Mt. Antero Treasures - Episode 1- Mining Aquamarine

one little thing that could go wrong or will go wrong mechanical failures whether human breakdown people who fall apart up here you know it's a very hard environment if one of those things breaks down it's a bad season our window is really tight up here guys we got three months we're going to be going in this year and mining our load claims searching for aquamarine big pockets big plates going in behind big boulders that no man can get to with just hand tools now we're gonna rip into it with a piece of machinery that's about a block long it's a family business fourth-generation miner and we're gonna get out here and make some action [Music] [Music] great card well owner of the mana Tarot treasures mining claims famously known as the blue star claims we're gonna be going in this year in searching for aquamarine it's a family business fourth-generation miner my grandpa his dad my dad now me my sons my lovely wife we all mine up here as a family farm to table getting the gemstones bring them down to our gem store quite frankly we got to hit it big this year to survive so we're going all out we're going to move into some new areas what we're gonna do this year is some special we're going into the snow patch I think it's gonna be one of those we don't quite know we're getting into until we get into it got all the history from the previous miners that actually made this mountain famous dating back to 1890 got a wonderful crew myself my wife at the tip of the spear and we look forward to operating in the snow patch and making making a little history of our own I'm Tracey Cardwell and my husband and I own the Blue Star mining claims upon man and taro we've got about 1,600 acres over there you know we have a shop down in Buena Vista we have a little gem shop and I have a day spa we're so excited about this season and we're right up into the snow patch right where we've been wanting to get forever once you know what to look for when she'd get down in there and start digging once you see the blue you get the blue fever it's on and this is just our way of life and it's our legacy and we're just so excited [Music] not many people can do what we do up here and the group of guys that we got here come from all over the United States and they send on this one slope in hopes of one thing hitting the blue [Music] each year the ice pushes up it melts the rocks collapse and move push-up collapse move so the mountain literally is pushing up collapsing and it moves itself in increments down the slope and it's a constant replenishing of the minerals that are kind of pushing up and moving with the water and melting with the water as the seasons change so so working the alluvial is a constant back-and-forth if you will because it's permeating up and collapsing and gives us fresh minerals as far as the crew you know they get a cut of what we find up here this is their livelihood you know there's a lot of steak a lot of frustrations gonna set in at some point guys get fatigued we're not hitting pockets we're in between zones and if we're not getting that production the frustration builds it goes through the camp and just like with any project it gets frustrating I guess there's a kind word for it [Music] so what we've got going on with the set up this year is we've got all of our mining participants that are helping us out that are feeding off of my grandpa's actual treasure map over the years as he collected cut the roads surveyed he gathered a detailed map that covers several areas on Montero that he narrowed down through years and years of work that hey these are the most valuable spots and told me many times grandson you got to hit these spots once you get up and running and that's what we're doing this year we're sending all of our mining crews over into these special spots that's directly pertaining to my grandpa's treasure map how you guys feeling good got your legs on you okay cuz you're gonna need it because I'm sitting in rut row I'm sending you guys to some of the most abandoned spots the most prominent spots that nobody's had a chance to get over to Dean and Jason with your expertise your knowledge of minerals and be quite frankly you're young enough you know you got the leg you got the legs for you got the legs man snow patch this is what made the mountain famous you're gonna have to ascend down the slope from the North Face so as you ease back around here this is gonna get you down the snow patch we haven't had a chance to ascend on it and if I can get it scouted marked out we'll get the excavator over there and we're really pushing and make make it happen for you guys awesome my man good deal yeah good deal Jason all right leyland lau gosh man i can't say enough about why you're here now Silver Star so the Silver Star claims here this was the initial discovery the barrel inclusions shot through this mountain like a freight train and it's a huge deposit so as you ascend up and you get into this wall its unmistakable you'll see someone to blowouts blue barrel blowouts but there's a lot of hiking we'll eventually want to finish cutting the road to the top and your explorations going to say whether we do that or not yeah so this is we need to know we need to know so let the journey begin let's go get the blue alright guys alright we've got a great team with the maps that kind of guide them to where we want to go and for the future and if they pan out like I think they are future is pretty bright for the card will [Music] there are a lot of very interesting and different minerals that you can find on Mount antero but the king of them all is aquamarine my name is Ian I've been coming out here for about five or six years now Jason and I have been friends for a long time and we've been business partners since 2015 when we started our own mining and minerals business Ian and I both have our own areas of expertise that make us work very well together we're on our way to the snow patch that's an area here on the north side of the mountain covered with large snow field for a good portion of the year historically some of the largest darkest blue aquamarines to be found on the mountain to come from that area the talus and screen rocks are very loose so you have to definitely take your time watch your steps be careful be methodical we have some pretty high winds gusting up and if you're not careful that wind can knock you right off of your feet and if you're on a Ledge it can knock you right off of the mountain well we finally made it down here to the snow patch in I'm very excited to get to a thawed area over here seeing plenty of blue barrel in the area and other minerals that make us think that this area right here is going to be very mineral rich we're hoping to get deeper underneath some of these large boulders so that we can find the high-quality aquamarine this is some fried stuff but there's some better stuff beneath this and that's what we're going for yeah Wade you see what this seam looks like underneath who are about to climb the hike from hell what we're going to do today is explore the Silver Star claim and retrace greedy card Wells footsteps based off the treasure map that he left behind [Music] my name is Layla and I've been mining since I was 2 for a total of 33 years I was actually born into a family of miners as far as livelihood goes mining is my entire livelihood that's what I do I like to stay up on the mountain as long as possible get up here as early as possible I never stopped and I never give up my name is Lyle aka Pookie been up mount and Tarot this is my first season it's only been a couple of months we still have a couple of months left hopefully I'm just beginning to learn about mining I met Leila about a year and a half ago and she's the one that got me into this mess well rumor around base camp is is this is a treacherous hike just to get to the silver star or the bottom of the silver star and then it's like quarter-mile straight up over boulders cobblestone I'm not looking forward to it I don't even know what kind of an angle that is but it looks straight up from here [Applause] [Music] need more oxygen but this level I hate it when you step on these big ones they move they shouldn't move we just got done climbing five six hundred feet maybe more and now we got to go up this beast right here we think this cliff is maybe 150 200 feet maybe more on the top side of this cliff we think there's good mineralization possibly aqua but we really won't know until we get up there so I'm just gonna free solo up and if I fall well more likely to fall to my death and all these broken bones or something I'll try and catch her [Music] [Music] that pocket million-dollar pocket baby [Music] my name is Chris Kyle Minh my wife Adriana and I have been coming up to Mountain taro for the last three years it's really cool just being up here and being able to make your own day you come up here and you can decide to hike all around the mountain looking for different places or you can sit in one spot and just dig until you can't dig any more you make your own hours you make your own you make your own day and it's it's really cool to be able to do that I come over here to the north side of mount and Tarot because it's well known for its massive crystals tommy Cardwell did a lot of digging up here they found a lot of great stuff and craig Cardwell is following in his footsteps so today I've kind of decided to come over here this North Face and instead of you know moving real big boulders just kind of move some of the loose material and see if I can't scratch out some of the float crystals that weather out of these pockets and it's it's it's moved from its home and it's usually because a lot of geological movement has taken place for that that crystal to move out of its pocket my name's Tom Miller I'm here on the South knob of non antero I am equipment operator for Craig card will this 2018 collecting season so the south no man on terror is approximately thirteen thousand eight hundred feet we are dealing with extreme altitude here which means of course there is less oxygen making it harder to do our job working wise it's harder on the machine we do have some power loss there at this altitude because of this we are operating daily it's taken us about five days to get down there to the famous snow patch area this could possibly make or break a business here we are never never certain of anything in mining I know Craig is a very good businessman and I I personally believe we're going to find some very good material down there yes over the past few days you know we've been trying really to get this machine down here and you know being able to keep this thing active and keep this thing fueled up it really it's not as easy as it may seem you know just to be able to get you know 40 gallons of fuel down a quarter-mile road you know as you can see just behind us here it's it's rather sketchy get home we're getting it done ultimately that big payoff that's really what we're