My Gold Rush Career Begins in 1984

Chapter 129 The Buried Gold Prospectors

The rest was simple: the two bought grain on the black market and vegetables and meat on the street, with the tractor following behind, loading the goods onto the tractor as they went. They finished in about half an hour.

This trip to the new mining site is much longer, and it will probably take even longer. Zhou Jingming even bought a lot of naan bread as provisions for the journey.

Then, the two men led Jin Wang onto Wang Youping's tractor. The two tractors sputtered and chug along, heading briskly toward the Fourth Mine Bridge.

At this time, Peng Yuanchao and Li Guozhu led their team, using three carts, to transport supplies such as chutes, felt, diesel engines, water pumps, and barrels of diesel fuel that still had a lot left, to the grassy area by the dirt road leading into the mountains.

With a lot of stuff, the group was exhausted. When they reached the grassland, they didn't care that cow and sheep dung was everywhere. They groaned, collapsed, and fell asleep.

The gold prospectors who wanted to leave were quite helpful; when Peng Yuanchao and his group were carrying supplies out of the valley, they also helped carry some things.

Of course, there are also considerations such as having company, being safer, and having food and drinks at night.

Now that the items had been moved to the agreed location, and seeing that there were no cars on the road, the group said goodbye to Peng Yuanchao and Li Guozhu while it was still early, and headed towards Tiemaike along the dirt road.

Watching the group walk away, Peng Yuanchao handed Li Guozhu a cigarette: "I wonder how their business is going!"

Li Guozhu lit a cigarette: "Don't worry, Brother Zhou is much more shrewd than you or I when it comes to handling things."

Peng Yuanchao nodded: "That's true. To be honest, I'd rather believe he's a seasoned veteran who's been lurking in the Gold Rush Valley for years than believe he's a technician who came from a geological team."

None of the people who came out of there were like him.

But his ability to find gold was undeniably impressive.

Li Guozhu thought for a moment and said, "I've heard people say that there have always been secret gold-mining families. Even in the most chaotic times, gold mining never stopped. Do you think Brother Zhou might be from one of those gold-mining families?"

Peng Yuanchao thought for a moment: "I've also heard some rumors, it's very possible..."

The members, who were lounging on the grass, immediately became interested when they heard the two talking about the rumors. Several of them came over and pressed for details about the gold rush secrets, while those who didn't join in also perked up their ears...

Meanwhile, in the Haiertes River tributary, the two leaders of the gold prospectors who had taken over Li Guozhu's mine went to the small peninsula to check. Seeing that the tents had been taken down and Zhou Jingming and the others had left, their worries finally subsided.

"Damn it, they're finally gone. They kept me on edge every day, always thinking they might suddenly storm the mine..."

"That guy surnamed Zhou is indeed a man of his word. Once the matter is over, it's over. To be honest, he's a pretty easy person to deal with."

“You’re still defending him. He took so much of our gold… Look at this mine, there are still five left. The one surnamed Zhou has already left. Why don’t we try to get some of it back from them?”

"What are you thinking? What if they still have contact with that Zhou guy? What if word gets out and he comes looking for us again? Don't go looking for trouble. I can't afford to mess with him, and I don't want to lose my life."

Zhou Jingming and his group left, but their influence in Chagou remained.

The two looked at the small peninsula from the woods for a while, and when they walked back, they straightened their backs a lot more.

On the small peninsula, five people stayed behind who didn't want to leave. Among them was Old Wang, who often called himself Gold by his homemade scale. The group, wearing only shorts and shirtless, were busy in the sandpit.

After Zhou Jingming, Peng Yuanchao, and others left, they set up the wooden chute made from fir wood that Zhou Jingming had taken over the small peninsula mine in the sand pit.

It's convenient now, since the inside has already become a small river. We don't need to raise the chute too high; we can directly use the water flow for initial washing, saving the trouble of hoisting and transporting materials.

When Zhou Jingming revealed that they were going to the new mining site, the five of them had discussed it privately. Of course, they knew that the conditions for the team were very good and they were unwilling to leave. They were just eyeing the remaining gold-rich layer at the bottom of the sand pit.

Yesterday, the five of them moved into their dugout and went out together to buy some food and a few tools from a local vendor.

After breakfast this morning, I couldn't wait to go down into the sandpit and start panning.

They bent over, shoveled the mud and sand from the bottom of the water, put it in a basket, poured it into the sluice, and let the water flow wash it away. Then they cleaned out the remaining gravel and dumped it next to the sluice. Then they went back to shovel sand and dig out the mud and sand at the bottom.

In just one morning, I produced quite a pile of waste.

On the felt laid under the chute grid, many tiny gold particles can be clearly seen.

They had already washed the felt six times that morning, and they were all delighted to see the layer of golden substance mixed with heavy sand in the basin.

