A Flash in the Pan

Occasionally Sophie and I put on our real tourist hats and set off to see the sites. Fairbanks offers a couple of things you just know are going to be a little hokey but hopefully still a lot of fun. One company runs two of these tourist attractions so credit card in hand we signed up for a tour of Gold Dredge #8 in the morning followed by an excursion on the Riverboat Discovery in the afternoon.

Gold Dredge #8 is similar to the type of mining activity that caused all the piles of rock and gravel around Fairplay, CO. A dredge is a pretty simple concept. It resembles a boat, or rather more a floating barge, located in what is often times a man made lake or pond. At the front end are a series of large ore buckets that eat into the bank ahead of the dredge. The buckets carry the material into giant sorters on the dredge which sorts out the large rocks from the smaller stones and sand which is where the gold, if there is any, will be found. The excess rocks and material are then dumped off the back of the dredge. The lake or pond stays about the same size  but continues to move forward as the dredge processes what's ahead of it.

Dredges can efficiently process a lot of material and can find a lot of gold if any is to be found. In its heyday Dredge #8 was processing up to 4,000 ounces of gold a week making its owners a lot of money while it was operating. The modern-day miners featured in the shows on the Discovery Channel would feel like they had died and gone to heaven if they recovered anywhere near that quantity.

All that is very interesting for engineers and history buffs but for most of the tourists the fun factor came in the form of holding a 10" metal pan and panning for their own gold. I had never panned for gold before and it actually was kind of fun as you swirled and strained the material hoping to catch that glint of real gold. Now to be honest, the material they give you has been "salted" with flakes of the real thing so everyone is guaranteed to, if not strike it rich, at least feel the thrill of catching a flash in the pan.

Combining our finds Sophie and I went into the conveniently adjacent  gift shop to have it weighed and valued. Our combined yield? $36 for about 15 minutes work. So you might be thinking, how can this operation stay in business giving away  real gold? Here's how - in that friendly gift shop they have lockets you can buy so you too can display those beautiful golden flakes you panned yourself. Cost of Sophie's  locket (you really thought there was any real chance of escaping without one?) was $109, thank you very much. I felt like I was at Kohl's  where at checkout they say things like "that'll  be $119, but you saved $230!". When they do that I always expect the difference  back in my pocket but it never seems to work out that way.

Still, Sophie had so much fun and was so excited panning, and actually finding, gold that I went to a Sportsmans Warehouse  and bought my lovely locket-wearing wife her very own gold pan. While there I tried to ignore the bundles of dirt  guaranteeing $XXX amount of gold for $19.99 hanging just above.

When we get back to Denver and check out at Kohl's I'm looking forward to handing the clerk a bag of gold my wife panned out of all the rivers and lakes we passed on our way home. "Here you go young lady, it looks like $119, but it's really $230; can I have my change in small bills?"