all looking for [Music] on the steep slopes of Mount Antero the way that we like to mine is build ourselves a little bench and when we do that we often have to move some real large boulders but in the end it's worth it because it gives us a good safe and stable platform to be able to work on and it allows us to get to the material we want to get to much easier you blew out your britches night damn it that's all fractured we know that's loose that's supporting that to get deeper into there we're looking at the potential of removing a large boulder that's overhanging and potentially could fall and crush either one of us anytime if we were working in that pocket he would have to remove material that's potentially supporting that Boulder now that can be fairly frustrating when you're working hard and you're not finding anything feel like you know what you're doing then you know good places to look and still don't find it you know this is what we use to pay our bills to earn our own living it can be more than a disappointment if we come home empty-handed dad's pissed me off sometimes I can talk about all this but no Diggle they can't find in damn things all right the season only last so long as you follow the fine-grained granite into graphic granite and pegmatite what that showing is in those areas that granite cooled more slowly allowing the minerals within the rock to become crystals instead of small pieces that's a good indicator for what we're looking for because we want those areas where the magma was able to cool slowly and form the crystals that we're looking for so the reason why we look for blue barrel and why we like to see it is because barrel is the mineral which comprises aquamarine oh yeah buddy in just found a nice phenotype brother yeah oh my goodness dude this is a nice it looks like you got into a good pocket if anything I saw bro man yeah wow these fina kites that Jason's been finding are a similar mineral to barrel much more rare mineral that's pretty highly prized by a lot of people usually sold just as a specimen although some people may wire wrap them in jewelry a lot of people like them that way hopefully going this way it'll crystallize out a little better and find in Phoenix there and I think it's a good indicator so yeah take it down I just grabbed a little feldspar and I think I got a smokey quartz oh hell yeah that's what I'm talking about rather another one huh yeah oh dude that is a nice that is gorgeous piece Moki quartz is a quartz crystal that formed clear and was exposed to a little bit of radiation from nearby radioactive elements that is what gives it the dark smoky color so anytime you find quartz crystals it's a good chance you may find other peripheral minerals in the area it looks like a little baby to the other one you found oh yes oh it looks the same that's badass what I can see there's a straight up and down cliff I'm gonna free solo up that continue to explore that from mineralization make a judgment call where we should go from there [Music] so just scaled up the cliff and got to the top and found a blue wall so since this looks pretty promising I'm gonna go ahead and date and prospect here after scouting around I actually found an easier way for chubby to get up here I think it was worth the hike to get up here for that that's a really good sign lord knows what else we can find around this bluff right here I really like that it's really dark it's dark if you don't extract it or work it carefully you can have stuff above come crashing down your head it could kill you oh that's loose yeah so what should we do start digging right here you think yeah I say probably dig prospector owns he would possibly find it definitely is the first step so gonna start working in and breaking up some of the looser rock and to the crack next to this blue wall and the crevice where this blue wall and another wall actually comes together and see if we can possibly get in there and work out some of these crystals are in the crystal pockets and it's loose pipe material in the cracks a lot of people at this elevation especially if they're not used to it can cause lots of issues and if you're not hydrated you know it cause dizzy spells just anything can happen and you definitely don't want to fall off the edge over here what there's one right there yeah Oh sparkly right now I'm trying to grab it with just two fingers so she chiseled in here and this crack in the wall and it's the thickness of a finger so it's hard to get in there luckily she's got long skinny fingers to get in there maybe she can push it with a screwdriver without breaking it or damaging it I'm grabbing out of her right now right there that's a pretty one this is an aquamarine it looks like to be like a hexagonal shape so I'm guessing this could be probably about five carats I'm going to go back to working on this aqua pocket so this little rascal right here was worth the trip alone this is awesome but where there's one there could be more should be more just a better shine the light so she can see [Music] we just woke up it's about 7:30 in the morning we're gonna make a little bit of coffee and make some breakfast get our lunch ready and hit the road my favorite thing about camping is actually getting away from the city it's really nice to get it a little bit of peace and quiet enjoy the fresh air and enjoy the outdoors this is our campsite here on the mill site area it's used to house miners give us a place to stay it's a beautiful little area in this valley leading