.
You got a slow leak.
Mate, it's been 20 minutes. I know.
Oh BLEEP sake!
That's both our tyres. I know, I know.
That's it.
I don't know what to do, mate.
We can't keep on going if we've got no spares.
Well, Kate, it's a wonderful morning. As you know,
the large companies around here are trying to buy me tenement
but this deal's not a done deal yet.
I've still got expenses
and I haven't got one penny from it yet.
Nothing. I haven't had a cent from it.
Nup.
After having a think about it, I think we need to fire up
those wash plants and maximise the amount of gold
you're getting out of this place before we leave.
There is a lot of free alluvial gold here
but my only concern is driving a bit of that machinery
and we're both not that competent with it
but we just have to work together as a team and see what we can do.
Yep.
And luckily we got our old mate Bruce still around
and he can probably help us out a bit.
Yeah. But as long as we work together
as a team, we'll make it work, OK?
Yep, I'm happy with that. That sounds really good.
So we'll make it happen. After you've had this cup of tea.
Probably the worst cup of tea in the history of time but anyway.
Here.
We'll find out. Thank you.
OK, Kate, you want to sluice? Tell me what the programme is.
Alright, well, we've cleared this whole area now.
We've exposed some really nice river gravels
so I think that material will be perfect to go through the sluice.
It's got to have some fine gold in there.
OK, well, I've organised Bruce to stay for an extra couple of days.
Perfect. Alright, Bruce,
let's bring this all through.
Yeah, no we can push it all this way, that's fine.
Yep, and then we'll get started on the sluice.
Righto.
And then me and you will go and have a look at the sluice
and see what sort of arrangement we've got.
Alright, let's do it. OK. Done.
OK doke, let's go.
Pretty good being up here.
Shane's been a mate for about 35 to 40 years
and I've known Kate for all her life.
Lovely girl and geologist is what Shane needs here
at the moment to help maximise this sale
if he can, so let's hope it comes to something
that'll set him up for an awful long time I would hope.
Last week Shane met with Ryan Colquhoun...
Ryan. How are you, mate?
I believe you're the exploration manager.
That's me.
..to discuss what the mining company needs to secure the sale
of the Galah lease, which Shane has owned for seven years.
I don't know what it's worth at the moment
so we need to do some sampling and we need to check out
what you got and just see if it flies.
We can get the ball rolling, send the samples to the lab
and then we can come back and talk.
To help with the sale, Shane has brought in
long-time family friend Kate Dundas.
Shane's a great prospector but he's no geologist
and so I've come up here to give him a hand.
I'll be able to help him interpret the results
and the reports that he's getting from this mining company
and really get the best price that he can for his leases.
We're just trying to maximise the gold that we can get out
of Shane's lease while we've got time here
so we're going to have the two sluices going at the same time.
So what we've got here is Mr Fragile.
He's seen much better days. He wouldn't look out of place
in a scrap yard. He's Shane's first sluice.
And down here we've got Mrs G-Force,
but she's in the completely wrong spot,
so what we need to do is put in a new pad
and she can sit there and we can feed both machines
from the same place.
Shane's former partner, Russell,
built Mr Fragile from junk metal
while Mrs G was bought by Shane and adapted
using various collected components.
Both wash plants use centrifugal force
to separate the gold from pay dirt
before water and gravity move material through the sluice box,
settling gold in its riffles.
Where am I, Kate? I can't see a thing.
Alright, come on. Poor old ute.
Poor old driver.
Yep, keep coming. You've got three metres.
Two metres.
Whoa, whoa, whoa.
Calm down. You've got one metre left.
How close? How am I in line with the hitch?
You've got about this much. You're bang on.
Bang on. Well, just... Whoa!
That was that far.
Stop! Alright, stop there. You're alright. Oh my God.
Yep, you're right. Is your brake on?
Is your brake on?
I'm about to put it on.
'Cause now it's sitting on there.
OK, Kate, just drive it out.
Running both sluices will take 4000 litres of water an hour,
pumped from a bore 750 metres away.
Straighten it up. Straight! Straight, straight, straight!
That will do ya! Perfect. Just leave it there.
Handbrake on.
Right, just turn it off and I'll plumb it up, OK.
Alright, sounds good. We're hooking up the water
and we're going to be running both plants before too long.
Right, this is the story.