"They're just a bunch of gold-mining novices who are easy to fool. Zhou Jingming just said a few words and they went with him. They didn't even think about how long it would take to get to the new mining site, sort things out, and start panning for gold."

"The key issue is that they don't even know where the new mining sites are, let alone how much gold they can produce. They don't understand anything and just blindly follow along."

"That's right. Even if the new mining site is a rich mine, the best gold-rich layer is still at the bottom. It would take a long time to dig to reach the gold-rich layer. They can't possibly benefit from it."

"Zhou Jingming and Peng Yuanchao are getting all the good stuff. Damn it, seeing them getting over ten grams of gold every day, and then looking at the three or four grams I have, it's really unsettling." "That's true. I'm so envious and anxious every day... Let them go with them. We can stay here and properly sift through the bottom mud and sand. It's much better than going with them. We won't work for long, just another half month or so. Judging from the current gold yield, we'll each get three or four ounces of gold, no problem at all."

“Some of them thought that Zhou Jingming and his group had ten hunting rifles, and that ordinary people wouldn’t dare to mess with them, so it would be safe to follow them. But they didn’t think about it. Who would want to be at a deserted mine? What’s there to be afraid of?”

……

The group chatted as they worked, working with great enthusiasm.

Suddenly, a small block of mud and sand rolled down from the upstream side of the sandpit, startling the person below who tried to back away but fell into the muddy water.

He struggled to his feet from the water and looked at the mud and sand on top of the sandpit: "Is it really going to collapse?"

The other person also looked at the collapsed area, but dismissed it: "What nonsense are you talking about? Don't scare yourself. You actually believed Zhou Jingming? Anyone with a brain wouldn't think like that."

The silt in the river is accumulated layer by layer, with a slight slope, but very gentle, unlike a dam built in the river that suddenly blocks the water.

The silt will only be washed down little by little by the water, gradually widening the gap; it won't collapse completely. Go ahead and do your work with confidence.

Old Wang, looking thoughtfully at the gap where a small stream of river water cascaded down like a mini waterfall, said, "I feel that flushing away silt here would be more effective. Everyone, take a look, do we need to just build the chute there?"

The group refocused their attention on the gap where water was flowing.

After watching for a while, someone said, "I think it's a good idea. The silt carried down by the water also contains gold. With a continuous flow of silt being washed down, it's like there's always material being dumped on top. Maybe we can pan for even more gold. Besides, that current has a stronger force and a greater impact..."

After discussing it, the group agreed that the location was good. So, they moved the wooden chute over there and set it up under the gap. Then, someone shoveled up the small block of mud and sand that had just collapsed and poured it into the chute. After a brief test, they found that the flushing effect was indeed much better than when it was placed in the drainage ditch.

More importantly, someone quickly picked up a piece of white quartz from the shoveled mud and sand. It was about the size of a fist, but it was covered with some yellowish things like chicken claws. They even saw a few grains of bright gold stuck to it: "Look, a good thing that fell down."

Although the five men were panning for gold together, they were also keeping an eye on each other and guarding against whether anyone would embezzle the gold.

You should know that this is the bottom spot. During the previous mining process, a lot of gold nuggets and even some large pieces of gold were found. If you see these things, you can just pick them up and hide them on your person, and you might just get tens of dollars.

So when the man picked something up from the mud and sand, the other four people all went over and saw that it was a piece of gold-bearing quartz ore, and they all rushed to take a look.

"I estimate we can get at least two grams of gold!"

“You can see granular gold particles, it’s more than two grams. Look at that small packet, it might be all of it. I think it could be four grams.”

"The fracture of this ore looks quite fresh. It must have been washed down from upstream during the recent heavy rains and floods. There might be even more in the newly accumulated silt."

……

The group of people took turns offering their opinions, analyzing the situation based on their own experiences.

In any case, we were happy to have managed to produce some gold.

The mining continued, and they continued digging upstream from the gold-rich bottom plate along the sluice, trying to extract the gold-rich layer as much as possible first.

As evening approached, they carved a deep trench, about seven or eight meters long, at the bottom of the sand pit, heading upstream.

Looking at the scattered gold specks on the chute felt, they were almost lost in their own world.

They forgot that during the flood, the flowing water cuts through the riverbed, washing away a lot of the silt that had accumulated and become relatively stable over time upstream of the small peninsula.

They also forgot that when they were mining the small peninsula, the surface silt was dumped upstream.

The "silt" dam blocking the river upstream, although some new silt accumulated later when the river slowed down, actually had a very thin layer of silt that could block it.

Suddenly, another section of the mud and sand on top collapsed.

They're used to it, because it's fallen several times today and nothing's happened.

So, the group only glanced up once before continuing their work. Who knew that the next second, a large block of mud, sand, and gravel suddenly collapsed, burying three people instantly underneath.

The remaining two turned to flee in terror, but were swept away by the surging river water, and even more mud and sand poured down, giving them no chance to get up.

Five people perished in this sandpit.

(End of this chapter)