Gold Mining at Porcupine Creek is Over...

....at least for the summer of 2013.  Don't worry friends.  I am sure they will be back to the Porcupine Creek Mining District next summer.  In the mean time.... if you want to see what my gold tours were like check out this music video I put together.  It highlights the last three years of Gold Rush to Porcupine tours to the Schnabel's Big Nugget Mine and then to the Dakota Boy's Porcupine Creek Mine.

The last Cruise Ship of the summer came to Haines, Alaska on Sept. 11th
but I had my last Gold Rush to Porcupine tours on the 9th and 10th of September.  The season changes quickly this time of year and even more so for the Gold Miners at Porcupine Creek.

We had a tour scheduled for the 8th but it cancelled last minute because Porcupine Creek was flooding out Porcupine Road.  Gary of Big Nugget Mine said Porcupine Creek decided to turn the Big Nugget Mine Road into a new water channel since all the rain we were getting was increasing the water flow in the rivers and creeks of Haines.

My guests were flexible since they were staying at Haines Hitch-Up RV Park, they decided to stay in Haines an extra day so they could go on the Gold Panning tour.  Gratefully the rains stopped and allowed the road workers to clear Haines Highway of the mud slides. Gary said he filled Big Nugget Mine's road up with their tailings.  So they literally have roads paved in gold.
My guests were a fun family from Kansas and BIG FANS of Discovery Channel's Gold Rush TV show.  They said the day delay was worth it because they got to meet both Dakota Fred and John Schnabel on the re-scheduled tour.

Same with the my last gold tour on the 10th.  Well, they missed Dakota Fred by two minutes.....he was....busy getting gold.  I can't give away spoiler alerts now can I.  

So Jen Sheets gave us a special gold tour and let us play around in the areas we normally don't get to.

On our way home we saw John Schnabel driving down the road so we flagged him down, he pulled over and let us take a picture of him right on the side of the road.  I will tell you, he is one smooth driver when a car full of wild eyed tourist and a determined guide pull up beside him waving frantically for him to pull over.  Cool Hand John. Very Smooth.

Now it is time to start watching Season 4 of Gold Rush on Discovery Channel to see what happened to all the gold miners this summer.  Last night was a re-cap so next week must be the start of the new season.  I am excited to watch it!  Happy Panning my friends.