up to the mountain in front of me we have our creeks that we get water from and behind me we have our whole camp my tent Jason's tent we have our common area then there's our kitchen we have a simple table small stoves and all of our cooking set up there that's where we hang out take shelter we got a little fire pit there one is far far away I thought those two women I was like I was like oh that's a dude wearing those yoga pants yeah rich he can wear any kind of pants he wants but I won't wear those it's nice to get a good start for the day get yourself some good calories something to stick to your ribs a lot of times we're so busy during the day we get so excited when we're getting into crystal pockets sometimes we forget to eat and so we try to make sure we start out the day with a good breakfast so in this case we are not having chal we're having food as miners and prospectors we definitely have an impact on the land that we work on there's no way around making surface disturbances and that's how it is with mining but when it comes to the camping part of what we do we definitely always try to follow the seven principles of Leave No Trace outdoor ethics we try to walk in camp on durable surfaces we minimize our campfire use we pick up other people's trash we bury our waste and haul out our own trash ultimately it is the land that brings us these resources whether it's mining or food or something else so we feel it's very important to take care of the land and to give back as much as we can need to get refill on some water come on over here to the Creek and getting some refill this nice clean Rocky Mountain water all of our chores and tasks out here on the mountain become much more difficult than they are in town we have to do all the same things you'd have to do in town you have to keep yourself clean keep our kitchen clean all of our utensils dishes for sleeping areas and of course there's other tasks that you'd never have to do at home like chopping wood gathering water from the stream filtering it and when you put all of that together it really can be very time-consuming it takes a lot of effort to really do it well so all those sort of logistics are definitely things that need to be taken into consideration especially when you're doing long since of mining like we are ready to take some crystals baby you ready huh ready oh man so exciting [Music] coming up here it's rough this mountain kicks your butt from the time you hit the beginning of the trail you know it's knocking you around the whole way up to the time you get up here and the sun's beating down on you and the different weather is beating down on you and and it's it's a cost it's a cost of gas it's a cost of time all the heartache and all the struggles you put into this mountain you're just you just hoping that it pays off you're hoping that you find that next big pocket that just gives you you know that a high did it moment and this would made it all worthwhile [Music] get over here man nice crystal wow that's a big smokey just rolled out of here there's just so much still here I mean this is why I come here and scratch around because you know this kind of stuff is just in in the loose screen I mean this is a nice smoky it doesn't have a real jet black color but it's it's got great form nice point nice termination and you've chipped this thing up here and you know you just devalued it by more than half man if this is any indication of more stuff in here I got to keep going to have room to grow that big tells me that there's probably some pretty good aquamarine and microcline that have grown with this so I'm hopeful that today's is a good day to find some aqua on top of the really nice what's Christmas [Music] so we got Corey Moore from JM Joey's coming in from Houston Texas today we're very excited Corey's next part in diamonds minerals around the world Cory's traveling in to make one of his yearly and bi-yearly visits and bring some new material in and kind of engage us on what's new in the industry and what you can do for our store I'm Corey Moore with jnm jewelry and I've just flown in from Houston Texas we're gonna be showcasing some of our Asher and emerald collection pieces as well as introducing that line to Colorado and putting some items in their storefront location we're really excited bringing Tracy's ring in we've worked really hard over the last guys over the last six months trying to put together her design this is her upgrade ring you know we got married thank you for kind of tight so it feels good to actually be able to upgrade her ring and stuff she's worked really hard on the design and she doesn't know it's coming so this is gonna be great surprise for today this worked perfect been the cement tree was just unbelievable diamonds from Israel aquamarine for mounting taro input and design from from you and the boys in New York this is what it's all about love you so he's gonna tell me Hey hey babe look who showed up yes sir you as well ahead of the curve on the delivery of the you know what your ring yeah it's here check this out oh my god oh he finished it earlier fillet chop design you designed it we just have to come to life yeah made the dream come true that's the core test love it pretty sure she also designed we just really come to life for you I love it nice complete great job brother there's always Thank You Craig love it thank you [Music] so what we have here is a combination of different items for you guys some of these pieces are from our Asher and emerald