This Gold is Unreal! Rappelling Into the Old Workings: Season 2, Episode 3

Day four at the Golden Griffin Mine turns into one of the most exciting and revealing days on the property so far. Before heading underground, we start with a close look at material from the “hot pocket” — rotten quartz pulled by hand from the bottom of the vein and panned down to reveal visible gold, chunky pieces, and a heavy yellow mineral that behaves almost like gold in the pan. We're joined by Dan from @Danhurd, who hypothesizes the yellow material may be something else entirely - possibly scheelite, wulfenite, lead oxide, or another dense mineral associated with the vein system. Either way, the pan still shows real visible gold, and the material is promising enough to set aside for microscope work and smelting. From there, the day shifts into a much bigger mission: rappelling down the old shaft at the Golden Griffin Mine with Bobby from @HowNOT2. This is the first underground exploration of this section of the mine, and the shaft drops roughly 80 to 90 feet into old hard rock workings. At the bottom, we find a large mined-out stope, multiple drifts, crosscuts, pillars, old timber stalls, hand-stacked waste rock, copper-stained vein material, galena-bearing quartz, and evidence of the kind of hand mining that would have taken place around 1902. There are also real abandoned mine hazards: loose rock, dead air risk, low oxygen concerns, bats, a dead rattlesnake, and the challenge of moving safely through old workings that have not been entered in a very long time. With an oxygen monitor reading normal atmospheric levels, we explore the east drift, follow the vein, examine fault offsets, look at narrow sections of quartz, find old hand steel, and inspect mineralization left behind by the old-timers. Some of the material may not have been rich enough for hand mining over a century ago, but at modern gold prices, even broken muck piles and lower-grade vein material could be worth a closer look. The geology shows classic hard rock behavior: pinch-and-swell quartz veins, offset faults, diorite intrusions, copper oxides, possible galena, and sections where the miners clearly chased richer lenses before stopping at the face. The biggest discovery comes after climbing into the bat-filled stope above the shaft. High in the workings, the vein opens up into the widest and best-looking ore seen anywhere on the property so far — roughly three to three and a half feet wide, with strong blue and green copper staining and a much larger mineralized structure than expected. The stope continues farther than we can safely explore in this trip, dropping below the shaft level and extending west into a huge mined-out crack in the earth. This underground look completely changes the understanding of the Golden Griffin Mine and gives a much clearer picture of why the old-timers worked this vein so aggressively. This episode is a real underground hard rock gold mine exploration featuring visible gold, historic hand-mined workings, mine geology, old mining artifacts, rappelling, mine safety, oxygen monitoring, and the search for high-grade ore still left behind in the Golden Griffin Mine. Music in this video: "Streets of Democracy" by Lobo Loco, Free Music Archive, CC BY "Deep" by Noisy Oyster, Free Music Archive, CC BY Check out our Shopify and eBay stores for ore, specimens, cabochons, and more from our mines: Shopify: https://mbmmllc.myshopify.com/ eBay: https://www.ebay.com/usr/mtbakerminingandmetals For more info please email or call: Email: info@MBMMLLC.com Phone: 360-595-4445 Website: http://www.mbmmllc.com/ Patreon: http://www.patreon.com/MBMMLLC Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MBMMLLC Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mbmmllc/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/MBMMLLC #goldmining #geology #earthscience