Free Panning/Sluicing Areas, Colorado Options

[CP]

Thanks for the update Coalbunny.

[Alluminati]

Hello fellow Prospectors

This is my first post, so rather than just ask questions....I am a 50plus year old guy from Orlando. I got into treasure hunting and gold panning oh about 6 years ago. My treasure hunting has been primarily a Florida affair and does include some diving and underwater detecting, but mostly beach detecting (its about the only legal place left in the state to pursue this hobby). My gold panning has been limited to Georgia and North Carolina.

My best MD finds: A copper ingot from the Power Plant Wreck, Ft Pierce, The brass door knob & lockset from the Cape San Blas Lighthouse destroyed in the 1800s by a hurricane, 3 gold rings w gems, and a 1939 silver Washington.

On the panning front, after about a dozen trips Ive accumulated less than a half viel of dust & pickers , one nice olive Peridot and two full viels of very small garnets.

Needless to say all totaled I have spent over 1000% more persuing the hobby than what these finds might be worth.

Why keep doing it? Because it takes me to some of the most beautiful mostly secluded places in my travel zone and takes my mind off of witnessing the purposeful destruction of our Nation before my eyes.

Which brings me here.

I have to travel to Denver for bussiness periodically and always just fly in go to a hotel, then meetings, then fly back without ever seeing what Colorado has to offer. This month will be different. I plan on arriving early for my bussiness meeting and spending two solid weekend days at the end of August doing some prospecting.

This website has lead me to believe that Clear Creek would be my most convienient best bet to spend my two days exploring some panning sites. While I will probably pack my pans, classifier, tweezers, snuffer, magnet, loop etc., I will stop by lowes or HD for a couple of buckets, shovel & pick before getting to my hotel on that Friday evening, so if anyone here wants to meet up with me that weekend, I will have those things you can take home with you after that weekend. Woopie....right?

Now a couple of questions.

In Googleing Route 6, I see there are what appear to be some widened areas without guardrails along the road.
Is it permissible to park your car at these locations?
If so, do all or some of these have trails down to the Creek?
I will have my waders with me, In late August are there areas near the parking pull offs where the creek might be reasonalbly traversable with high waders on?
Is there more color upstream toward the 119 intersection or lower toward tunnel 1?
I see notes on the site about a claim around Elk creek, I have not found this creek intersection on Google, the BLM map site keeps saying maps are curently unavailable for the past week or so. The Jefferson county open space map does not identify this claim site either. Could someone locate it relative to the tunnels for me. Is it marked in some way?

I am only panning (shovel, pick & pan), maybe this opens up more location opportunities, It does in the National Parks in GA & NC,so if anyone has a location suggestion better than this for me or has any other suggestions or tidbits they can share, please do so by post or PM. I will be staying in the Central City Area.

Thanks
Dave from Orlando

[CP]

Hi Dave,

Welcome to the ColoradoProspector forums, make yourself right at home browsing around.

In Googleing Route 6, I see there are what appear to be some widened areas without guardrails along the road.
Is it permissible to park your car at these locations?
If so, do all or some of these have trails down to the Creek?
I will have my waders with me, In late August are there areas near the parking pull offs where the creek might be reasonalbly traversable with high waders on?
Is there more color upstream toward the 119 intersection or lower toward tunnel 1?
I see notes on the site about a claim around Elk creek, I have not found this creek intersection on Google, the BLM map site keeps saying maps are curently unavailable for the past week or so. The Jefferson county open space map does not identify this claim site either. Could someone locate it relative to the tunnels for me. Is it marked in some way?

Yep you should be able to park your car on the side as long as it's wide enough to safely be off the roadway, hwy 6 is an extremely busy road because of casino traffic. Be cautious at all times entering or exiting that road.

Trails to the creek probably won't be but in a few spots but it's not all that far in most places of the canyon from road to creek level. You will be traversing over larger boulders along the creek and road side usually.
A few spots (especially a bit further up) have some slow spots where you might be able to traverse the creek but the main current will be very strong anytime of year.