I'm going to fire the genie up, but you might have to give this
a bit of a nudge, OK. You ready?
OK, no worries. Tell me when.
Yes. Right, Kate, let her go.
Alright, we're going.
Is Fragile going 'cause I can't see?
Yep, Fragile's good.
OK, come on. Let's go do the water. Let's get onto it.
We're on the gold. Let's go.
Go stand over there at the unit
and tell me if the water comes through.
Alright.
Yes! Right, let's get some water going.
How you going, Kate?
Yeah, we got water!
You beauty!
It's looking good.
That's great, Kate, and it's got some really good juice.
We've got enough pressure. Everything's going really well.
What's happened here?
Well, the jets aren't blocked.
We've just got no water!
You're a plumber! How have we got no water, Shane?
You should know how to do this. It should be working.
Kate, I don't know what the plumber did.
We've got no water.
That's the problem.
The first time through here, Paul picked out the biggest gold
from a detector he's ever found.
This time around, we're just not seeing it.
We need the ounces to be rolling in, and at the moment,
it's just grams, and unless something turns around here,
this is going to be a disappointing few days.
(DETECTOR BEEPS) Oh. Sounds like it's something.
(DETECTOR BEEPS) Oh yeah.
Finding gold, you don't care about the heat or the flies.
Just focused on what you're going to get out of the ground.
There's nothing else like it.
Come on.
Oh, this is the best part.
Oh my God!
Get outta here.
(DETECTOR BEEPS) Check that out!
Oh wow!
I reckon that's a six gram bit of gold.
500 bucks easy, right in your hand.
Hey Paul! Yo.
We're on the gold, buddy!
I'm going to take it over to him, show him.
It's not a competition, Alex.
Yes, it is.
I like this dirt fishing.
It's like a little mini gold needle.
Oh yeah, well one piece of gold is all it takes.
Look at him dancing.
This is how excited I get with one run.
Alright, on to the next one.
It's a competition now.
Game on, mate.
OK, let's find a bigger one.
(DETECTOR BEEPS) Whey, hang on.
Where did it go, mate?
Oh, that made a good noise.
(DETECTOR BEEPS) Yeah, that's gonna be a good one.
We'll see whose is bigger, eh?
(DETECTOR BEEPS) Got it?
Oh my God!
Oh, it's another chunker. That's big.
Oh, that's at least a six grammer.
There it is.
Not mine.
I think I got another little one here.
Not like it's a competition or anything.
I think that's pretty much this run done, mate.
It sounds pretty quiet, doesn't it?
That one over there's definitely got to go down
another 200 mil easy. Yep.
And we'll just widen it on this side as well.
Alright, I'll get to it.
My cousin Darren is basically an all rounder. He can do anything.
He's gonna go and fire up the loader now
and open up a bit more ground.
We've pretty much gone over everything here
and we're not getting any more signal
so we'll go a bit deeper, hopefully pull some more gold out.
(ENGINE STALLING) Come on, baby.
Are you on channel, Paul?
Yeah, mate.
Yeah, I think we got a problem with the loader, mate.
She's not firing up.
There's always something going wrong.
Uh, you'll have a couple of good days
and then all of a sudden, everything just goes pear shaped.
We're in trouble, mate.
We're not even where we need to be yet
and we're through both of our spares.
I don't know what to do here. I don't know what to do.
It's either we keep going with no safety blanket whatsoever
or we get out of here.
We're in a tough spot and we need to sit down
and make a decision together.
What are you feeling? What are you thinking?
I'm not really liking it to be honest.
Not having any spare tyres, it's a big one for me.
And I really don't want to be stranded out here.
It's a long walk to any help.
Mate, if we turn back now, that's going to be a week
without gold and without even trying,
and you know, there's gold there.
I know if anything's going to seal the deal for you,
it's that. That was it.
That was it. Yeah, alright.
Alright, let's do it.
Come on, car, you got this.
The remote Kimberley region has a population density
of less than two people every 25 square kilometres.
Is that it?
Yeah, yeah that's it.
Beautiful breakaway pinnacle.
By pushing on,
the boys are risking a two-day walk to the nearest outpost.
Ooh yeah. Shit's getting really uneven, mate.
Oh yeah.
I reckon we follow that creek bed just to the right here.
Yep.
'Cause that'll put us right where we want to be.
