Yesterday, while my internet was out due to a "network upgrade" in my area, I decided to head west and do some prospecting. I intended to visit Texas Creek and the Cache Creek gold panning areas.
These are public lands set aside by the Bureau of Land Management specifically for gold panning. I have been wanting to get out there and scout the sites. These are popular areas that attract visitors from all over the U.S. That is both good and bad.
Good: They are popular because gold is still being found there.
BAD: They are popular, so often busy with a lot of people, some even camping there.
Good: Many of these people are amateur miners, so they make big mistakes and lose gold, thus leaving it behind for me to collect.
Bad: I prefer that people not know my exact location where I am mining, for safety reasons, and because I don't want to share.
Google Maps told me that the trip to Cache Creek is a three-hour drive. I didn't feel like doing that yesterday. I may rent a motel room for a weekend and scout the area to make the round-trip drive worth it.
So, instead, yesterday I went in search of agates. North of Canon City is the Garden Park Fossil Area. It is a National Landmark where dinosaur fossils were discovered back in the 1800s. As a protected area, prospecting and collecting are strictly prohibited. My goal is to see if the geology is the same as another dinosaur place that I know well, the South Dakota Badlands.
The geology of these areas is mostly limestone and tuff (a volcanic ash), and in these types of areas, agates, dinosaur bones, and other fossils are commonly found. The goal is not to collect in protected areas, but to identify areas nearby with similar geology. In South Dakota, I travelled through the Jewel Cave National Monument to Teepee Canyon to the west. Teepee Canyon is public land and open to rockhounding, whereas National Parks and Monuments are not.
There is a Dispersed Camping area up the hill, so I went up there to survey the landscape. The area I was most interested in is inaccessible in my Jeep. I need four-wheel drive and high ground clearance, so I will be back.
Lots of blue sky and sunshine.
My apologies to our UK friends. I am looking for another image host solution so you can see the photos too.
Is this a dinosaur fossil? No. Something got eaten (a deer). This is also a sign to remind us that there are mountain lions in this area.
I like this picture the best. This is Four-Mile Creek. Notice the cliff above it, how the limestone and tuff are in layers.
This is Marsh Quarry, where Allosaurus, Ceratosaurus, Diplodocus, and Stegosaurus were first found in the late 1800s by local fossil hero Marshall Felch. In the 1950s, the Cleveland Museum of Natural History excavated "Happy the Haplocanthosaur" from the Cleveland Quarry nearby. Happy is still on display there today. Fascinating fact: No one has ever found a Haplocanthosaur skull!
My next outing will be in a week or so, perhaps. My next-door neighbor has some land that needs some metal detecting. He has used his detector and claims he gets readings of silver coins, but has been unable to find them. We are making plans to tag-team the property with dueling detectors.
Wait. Is that banjo music I hear?
😬