collection which features seven different genuine gemstones we have three different metal selections and I cut in the Asher shape and the emerald shape this is a 46.78 carat Center aquamarine natural stone from Brazil mounted and 14-karat white gold with two and a half carats of round white diamonds you've got something like this which is a part of our Asher collection which is the 20 by 20 cocktail ring and dark pink topaz with 14 karat rose gold nice this is a zebra pendant this actually believe it or not was sketched on a napkin on an airplane on the way back from Israel and it has 500 diamonds on it each individually handset natural black and white diamonds it's called micro pave setting so the whole piece is 14-karat white gold nice support this is totally gonna accentuate what we're doing here and continue to allow us to build what we already got going on this is great man this is a great start of expanding our line absolutely I'm glad to be working with you again man yeah we're glad to be here that's nice Corey comes in got a great working relationship with this outfit Corey's one of the industry leaders and what he does and resourcing different minerals for us that accent or aquamarines so it's great to have him up here great to have him part of our community again and let's get that guy on the mountain have some fun [Music] from a geological standpoint yeah it's there we just have to find it it's hard too hard to believe but I can I can dig through solid rock like I did back there but here I'm having trouble with ice and rocket it's almost harder than concrete you know Colorado's had three periods of glaciation and we believe this is left over from the last period of glaciation so this this is ancient ice you know it could be a hundred thousand years old and definitely the deeper in we go there's there's always ice ice and granite [Music] I also always have to remember this is 48 thousand pounds of Steel sitting on somewhat loose ground pretty much I have to always be prepared if this machine starts sliding off the road or starts leaning over sideways I have to assess the situation immediately and either try and save the machine or get out of the machine and save myself ahead of me this is gun consolidated loose ground so I always have to make sure I'm safe I always pack down the outer berm with the bucket as I move forward I try and keep my inside track on solid ground as much as possible my angle buried at the road is a little bit too much right here I'm gonna have to reach up bring down some more material to build up my rope it I wrote that suddenly got a little bit too narrow for me I have a 10 foot 6 track width here I like to have at least 2 feet on the outside track here for safety and stability problem is as I reach out with the bucket to scrutiny riyal I'm pulling the machine downhill I'm sliding the tracks downhill towards a road bed that's too narrow all right roll back to go we're getting this machine down to the legendary snow patch and you have to have trust with the person that's next to you when you're doing this stuff what happened here was I started diving down a little bit too much let me reach up as high as I can make this angle a little bit less on this roadbed because at this point you can see I can almost I can almost reach the snow patch our our target and at this point all I got to do is get there we just keep at it you know we got 200 feet to go hen we're there the boss will be thrilled when we get to the target zone [Music] [Applause] [Music] we just arrived here to one of the spots we've been digging and prospecting at here on the snow patch Jason's been working on this he's found some real good indicators in this area and what we're seeing in there is this kind of coloration of iron oxide along with blue barrel it's pretty hard work getting a little winded here at you know 13,500 feet or so that we're at we're gonna keep going we keep going till fine aqua this whole thing comes up all the way back through here and it comes up into that curves up into person and crews all the way back down and curves back up like here again oh yeah oh yeah baby well yes you come here for that a little Jolly Ranchers look at that bad boy Wow oh yes nice work man that's beautiful oh that's another nice clear one beautiful ecstatic peace yeah Jason just discovered small but nice pocket of some pieces of aquamarine and these pieces are beautiful examples of that particular gemstone some of these larger ones are probably around 20 to 25 carats gem aquamarine varies in price of course depending on its quality but can go for upwards of $25 a carat the aquamarine is just such a beautiful stone it's highly desirable it's something you can sell quickly and ultimately that is the the biggest prize that brings us out here we got some FINA kites we got a nice smoky phoenix high combo and some great aquas now at this point we've been having a few collapses with some of the hillsides coming down on us so we're thinking we're probably going to move on from this spot but we're gonna go ahead and call this one a win and keep looking for more great crystals better loves men and like feet sunny mm-hmm the mountain is a harsh mistress and be persistent learn to work with her you will be successful [Music] [Music] so Craig gave Leila and I this map and he feels that there's a strong possibility we could hit mother lode back up in there I see another one really yep and I hope it breaks fashion statement right there Oh replica fact it is that one that's