Nah, that's the river right there.
Whoa, mate, it's not really the entrance we want.
That's pretty gnarly.
It looks like it might get real steep.
Whoa, Jesus!
Nah, nah, nah, stop, stop there. Nah, seriously stop, stop.
You reckon? I reckon we got this.
You sure? Oi.
We're doing it, mate. It's happening.
This is our safest way to get to the pinnacle.
Are you sure?
Oh, are we good?
Yeah, I guess so. This is on you, this one.
This is nerve wracking.
My legs are shaking.
Oh! Phew.
Yeah. Mate. That was huge.
Good driving. Good driving.
I was literally white knuckle tight the whole time.
On to the end, mate. Last little bit.
There it is. Man, I cannot wait to get that coil swinging.
I'm very surprised we got the car here in one piece.
It was a long drive to get in here.
Much longer than we both anticipated.
So can't waste any more time. Al and I are both going to hit
this pinnacle pretty quickly
and give it a really good sweep.
The shape of the pinnacle is created by a hard cap
of ironstone and quartz protecting it against erosion.
The large quartz outcrop indicates there was once
a major fault line here,
where dissolved silica and metals such as gold
were forced from deep in the earth's core
to cool near the surface.
Yeah, you've got all these ancient quartz blows
and the little plateau at the top,
which I really want to get to.
You know, it's basically remnants of this beautiful
old mountain.
Hopefully we do find something.
Day's getting on a bit.
With each passing minute, it just keeps getting hotter and hotter.
Sun's burning me neck.
Need to put me collar up.
One last little climb.
Got to watch out for snakes in these BLEEP holes up here.
You know, we're about 90 K's out of Halls Creek.
40 degrees plus heat.
There's no one around.
If something does go wrong, it's dangerous.
Woo hoo!
Look at that.
Ugh, that's a view.
It's like a whole 'nother little eco system up here.
Alrighty.
I'm feeling a little bit nervous now
because we spent so long getting out here.
I mean, that took everything out of us.
It would have been much safer turning back.
I do feel responsible for this decision.
I don't want to put Alan's life at risk
'cause we're a long way from anywhere out here.
It should be working.
Kate, I don't think we've got any water.
We've got no water. That's the problem.
You're a plumber.
How have we got no water, Shane?
It's nothing to do with plumbing. The bore's down.
Come on, let's go and have a look at the bore.
Alright, what do you think the problem is?
The pump's not functioning. That's what's happening.
How do you know it's not working?
Because the generator would be going twice as hard as this.
To tap into limited water sources, narrow bore holes
are drilled through rock and soil to underground reservoirs
that fill up during periods of rain.
A generator is needed to power the pump deep below
to bring the water to the surface and then over land.
I'm going to make a phone call.
Shane has called in local bush mechanic and trouble shooter,
Jim McNamara, to try and help solve the problem.
How you going there, Jimbo?
Shane.
Now, say hello to me new partner, Kate.
How are you going, Jimmy? Pleased to meet you.
So what's wrong?
OK, Jimmy,
the story is I've got no water.
It's just not pumping? Not pumping.
Yeah, righto. I don't think that genny's big enough.
Well, it used to work.
What do you mean it used to work?
Well, it used to run it.
I don't know why it's not running it now, Jim.
Now have you got another generator? No, Jimmy.
You know, I just run on bare minimal.
Yeah, I'm fully aware of that, Shane.
I do have one on me.
I'll lend you that. Do you reckon you can look after it?
I'll try. Kate's here to police me.
Nah, it's a good genny, Shane.
I don't want it stuffed 'cause I know what you're like.
I'll make sure he doesn't.
Thanks, Kate.
Shane's generator isn't powerful enough
to pump the 4000 litres of water per hour
needed to run both plants at once.
There you go,
and I'll make sure that tap's open.
OK, Kate, plug it in.
Whoa, yep!
We're in business, Shane.
Let's get on the gold.
Rightio, thank you, Jimmy.
That's alright, Shane. See you, Jimmy.
See ya. Yeah, I don't mind helping Shane out.
He's been a mate for a few years.
I hope it all goes well for him.
Rightio, Kate, away you go.
Water's going well. Time's against me
but I'll be right now.
I've got two plants turning.
We will produce some good gold now.
Shane!
Are you ready for me to come up?
