Hi from Tassie!

[rattrap]

Hi all, My name is John tho i go by & prefer Ratty or Rattrap. My wife & i live in Tassie. We're planning on a big caravaning trip within the next 18mths, probably 5 years or more on the road. I'm on the hunt for hobbies on the road. I've always had a fondness towards gold fossicking after my parents taught me how to pan when i was a young boy. I even inherited my dad's old Minelab GT 16000 metal detector & gold pan. I plan to upgrade my detector well before we head off on the road. My parents & grand parents spent many years fossicking for gold, gems & opal, before i was born but i grew up hearing all the stories - including the 1 about the uncle who hit a big gold reef, never told anyone where it was, kept jars full of nuggets as big as your fist in the boot of his car & finally died in a car accident. The gold was stolen & he never told anyone where the reef was.
I wonder how many have similar 'uncles' in their family tree.
I look forward to participating in this group & gaining a wealth of knowledge ready for our trip away!

[labrador]

Hi Ratty,
Hope you enjoy the foroum, I am sure you will find some info on hear, I liked you story about your uncle. My uncle came back from White Cliffs with a flower bag of Opal, said to be of the highest quilety, never got around to selling it on and died, the unty beliving they brought bad luck droped them down the long drop, and some years latter died. And now there is no one left who rembers where the old dunny was, propety has been sold, and the new owners dont know the story, Oh well.
If the road trip around Tassie will take 5 years, sounds like you could do with a new car. I hope you find plenty of gold in your travels.
Lab

[wally69]

Welcome rattrap

I have a FT 16000 I picked up on eBay several years ago, it paid for itself several times over on a 4 month trip hitting the beaches and playgrounds. Picked up a fish hook barb at 10" one day in sand so figure it is more than capable of pinging some yellow if I walked over it. Hit a coin spill of pre decimal silver on a beach, incoming tide meant I was doing a bit of ping-dig-dash detecting for a while. My advice is take your gt16000 with you as well, you can take it where you may not be comfortable taking your new one and even though it is old technology it is good technology.

Mine has delivered a nice collection of artefacts from the triangle having spent a couple of hours there, unfortunately the only gold was coated on a broken fob watch key. Did uncover a few nice clay pipes on top of a hand forged claw hammer head that made it a memorable trip. May have also picked up some natural platinum in a quartz, looks like it could be about an ounce worth, not sure how to test it though....I call it my white gold in the absence of success.

Also have a toolbox full of hot quartz from Clermont and Hill End, hoping to crush it soon and hopefully get my first yellow out of it. My pan has had better success on the yellow and the stories posted on this forum have contributed to my success.

Best advice I got from the forum is ....go low and slow.....go low and slow....go low and slow....

This is a great forum to do research on areas you plan to visit.......enjoy the forum

Wally

[rattrap]

Thanks guys.
I dug the old GT16000 out of storage & put it back together again the other day - it still works! Still has its original coil plate, no idea how good it is or even if my dad ever found gold with it. As soon as the weather warms up a bit i'm going to a go around Tassie with it.
Our 5 year trip ( or longer if we really like the road) will be around the North island, if the gold bug really bites i can see us spending a lot of time in WA looking for them big nuggets people keep tripping over. hahaha!!
This old GT might be good for the wife to use, shes not that keen about traipsing round in the bush since her eye sight is pretty bad but she'd be more than happy on a beach or parks with this old unit.
I'll have to do some reading up on Tassie gold while the weather is so crappy & get ready for summer!

[rc62burke]

Rattrap
Welcome, I panned Gold in the river at Derby when I was down there over xmas, good luck.
cheers
Lee