Thurs, 15th Aug, 2019 Bush camp near Western Shaw Mine, south-west of Marble Bar, WA

7.30am 21 degrees, overcast and breezy. Woke to the south of the pitter patter of raindrops on the roof. There was a shower in the early hours that woke me too.

Pete, who has this pending lease, called in with his dog, Rex, on his way out detecting on his 4-wheeler. He said it has been pending for a long time because there is an issue with a timber reserve been on the lease so that is holding up the process.

9am, a few more drops of rain but there hasn’t been enough to wet the ground so we headed out to explore the area. We drove past the camp and then onto the eastern pending lease. I had put in mines etc that were marked on the mines department information for the area. We found a track leading between two hills which had been burnt and found a lot of pushings on either side of a creek. The fire certainly burnt a big area. Not sure where the Elevator Mine is that is marked for here.

We went detecting and Steve scored one bit of gold where someone else had dug a heap of holes. I only got rubbish. Certainly is easy to detect where it is burnt rather than push around the spinifex mounds.

The sky had cleared for a bit allowing the sun to shine but the clouds have come back over again as we continued south along the track. No sign of any more gold workings down here so we turned back. Lovely gums in the creeks.

A flock of Spinifex Pigeons ran out onto the track in front of us. They are so cute.

We can see smoke in the north – that can’t be from anything other than someone lighting the spinifex up considering it is overcast.

Back to the van for lunch, 25 degrees. The wind has changed to the south-east and another little shower of rain fell.

Took the track past our van following the creek along till we found the dam. Not very appealing but it is fine for the cattle to drink. On the hill above it was the site of a big camp – there is rubbish everywhere and huge piles of tailings. We continued on past more workings. Up the hill sides there are old mines that were hand dug years ago. This part always amazes me how they walked out here then wandered about up these very rugged slopes and found the gold to start with.

We ended up in the creek bed then eventually came to the end where a heap more work has been carried out in the creek and up the slopes. I found a pretty hibiscus on the side of the track.

We parked up on the slope and started detecting though the wind was trying to blow us off the hillside. I got a little bit near the truck so I continued working those scrapes. Only got 2 more near the first one then nothing but rubbish. Steve had wandered over to the next rise and had found a few bits on the side leading down to a gully. He had a lovely time there so I wandered over to help him out. Looks like we will be having ice-cream for dessert tonight as we had a good time detecting.

Steve found this interesting rock – he called it the vegemite sandwich.

A few more drops of rain as we headed back to camp for drinks. Steve put the generator on as there hasn’t been enough sunshine for the solar panels today.

Played more games of Skipbo – Steve is still on his winning streak.

Cooked dinner inside again though Steve has made his firepit and collected a heap of timber.

The clouds parted as the full moon rose up in the east – very pretty.