Yep, let's do it. Go for it, Kate.
Alright, so we're gonna do our first load.
That'll do ya.
OK, I'll get up there and start shovelling.
Here I am just doing the shovelling at my age.
I'm so BLEEP old. Let's get on the gold!
I've bitten off more than I can chew with the two plants
but that's the way it is. I'll have to keep going.
But it's all working well.
It's slipping.
There's something seriously wrong here.
The belt's loose. Why?
On no, it's stopped. What's the matter?
The pulley's broken.
The pulley is broken off the side here.
Kate!
What's wrong? One man down.
Me pulley's broken.
It'll turn slowly but when I put weight on it,
of the material, it won't be able to turn.
Just wasting me time
because what's going to happen, every 30 seconds,
we're going to have to readjust it.
It's probably weeks before I can get another one.
It's out. What's wrong, Shane?
Fragile's down.
I've broken the pulley. That's the end of it.
It's absolutely done.
Gone?
I've got no more time to waste on this. He's out.
He's absolutely finished. Can you grab the metal detectors,
go out see if you can find some nice nuggets
and I'll see if I can produce
some gold with Mrs G-Force. Yeah, alright, Shane.
Yeah, I think we got a problem with the loader, mate.
She's not firing up.
It doesn't sound like it's getting any fuel, mate.
Well, we know it's got fuel because we just filled it up
yesterday afternoon. Yep.
I wonder what it could be.
Um, I'll just get you to start it up again.
Yep.
Just let me have a listen and a look.
Alright.
(ENGINE STRUGGLING)
What the hell? There's nothing leaking.
There's nothing coming out down the bottom.
Well, if we can't get this machine up and running again,
um, that's going to be, that's gonna be it for the rest of the day.
We won't be able to keep pushing,
and being such a large machine, anything, any call out
is, it starts running into the thousands of dollars.
There's no pressure in the fuel line!
I'm working the fuel pump now.
Alright. OK.
The vacuum must have dropped out or something.
Alright, give that a go, Darren.
(ENGINE STARTS)
There you go!
Good work, mate.
Always something.
Now we can get back to moving some dirt
and finding some gold.
With a lease like this, we haven't solved the riddle,
where did the gold come from?
Mel and Alex at the moment, they're down the back end
with that quartz outcrop, trying to prove that up
to see if that's actually where the gold came from.
If we were just to leave without knowing where it came from,
we could be leaving behind a massive gold deposit.
Darren, got a copy?
Yeah, go ahead.
Yeah, you wouldn't mind coming over and just taking another slice
into this reef for us? Rodgie, no worries.
Hopefully they have some good luck and I'm going to persevere here
and keep detecting and keep adding nuggets to the tally.
Keep going past.
That's it and just dump it there.
Should be able to see the reef now.
Beautiful job, Darren.
Loving your work.
Thank you very much.
Check that out.
That's uncovered it nicely.
Wow, I think we crush some of this stuff
and let's see if we've got some gold.
Alright.
There we go.
The portable hammer mill uses spinning chains
to crush even the hardest rocks to fine dust.
All we want is a couple of handfuls
crushed up fine
so that when we pan this out,
hopefully it's liberated some gold.
Alright, this is my favourite part.
See if we can find any gold.
Now we only need a few colours to let us know
that there's gold in the rock.
Is this going to be enough gold in this
to make us up sticks from Phoenix?
Who knows?
Let's see what the pan shows us.
I see a little gold there.
There's a few specks. Yeah.
It's not as much as I'd like to see
but at least it's gold.
So the indication is that this structure is the same one
that we got the chunky gold out of.
There's a huge amount of volume of rock between here and there.
Even a little bit of gold through it, that could be our future.
Big decision to move all the stuff over here though.
Yeah it's another 100-200,000 burnt
to come to a virgin location, get the permits and mine again.
Yeah.
I think we do a few more runs and who knows?
Let's see what the pan shows us. Yep.
It's a good start.
Where we are at the moment,
the big pinnacle, it's just pushed up
out of the Earth's crust. It's so remote
I can almost guarantee there's never been a coil out here before.
It's not really that pleasant to be out here.
Expecting 44 degrees today, but when you're on these hot rocks,
it can easily be 55.
You know, we've only got a short window each day
where it's a good time to be out there swinging a coil.
