Articles & Info
6 Valuable Metals Rarer Than Gold
Part of the fun of searching for gold in California is knowing just how rare it is. The history of gold points to a lot of other unique discoveries. After all, there are metals out there even more valuable than gold. Here are a handful that are even rarer! Iridium:...
Field Trip Perfection – Learn Gold Panning and See a Prospecting Museum
Kids need to be active in order to learn. Sometimes, letting your children run around until they tire themselves out is viewed as a reprieve for adults. Yet activity doesn't just tire kids out and make it easier for adults to manage them, it helps kids process and...
What We Forget About the Gold Rush!
How did the California Gold Rush start? We often imagine miners coming up with a hunk of gold, but no – that's not how it happened. On January 24, 1848, James Wilson Marshall discovered gold flakes in the American River in Coloma. Marshall was helping to build a...
4 Big Facts About Gold and Where to Find It
We bet there's a lot you don't know about gold. Here are four facts that help tell gold's story. Did you know: If you took all the gold that's ever been mined out of the ground, more than 90-percent of it was extracted after the Gold Rush of 1848. The discovery of...
Why Gold Panning in California is Part of Our Culture
What exactly is the draw of gold panning in California? Part of it's the nature. It's good to get away from it all for a while, away from the TVs and tablets and phones. We have wifi here if you want to watch a movie or need to get some extra work done, but at home we...
8 Facts We Bet You Didn’t Know About Gold
Think you know about gold? Every now and then, we like to drop a few new facts that help us remember how important and unique gold is. We hold these close to our hearts, since gold in California is part of our state heritage. Here are 8 of our favorites: Every hour,...
What Makes Gold Both Heavy and Soft?
You may be surprised the first time you hold a nugget of gold. Even knowing it will be heavy beforehand, you'll be surprised at how weighty it actually is. How is this? What is it that makes gold so heavy in the first place? Gold is classified as a heavy metal despite...
Novice Fisherman? These Tips Can Help!
At Roaring Camp Gold, we offer lots of exciting activities to help round out your visit, but one of the most popular is fishing. We offer miles of river to fish for a variety of types including Rainbow Trout and Mountain Pike. If you're new to the world of fishing,...
Why Gold Became the Standard for the Ages
Why is it that gold became the most standard measure of value across all societies? Why wasn't it some other ore? The most obvious answer is that gold is so rare – and this is true, but it's only part to a larger puzzle. Long ago, societies used barter systems to...
The Rarest and Largest Gold Nuggets in California History
Some of the largest gold nuggets in history have come from California and the Sierra mountain range. The Fricot Nugget is one of the largest crystalline gold nuggets ever found. It weighed 201 troy ounces, or 13.8 pounds. Large crystalline nuggets of this variety are...