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Again. Just 6 years since the last outbreak. Mother fucking bloody hell.
As soon as this clears up I'm getting the vaccine. It's supposed to be a once in a lifetime thing, this is - well, too much, must be the Native American blood that's making me sensitive to the pox, after the dentist, probably stressed, undoubtedly, a tingling in the extremities, I recognize this, ignore it, hope it will go away, but nope, nope, nope.
The pustules, leaking burning lymphatic fluid, acid, that lift the skin, blisters, on your eyes, around your face, fill your ears, groin, thighs, from the tips of your fingers to your wrist, wake in the middle of the night almost howling from the pain, it's as if someone sanded your skin down to the very nerves then threw some gas on you and set you alight, then begins the drying of the dead skin, the cracks, lesions, sores begin to heal - heal it's own form of torture, how many layers of skin have to be shed? 5 at least, feeling your finger tips, you can feel them, but not them, as if they were hidden somewhere inside a dead flesh glove, knuckles crack, around my mouth, eyes, I grow in my beard to conceal it, this is fucking murder.
When all of it is passed, and it is passing now, I'm getting the vaccine, fool me twice...
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Monday, exhausted, in such a rush to leave that I forget my phone charger, proper climbing shoes. Monday, after banking and errands I swing through Balfour on my way to the big adventure.
Pick them up. There's been power outages, the weather, unruly, 3 foot whitecaps on the lake, no boats, this might not be the day to be off prospecting...
North of Kaslo I hit it. Torrential rain, the road, awash in an inch of water, pouring down, wipers can't keep up.
And 20 minutes more and I'm through it. Roads dry, have never seen a drop of rain, and North of the meadows the logging roads are dry and kicking up dust.
First stop, some snacks at the little shop in Trout Lake. I hoped to have a bite to eat at the Hotel - beautiful, 100+ years old, but it's booked for a private event.
Nevermind. Some chips and a pop and I'm off towards Ferguson. There's a few roadcuts there that inspire me, similar terrain to the crystal mountain, but a couple of hours later I've found nothing. Now where to?
Up Crystal Mtn. Why not?
That's actually a rhetorical question, there's lots of good reasons "why not", but that inner voice is generally silenced by the prospect of treasures...
Up, up, the jeep, overheating, slow down, speed up, switch gears, 4WD Lo, and somehow or other I find the balance between driving baby hard and getting her to the top of the mountain. The hardscrabble 'road' to the summit is worn, not only am I tipping precariously back on the way up but to the left, over the cliff, hit one rock and you'll be pitched rolling into oblivion...
I make it to the top. The roads, worse than I remember, the last couple of years are eroding them, soon there will be none...
And riding along the summit I come to snow. A little late in the season for this, a 3 foot patch, someone has been through with an ATV, why not, give it a run...
Nope.
And - getting out to walk the snow patch, looking over a small rise I see snow all the way down, had I succeeded in surmounting this I would have drifted into a snow filled ravine and been there a week or so waiting to get out. So - a guardian angel of sorts somewhere...
This road, rude cart track on the edge of the mountain, a 341 point turn and I'm turned around and ready to go back.
Not that I'm going back, I just like first things first.
Now get out, gather my tools, head to the crystal place.
It's a mess. Deteriorating overburden have hidden all pockets, to get to "the good stuff" will take a day or more's digging, and so I content myself with raking the tailings. A few small crystals, none worth the journey.
And for all the deep-woods-manly-sportsman-off I'm wearing it's the mosquito netting cap on my head that saves my life. No kidding. They're bad.
Night, walk the 2 KM back to the jeep, tuck in, the next morning explore other roads up to other summits.
There are plenty of good signs, and places to dig and sink a hammer, but - well, still too much snow.
Off to other destinations....
***
Frosthall, then Sol Mtn road, some 60 or so KM off road from the ferry at Shelter Bay.
Up, up, a lizard scurrying between rocks (are there lizards up here? How? But I saw it...)
Getting out to tap at some of the pegmatites, I'm seeing them everywhere, this mountain, it's nothing but a zone of pegmatites, but I'm not seeing...
Well, what I'm here for. Minor mica, black tourmaline, some garnet, feldspar, smoky quartz. But none of the other, none of the goodies.
And it's here, I know it - I can feel it, only somehow I'm just not seeing it. It's like standing on the edge of some vast treasure that I'm somehow just not able to recognize...
Getting out at another peg I'm finding myself short my Estwing Hammer. Damn. Put it on the jeep last stop while I took a leak and now...
Backtrack, can't find it, must have slid off and been lost, and I'm mourning it, the loss of a faithful friend, tool, that discovering-breaking extension of my right arm...
...and braking on the way back it slides from the roof where it was hidden and lands clearly on my windshield.
Reunited!!!
I drive up to the furthermost point of the road, I could go further but this is far enough, in the morning I'll prospect the way back,
I've checked it all, but then, not even a fraction of what's up here - and there's lots. It's here, and sooner or later I'm gonna find it. I have to stop at the hundreds of creeks and rivulets, pan them for gold, screen for gems, I need to canvas the length and breadth of every pegmatite - it's here, I know, and in the past it's taken me a few trips to find the paying ground, this will be no different...