(DETECTOR BEEPS) Oi.
Oh, I know that sound.
It's out.
Oh look, there it is.
Look at that beautiful piece.
That is a nice chunk. Eight grams or so.
Right on the shoulder of where these two drainage channels meet.
I don't know how Salty's going but it's a good sign
and I'm absolutely stoked with that.
Mate, no luck up here.
Sure is beautiful though.
How you going down there?
Yeah, no I'm doing pretty good, and do these drainage channels
'cause that's where I'm having luck.
Alright, I've got one just to the south of me.
I'm going to do that one and weave my way through.
I've got about 20 metres to go, finishing off this creek.
(DETECTOR BEEPS)
Oh, that is unmistakeable. He's right there.
That's come from, yeah, another channel.
Let's get that out.
Oh you're kidding! Look at that!
Ha, ha, ha. What a cutie!
That's about half the size of the other one.
Three to four grams so the best part of 350 bucks.
Ticking off the target one nugget at a time.
Happy days.
(DETECTOR BEEPS) I can see it. Look!
Ha ha!
Beautiful.
This spot is seriously producing and it's not small gold either.
That's a nice size nugget.
As the water flows up the side of the pinnacle,
it can collect gold nuggets and you know, fingers crossed,
it's collected and washed them into this drainage channel.
(DETECTOR BEEPS) There's definitely something here.
Come on, come on, give me something.
I want to beat Al today. That would be nice.
(DETECTOR BEEPS) Ooh, hoo, hoo, it's in here.
You little beauty!
Yes! Oh!
You little ripper. Ah, that's a good feeling.
Hey Al, you got a copy, mate?
I'm on the board. Woo hoo hoo!
That's awesome. Keep following that run you're on
and see if we can jag a couple more.
You know, I'm on,
he's on,
making the trek out here really worthwhile.
(DETECTOR BEEPS)
Well, I got something here. Another one, maybe.
Might be little and close to the surface
or it could be big and deep.
I'm hoping for the latter. (DETECTOR BEEPS)
You are joking. You are joking.
Ha, ha, ha, oh my God,
that's the biggest nugget I've ever found.
(DETECTOR BEEPS) Oooh, it's another.
Let's get it out.
I found it.
There. Oh ho ho ho!
No way!
I was not expecting that to be that big.
Al, mate, have you got a copy?
Gotcha.
You won't believe it, mate. I got another little signal.
You're kidding. So did I.
How big's yours?
I reckon somewhere around the two.
You just outdone me then
'cause I've just pulled up an ounce piece.
I'm losing my mind, mate. I'm shaking.
The two finds that we just got
are really gonna get us up there on that tally.
We've lost our efficiency. Mr Fragile's down.
We've only got Mrs G-Force.
Kate's gone off to find nuggets.
I just hope she can find enough nuggets to make up
for the two machines not running.
So at the moment, I'm just stuck with Mrs G-Force.
On the remote Galah lease,
Bruce is clearing a new area for Kate to detect
after a mechanical failure shut down their trummel.
Yeah, receiving there, Kate, now?
Yeah, copy, Bruce.
Yeah, I reckon we've taken it down about a hundred mils
so it might be worth a detect before I push any more up.
That sounds really good. I'll get out there.
Can't wait.
With the fine gold production cut in half,
the team are counting on nugget finds
to boost their gold recovery.
(DETECTOR BEEPS)
What I've got here is a really nice sound actually.
So we're just going to have a scratch around
and see if we can find something.
(DETECTOR BEEPS) Got it out of the hole.
OK, so I'm just gonna do what Shane says.
You halve your piles.
See which pile it's in.
(DETECTOR BEEPS) Still got that really nice sound
so I think it's in that top pile there.
Oh, I hope it's gold after this digging.
(DETECTOR BEEPS) Sounds good. Right, it's in my hand.
(DETECTOR BEEPS)
Oh, it's gold!
It's actually gold. It's only little.
I'd probably say half a gram.
Maybe a little bit under half a gram.
Put that in the pocket and keep going.
(DETECTOR BEEPS)
That sounds alright. Oh, that's very loud.
That's probably steel, I think. It's really yelling,
and so I mean only big gold nuggets or big pieces of steel
basically make that noise.
So we'll just get that out, have another go.
(DETECTOR BEEPS)
Still in there. I've got to keep going.
