Doug goes Gold Panning
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Introduction
Last year I studied a course on gold with the School of Continuing Education at Leeds University. A fantastic course with Dr Rob Chapman who is a bit of an expert on alluvial gold in Scotland.
The course has a fieldwork component involving a trip gold panning trip in the Leadhills / Wanlockhead area of Scotland. A bit of a problem for wheelchair users you might think. But no! Under the new Special Educational Needs and Disability Act universities have to provide resources for disabled people to go on field trips. So after a lot of help and work from Rob and Nicky Smith amongst others at the School of Continuing Education, I went gold panning. In a wheelchair. With nursing support. Near the highest village in Scotland!!!
For more info on gold in the UK, go to Rob's excellent page: Gold in Great Britain and Ireland.
Getting there
Getting a wheelchair user to the edge of a river so they can go panning was interesting! With a bit of determination and some specialist equipment we got me there though. We used Portapath, which did the job though it fell apart a bit - don't think it's designed for going over moorland.
It's a good idea to go properly dressed for the elements, like Rob, not like Nicky :-)
Digging
Once you've found your location it's pointless panning the "surface" gravel. All the gold is next to the bedrock. Time to get your waders on and start digging! Rakes and crowbars are useful, as these visually impaired students from Bristol University demonstrate.
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Bristol Uni students with Rob |
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The students start work |
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Working hard (!) with the rakes
(apologies for blurred photo) |
The hole being quite deep, some poor soul has to get quite cold and wet!
Once some likely sediment has been found, an improvised pump can be used to put it through a wide mesh sieve into the pan.
Panning Gold
This is normally done in the stream but I'm a wheelchair user so I can't really! No problem though, Dave came up with an ingenious solution with a tub of water.
The idea is to shake the sediment so that the heaviest stuff (i.e. the gold) sinks to the bottom then to use the water to "suck" the rest over the edge of the pan.
Hopefully after panning there will be little sediment left...
Result!
For a full afternoon's work I found two tiny gold grains! I then managed to lose one on the way home - typical. However here's what we found:
I still think it's amazing, and a fantastic time was had by all. Many thanks to my carers and the staff at the School of Continuing Education for making it possible.