a nice one that's already ready for a necklace this one could be anywhere from five to ten carats faceted means that it already has beveled edges so it's already naturally shaped to be said in rings necklaces and it also means that it tends to be worth more so so far we got two really nice pieces of aquamarine right here and that's just from a little bit of chiseling with a hammer and screwdriver we haven't even brought up the real tools yet we might have to come back another day with some heavy equipment and get in here there could be more to heighten deeper they're in there bigger better possibly might be another one it's pretty tight tight quarters I can't see down in there but would be awesome if there's another one right there yep just popped up all right all right here we go here's another one oh my god that's fat no that's a fat one right there it doesn't look like it's got any fractions you know there's no fractures so that as well could be anywhere from five to ten carats well it seems like we hit a really good pocket right here but it is getting late in the day and clouding up we should probably head back to camp because we don't want to hike down in this mess in the dark and maybe let Craig know what we found and come back up here with some bigger tools this is getting chilly [Music] this particular type of digging is more random we kind of search through to see what has weathered out we want good crystals we don't want edged crystals we don't broken crystals but a lot of times the float ends up that way you could easily cover a crystal and just throw it right out right out of the back using technique that I like which is kind of building a little bit of a shelf that has kind of an angle to it that way when stuff rolls down off the face of it it rolls down right into the flat here and you can see how the the blue just stands out I mean when it comes out it's just really noticeable any crystal that rolled out rather is really noticeable so I just kind of bring this stuff down and fan through it well this is no there's no way oh my gosh hold Wow [Music] there's no what hey oh my gosh I just thought it was like a blue piece of trash first perfect structure I mean you can count them you can almost look right down the crystal and count all six sides you know sometimes these crystals just don't have you know that real good form to it but this has got great form I mean this is exactly what you want to see in an aqua crystal that structure is it and the clarity and the size everything's here this is just this is magnificent very clear oh man there's little fennel kites there's a little crusting of fennel kites on top and on the side here this is insane I mean like I barely wiped my hand across this dirt and the whole face of this aqua just showed to me and it just just came right out right here in the loose material I would have to say this has got to be thirty plus thousand dollar crystal I mean you just don't see them this big on this man hopefully we can find the source Sunday because that pocket million dollar pocket baby persistence paid off it makes everything worthwhile it makes everything I've done and that my wife and I have gone through we've we've gone through a lot to be on this mountain and it just makes it all worthwhile so I'm gonna go ahead and put this crystal somewhere safe get a hold of Craig let him know I'm coming down and I cannot wait to show him what I have found he is just gonna be elated so it's complete you know we've got all this owns platform din we've got all of our target areas honed in and it's nothing left to do now but just to dig slowly methodically take apart some of these enrichment zones and get down to some of the the more museum quality pieces that we hope to find it and that's what made this mountain famous Tommy Craig's dad has been wanting to do that for so many years that's just paying homage to him and to have in Craig's granddad to see the geology down there is gonna be really amazing just really excited to get down in there now there's a road over there there's activity with the mechanized piece of machine we're actually going where nobody's been able to go before I think we plan on being in this snow patch area for another 10 years [Music] [Applause] [Music] so I have a skincare line that I've developed from the glacier washed mountains upon mountains arrow so it's over 33 different minerals that go into your skin Hasmik type clays and minerals that are just indigenous to mount and Tarot so it's just a wonderful product and you have to come try it [Music] when I'm on entero about to go up nothing else will do but the Wildcat 4/5 link suspension availability for four individuals gets me the top and back when I needed all the power and then some [Laughter] it's not in Tarot tough it's not tough at all [Music]

Channel: Mount Antero Treasures Productions

Views: 919,575

Rating: 4.6898222 out of 5

Keywords: Prospecting, mining, aquamarine, gems, minerals, Colorado Rockies, Rocky Mountains, Mt. Antero, Outdoor adventure, Prospectors, Elite outdoors, Fourteeners, miners, birthstone, topaz, aquamarine jewelry, rockhound, collegiate peaks, mt Princeton, 14'er, hiking, mt white, thrill seeking, high elevation, crystals, colorado state gem, mining claim

Id: RoL6uSQgbLY

Length: 46min 57sec (2817 seconds)

Published: Sun Jan 27 2019

Reddit Comments

[u/horizonview]

Cool idea but the storytelling was a bit drawn out. Also what is up with that close up of dirt they kept throwing in? Some fight club shit.