Blackhawk and Central City are known as the "richest square mile on earth" from historical production days as well as Idaho springs rich gold hisory. Both of these areas and all their drainages contribute to Clear creek, that's literally hundreds of old mines that did very very well included in the drainage.
Gold upstream will be better normally but the entire drainage system below those old mines still has good flood gold distrubution especially closer to those towns.
Jefferson county open spaces ends at the county line though (traffic light in the canyon) where the hwyways split. Above that point upstream on either Clear creek or North Clear creek both go to private lands immediately.

Elk creek dumps into Clear creek just above tunnel 3 about 1/4 mile or so, that claim then goes upstream on Clear creek from there. Last time I was through there the claim was marked but that was a few years ago.

Have a great time on your visit and good luck on all your prospecting. We'll all be looking forward to your future participation as well.

CP-Dan

[Alluminati]

Hi Dave,

Welcome to the ColoradoProspector forums, make yourself right at home browsing around.


Yep you should be able to park your car on the side as long as it's wide enough to safely be off the roadway, hwy 6 is an extremely busy road because of casino traffic. Be cautious at all times entering or exiting that road.

Trails to the creek probably won't be but in a few spots but it's not all that far in most places of the canyon from road to creek level. You will be traversing over larger boulders along the creek and road side usually.
A few spots (especially a bit further up) have some slow spots where you might be able to traverse the creek but the main current will be very strong anytime of year.

Blackhawk and Central City are known as the "richest square mile on earth" from historical production days as well as Idaho springs rich gold hisory. Both of these areas and all their drainages contribute to Clear creek, that's literally hundreds of old mines that did very very well included in the drainage.
Gold upstream will be better normally but the entire drainage system below those old mines still has good flood gold distrubution especially closer to those towns.
Jefferson county open spaces ends at the county line though (traffic light in the canyon) where the hwyways split. Above that point upstream on either Clear creek or North Clear creek both go to private lands immediately.

Elk creek dumps into Clear creek just above tunnel 3 about 1/4 mile or so, that claim then goes upstream on Clear creek from there. Last time I was through there the claim was marked but that was a few years ago.

Have a great time on your visit and good luck on all your prospecting. We'll all be looking forward to your future participation as well.

CP-Dan

Thanks for the reply Dan.

I see now on google where Elk creek must be, there doesnt appear to be any water flow at the time of the google shot, but I can see the over pass over it. So the no go zone there is upstream from that overpass.

It looks like there are plenty of spots to pick for just a two day adventure. I am guessing at my speed I could possibly hit 4 spots in the two days and hopefully find some color "in them thar hills" as they say in Georgia.

I will post my trip results.

Dave from Orlando

[Alluminati]

Thanks for the reply Dan.

I see now on google where Elk creek must be, there doesnt appear to be any water flow at the time of the google shot, but I can see the over pass over it. So the no go zone there is upstream from that overpass.

It looks like there are plenty of spots to pick for just a two day adventure. I am guessing at my speed I could possibly hit 4 spots in the two days and hopefully find some color "in them thar hills" as they say in Georgia.

I will post my trip results.

Dave from Orlando

Well, I am back from Denver and I must say I enjoyed my trip with Don and Ryan. I had my first sluicing experience and you sure can process more material with them. I think what really is the differnce is working as a team digging, classifying and feeding the sluice. I still got one of the larger "pickers" from direct panning however.

We hit 3 different spots on Clear Creek and acctually found more color down stream. Thats not to say that elevation makes the difference, It may be an issue of access and what has been worked already since last flood stage. The scenery at the higher elevation makes up for the harder prospecting in my opinion and is at least worth a try. I am told the chance of a nugget is higher up in em hills. The fines were pretty consistant down low though. Probably did nearly a gram in two days.

In any case, I had a hell of a better time prospecting than I did on the business meeting side of things. I am sure blessed that finding gold for the money wasnt my motivation, it makes the work fun and is a bunch healthier than my regular job.