Wednesday, stinking of deep woods off, sweat, cigarettes and vodka, the jeep, filled and billowing with the dust collected from 400 KM of gravel roads, it's back to Nelson to clean up for work on Thursday...
***Note: Working pretty much the next 10 days straight. I want to complain, but I've got bills...
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So, breaking myself into the new jeep. It runs, well, with a few quirks. The Passenger door doesn't open. Sorry Hitchhikers. And the door behind drivers doesn't open. And don't dare try and lock the drivers door or you'll spend hours crunching yourself in other doors and crawling over rubbish to get in. Which I have done and learned the hard way, this jeep, just keep it messy enough no one wants to break in.
It came with a single key. And I would jostle it and think to myself "I should get another one cut" - but - I've never lost a vehicle key in my life.
Until Monday, when I did, and had to pay the dealers to cut me another, $80.00 worth of "Ouch" in a hard lesson learned.
It overheats going up logging roads - just like every other one I've owned. Top up the rad fluid. Same problem. Clutch Fan need replacing? Maybe, but, god-damned - every time, every single one, wtf is up? I'll investigate a few other things first. There's no way - unless I find a solution - that this is getting to the top of Crystal Mountain, and - well, it's time. Overdue. There's a big dig gonna happen and great things will be found...
So, expeditions, twice to Revelstoke, Nakusp, the Valley, other areas, a few new roads, no great discoveries on the old ones; one new area I found of promise seems to hold great potential for giant quartz crystal clusters. None found, as of yet, but - well, the ground is good - and looks right, big area to be covered, merely need to do some poking with a shovel and pick and see what I can unearth. Sometimes great things are hidden in plain sight.
And so far that's it. Great swarms of mosquitos are everywhere, in town even, and worse upon the mountains, I've bought some "Off" but will definitely need some mosquito netting - there's just too many, this year they're insane. And hopefully it reduces the deer-fly and midge bites as well. Then there's the heat, 34 degrees the other day, sweating buckets, drenched, too fucking hot. These are the terms...
Now, tomorrow back to work, 30 hours in hell to buy myself a few days in the high-swamps of BC...
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Sunday night, done work early and I'm off, break like the wind, my first day off in about 8 weeks.
I'm off to Revelstoke. South of Revelstoke, check out some areas on the logging roads south.
It's raining - the week forecast - the whole month, actually - to be one big wet monsoon, unseasonable - but I have to go.
3 hours later and I'm there, up 25 KM into the woods.
The next morning, begin. Checking every roadcut, there's pegmatite everywhere, the abundant sapphire claims tell me it's here - and while I'm finding pegmatite galore, feldspar, quartz, a little bit of mica and black tourmaline - I'm not seeing it.
Still, drive the 25 KM out, check the road at every cut - always the same.
Now I should note the pegmatites go all the way up the mountains, to the very top, and the paying ground could be anywhere. A lot of is covered in overburden. And it's raining, and to step into the chest-high ferns and bushwack through wet brush - well, not today. So I explore, go further up a few of the roads - more brush, more pegmatite get maybe 35, 40 KM off road and I start to get a little nervous, this is a 2 day walk out, through miserable weather with minimal supplies - and my trust in the jeep is so far reasonable but cautious.
Soon enough I'm sure it will be abandoned, but - given the weather I'm not taking chances.
The road up, abundant pegmatite. Fields of it. Pull aside the moss, admire the feldspars, quartz, occasional patches of schorl, but - a lot of room for searching.
The mosquitos - given the weather, soon make any expedition maddening.
Eventually the day is done, and by Tuesday I've resigned myself that this is not the week for finding. My planned detours for the route back are thwarted by possible flooding and so it's the straightforward valley tour. And coming through Winlaw I spot this:
Of course I stop. Maybe somebody found something on their property and is operating a fee-dig?
The truth is far more boring. The owner of a rock shop in Nelson has simply sprinkled some crystals and pretty rocks around their garden, you find what you like and pay by the pound.
***
Nelson, after the long weekend, is busy, the tourists clogging the streets, gawking, squawking, walking into the streets against lights, line ups grown unreasonable long at every restaurant and cafe, it's intolerable. I was better off in the forest. And the homeless, now raging in the street, only now there's legions, the seasonal influx of homeless people must crowd out the local homeless population, vying for their begging $$$, who knows but if I'm losing patience with tourists how are they feeling about being displaced by the more belligerent populations from other centers?
By odd coincidence my youtube recommends a local (BC) "celebrity" prospectors' video on finding Star Sapphires, and - LOL - I recognize my old pal **** from the Chamber of Mines, and the location - which I'd hammered countless times before in a fruitless search for unremarkable crystals I'd passed over a dozen times before.
So - watch the video, see what it was that I was missing - stop by and rib **** - this 'celebrity' prospector, most likely a very nice guy, certainly his videos seem to promote this, but I rather resent him coming to our turf, if you know what I mean. And I'm generally of a mind to despise any sort of celebrity who needs to sell merch and get likes to fuel his dreams - but to each their own.
The dentist today and the week is over...
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Just recently this popped into my head, I don't know why.
Link: https://www.gawker.com/5839596/gordon-ramsays-porn-dwarf-double-eaten-by-badger
God, I miss quality journalism. The news these days just stinks.