I have no idea what it's going to be.
(DETECTOR BEEPS) Oh my God!
Oh my gosh!
Look at it!
I can't believe that. Oh my God!
Shane's going to be blown away by that.
That's got to be one of the bigger nuggets he's found here.
That's unbelievable.
Alright, the sampling is done.
So, what do you reckon?
Um a bit of gold in the pan.
A few specks.
And it's in the quartz so that's running right through
the middle of the lease,
but it's a bit patchy and there's not a huge amount in the pan.
Yeah, not really going to float a bunch of equipment down here
on a, you know a couple of specks in a pan are we, so.
No. It wouldn't make sense.
How do you feel about getting a drill rig in here
in the next few months and whack some holes down
along the whole zone and...
See what's here.
See what comes back before we make any other further
investment out here. Yeah, I agree.
If you guys want to grab your detectors, head down there,
I'll keep going here. Yeah.
I'll go get kitted up. I'll keep going.
There's clearly more gold here
in that reef structure
but we need a payday so it's down to nugget hunting.
Unfortunately the reef is gonna have to wait.
(DETECTOR BEEPS)
Nice little couple of grammer.
We didn't pick up any more big ones.
We're basically down to bedrock now.
So pretty sure, right now we're done and dusted here.
Time to have a weigh-in and see how we went for the week.
Sounds good but you never know
until it's on the scales.
There we go. That's beautiful.
Nice big chunks there. How much have we got?
8.3.
Each one of them was time and effort well spent digging a hole
in the flies and the heat.
Yeah, and we got these species.
Probably about half an ounce in there maybe.
So all up, we're at 8.8.
The nearly 23,000 dollars of gold the team has found this week
is less than one percent of their target
but has more than covered their expenses.
So how do we feel about this?
It's not a loss.
We didn't get the kilo that we were chasing.
Yeah.
You know, couple of ounces goes in wages and diesel alone.
Yep.
I mean, we always want to be on the best gold we can possibly dig.
And at the moment, that's definitely the Phoenix Project.
Yeah.
But if we didn't come and do this, we'd be always wondering
what was there?
So we're a ways off our thousand-ounce target
but we're not walking away empty handed from this.
In the far north of Western Australia,
Alan and Salty risked getting stranded in the outback this week.
They're hoping their gamble has paid off.
We made it, mate. Made it out of there alive.
We did and it's that time of the week. Weigh in.
Oh, I thought you were gonna say 'pub lunch'.
Almost.
We got to weigh in to see if we can afford the pub lunch first.
Just like this old thing, mate?
Yeah, if I can guess it, I get to keep it.
Alright. Go on then.
Oh look, that's a two ouncer all day every day.
Two on the dot?
Go on.
1.9.
Sorry, mate. Another day.
Oh well.
Let's do these other two.
Oh, that last one's cute.
2.4.
Lucky you got that big one otherwise I would have had you.
Mate, it all adds up. Look at that.
4.1.
Oh mate, that's huge.
That's sick.
That's 10,500 bucks. I didn't expect that.
The haul brings the team to within three ounces of making their target,
with just a few weeks left in the season.
Couple of pub lunches and a long detour
down the West Australian coast line
before we head inland, I reckon.
Yeah, back to the country I know best.
Let's do it. Let's do it.
I've got my eyes on that big nug.
What nugget? Ha ha.
I don't know what you're on about.
What nugget?
Woo hoo!
OK, let's go.
Do you like what I've done with the place, Shane?
Kate, all I'm worried about is me weigh-in.
Now we've had both wash plants going
and that was really full on.
One did throw it in
but we did produce gold and that's what we're here to do.
Yeah, and I got some good nuggets detecting as well.
And luckily Bruce was here and he had a good scrape.
If he wasn't here, we wouldn't have got those nuggets.
Nup. Alright, well, should we find out what we've got?
Let's do it.
That's one ounce, one and a half, two,
that's 2.0, 4.9 ounces.
That's not bad, after the setbacks we had but we just keep battling on.
The team's find of over 5000 dollars worth of gold
has pushed them past the quarter way mark of their season target.
I've spoken to Ryan about the samples that he took
and some of them are coming back
at more than one ounce per tonne.
Now they're going to have to pay me the big bucks for these leases.
Come on, let's go and have a feed.
That's the best news I've heard all day.
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