Best thing is I met some great folks and hopefully some new freinds out Colorado way!

I can see how TPTB have really made it hard to access the resource there in CO dispite thousands of acres of rocky untenible land. You all stay united out there and fight them gummit varmits who think we like being subjugated by our employees. They forget who pays their salaries.

Never the less I hope to be prospecting out there again soon before the cold gets beyond this Floridians tolerance level. Oh and one last thing, I may just have to lug a bottle of oxegen along. Going from sea level to 7000 feet in one day is rough on the hemoglobin.................

[placer]

The more I read, the more I think I am going to try clear creek around the Golden area, and I may wander over to Blawkhawk and try at Vics. I really would like to find a spot that I could file my own claim, on a creek or river, then I would consider relocating. Gold is gonna do nothing but go up in price and at 1600.00 oz you could support or at least help support yourself.

[sunspirit]

This might not be the right thread for this question, but here goes: What is the status of areas along highways that are in the right of way? I know that you can't claim these areas, but can you work them on a very small scale on a sporatic basis? I'm thinking about maybe a sand bar that has formed under a bridge or an overpass. Or perhaps a gravel bar just downstream from a railroad piling. Some of these areas might be good gold collectors that could be worked after the runoff and then left until next year. Any thoughts?

[Kevin In Centenn...]

Great question...also what about in culverts under roads or in the bed of a ditch running along in the right of way next to a road?

[traddoerr]

my guess would be to contact the highway department/county/city to see what is allowed, if it's NF make sure it hasn't been withdrawn from mineral claim, some of the USFS area managers have closed these areas to any type of propecting/panning.

[Woody]

Caution, Red Flag, Warning!

Any digging or disturbing the soil around roads, bridges, pylons, trusses, culverts or roadways is frowned upon by a whole host of people. Corps of Engineers, DOT, BLM, NFS, and Privet land owners is just a few. I understand where they are coming from. Many structures have been damaged due to uncontrolled erosion and the cost to repair these things is enormous. Sometimes the officials will completely shut down an area because someone dug too close to a standing structure. I'm sure that what is being discussed here on this thread is just small scale, but to the officials any material being disturbed is a no-no. There is a bylaw distance a person must be from any structure. If I was going to be close to one I would definitely take the time to make sure I was legal. This has been a big problem in some areas. I'm even going to suggest that the officials would like to make an "example" out of someone for violating this. And they would have a lot of support from many different agencies.

Sorry to sound so negative but in the end a little research before you go will give you a piece of mind and make your outing a lot more enjoyable. Good luck, Woody.

[CP]

Very good point Woody and I agree that can be a problem in many ways.
Another very important thing to note.....a road "right of way" is an "easement" not ownership. While DOT may have authority over the roadway, bridges etc.....ownership is still that of the original owner concerned with private land.
While many folks think a road right of way means it's open.....in fact it's very much the opposite. Road easemenst are granted by the land owner for the road. Ownership is not given away with that easement.

Good luck out there everyone, and as said above, check and verify the research to make sure your adventure is both fun and successful!

CP

[Kevin In Centenn...]

Lots of good cautions here, thanks!

One correction I think: withdrawn from mineral claim means you cannot file a federal mining claim but recreational prospecting ( no intent to claim) is still ok in most cases...right?

Cache Creek is a good example of this!

[CP]

Right Kevin, generally speaking that's the case on minerally withdrawn land unless (like Cached creek) there are additional rules imposed on a specific area restricting certain activities via the special designation of the area to impose those special rules. In some places (national parks/monuments) all digging is prohibited for the specific area, not even sample collecting off the surface is allowed.

[blue_heron]

When poking around looking for areas, I found this on the County Clerk's website:

http://map.co.clear-creek.co.us/imf/sites/...up_blocked=true

I like it...I like it a lot.
Chris

Screws fall out all the time, the world is an imperfect place. - John Bender

[Kevin In Centenn...]

Totally cool. I suggest also posting in a forum area related to prospecting and finding land to claim as this will help a lot there!