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Hi Everyone, My family and I made it back home safe and sound. We had a wonderful time exploring eastern Canada, despite that awful heat wave. Our plan to escape the Arizona summer didn’t pan out quite as expected, and the region set new all-time highs during our visit. It was hot and humid, but we made the best of it and saw lots of amazing places as we passed through Toronto, Montreal and finally Quebec City. This was my first visit and I fell in love with all the historic sites and old “walled” cities. I day dreamed about the coins & relics that must have been hiding just beneath the soil around those old forts built by the French in the late 1600’s. I guess it gives an excuse to go back some day. Here are some really amazing minerals that we spotted in the Royal Ontario Museum. Also, these old cannons were posted around the perimeter of Quebec City. I was familiar with the longer barrel ones, but I had never seen the short, squat ones before. Does anyone know their purpose? I thought perhaps for close range defense, like a shotgun. For those that left messages and emails while I was away, I sure appreciate your patience. Your orders will ship out directly, and you will get replies by tomorrow, if you haven’t already. I hope you all are having a great summer season so far, I hope to have some nuggets to post as soon as it cools off a bit. Happy hunting!

I really appreciate all the info guys! I really liked how the city had left the old cannons & mortars in place. I was also impressed that no where did I see graffiti on any of them. Only thing better would have been if they left you fire one off into the lake for a small fee

AZO Office Closed June 28th - July 10th, 2018 Hi Everyone, I wanted to let you all know that the AZO office will be closed from June 28th - July 10th. It has been an incredibly hectic year, so my family and I are taking a few days to go explore eastern Canada. I'm excited because it's an area I have never visited before, plus it will be nice to escape this desert heat for a while. I apologize in advance for any inconvenience this may cause. All emails and phone calls will be promptly replied to upon my return. Until then, everyone stay safe out there & happy hunting!

The family and I made it safe & sound to Canada and are having a blast! Mike you're right about this heat wave, its been really, really warm thus far. For us its not so much the heat, but rather the humidity thats getting us. Its a little rough, but we're making the best of it and its been a great excuse (at least for Maddie) to get ice cream 😊 We left Toronto this morning and took the train to Montreal. We will spend a few days here, them its off to Quebec...Here are a few pics that I snapped at the Royal Ontario Musuem. Their collections are wonderful, especially the minerals & fossils! I think I left a little bit of drool on the display cases, lol! Stay cool & safe out there everyone! P.S. That's a solid gold coin weighing 100 kilos!

I wanted to give an update on the weather here in central Arizona. Yesterday the Prescott area and surrounding region got pounded with probably the biggest rain storm I have seen in the past five years. So much water was dumped that many of the roads here in town were blockaded, and I even heard the waters of Lynx Creek overflowed the dam at Fain Park/Lake. A friend of mine in the Walker area said it looked like a river of chocolate milk that filled the creek from bank to bank! Going off the forecast, it looks like we could see more showers this week...Those flash floods move a ton of dirt, so I am thinking that once those waters receded, there should be some new bedrock exposed and maybe some fresh gold that has not seen the light of day for many, many years. Happy hunting everyone!

Here is a video someone took of Fain park.

Love the minerals photos! The short guns are mortars, used in close combat, they launched a explosive shell into charging troops or into fortifications, basically it's an old version of the modern mortars used in combat today. French mortar diagram from the 18th century The last use of these types of mortars was used during the American Civil War. Us Army 13-inch mortar "Dictator" was a rail-mounted gun of the American Civil War.

High Sierra Gold High Sierra Gold Join Jeff and Mike as they look for Gold and Treasure in the High Sierra's , Watch as Jeff finds a .45 Gram nugget.

I forgot to post up this find I made last month. I was working a new spot that actually didn’t look very promising at all. None of the classical indicators were there, no red dirt, no quartz, no nothing really, other than plain gray dirt. However down below this hillside I could see where the old-timers had dug around and stacked a few rocks. I figured they had gotten a sniff of gold, so I decided to swing around for a while. I hit a few boot tacks on the surface, then I heard a low, mellow sound. I dug away about eight inches of dirt until I hit a hard caliche layer. The signal stayed in the hole, so I kept chipping away. It was slow going but eventually I found the source of the noise. It was a solid hunk of caliche that had no obvious signs of gold. I set it down on the ground and smacked it with a rock. The lump cracked open and revealed a beautiful yellow color inside! A few more hits with the rock and finally my prize was free. It ended up being a lovely nugget weighing 2.5 grams. This find was just a good reminder that even if you can’t see visible gold it doesn’t mean it’s not there. If something produces a solid ‘beep’ on the detector, it’s probably worth hanging onto for a closer look later…I was swinging the Minelab GPX 5000 fitted with the Nugget Finder 15” Evolution Coil. Happy hunting everyone!

A customer & friend of mine over in California sent over these photos today. He wanted to show off his most recent find made with his GPX 5000 and new Nugget Finder 14x9” Evolution Coil. He said he measured out the hole as best he could, and it looked to be about 8” deep. Not too shabby of a dig for a nugget of this size…Congratulations to the finder; we sure appreciate you sharing with us. Bring that good luck down with you when you come see me this winter!

Heck yah! Good find and good ears I can vouch for this as I run the same set up and it will find small solid nugs at that depth. Congrats! Tom H.

Way to go Chris. Digging through that caliche is a real chore.

I wanted to say thank you again to Acorn Montessori Schools here in Arizona for inviting me over yesterday to speak with their students about metal detecting and gold prospecting. The kids were an absolute pleasure and I really enjoyed the excitement in their eyes when they got to handle real gold nuggets. I was about their age when I first got exposed, so I am hoping this was just the first step in their journey to becoming future detectorists! Thank you again everyone – I’ll see you and your families out in the goldfields!