Original subtitles

[bird screeching]

If you've ever seen a big amount of gold,

that's enough to turn anybody into a gold hound for sure.

It's my second year being a gold miner and I love it.

My dad bought this property,

thinking that it would produce a lot of gold.

Then we have...

none.

[Travess] The gold here is flood gold.

It's so super hard to catch because it's so fine.

[Travess speaking]

All of our gold's washing away

because we don't have the right equipment.

The mine is Andrew's future, so it has to succeed.

I've got stuff all over the place

that's half together

and I don't really know how to make it work.

Freddy and Juan, this is a plea.

This operation is on the edge right now.

If we're not able to get on the gold,

we're finished here.

[narrator] Freddy Dodge.

I'd rather have gold in the bank

than gold in the mountain.

[narrator] And Juan Ibarra.

[Juan] Not bad for built in the field.

[narrator] Want to make you rich.

It turns your dream out here into a reality.

[cheering, laughing]

[narrator] In the past five years,

the value of gold has doubled.

-[Freddy] There's a $3,000 nugget right there. -[man] Woo!

[narrator] But rookie miners...

[man] Whoa, whoa, whoa!

[narrator] ...find it more elusive than ever.

If we don't recover more gold,

then we could lose everything.

[narrator] But there is hope...

Miracles do happen.

[narrator] To turn desperation into fortune.

Freddy and Juan have one week...

What you just did was genius.

[narrator] To deliver a golden payday.

They have a future

and they know what they need to do.

[dramatic music playing]

[Juan over phone] You know, it's always nice to be back in Canada, Freddy.

Yeah, and I love British Columbia.

But it sounds like Travess is in pretty rough shape, financially.

Yeah, you were saying a little bit about that.

He's got a ton of money sunk into the mine site

when he really hasn't produced much, huh?

No, he hasn't.

So who's Travess out here mining with, Freddy?

[Freddy over phone] He's out here with his son.

You know, there's easier ways to have a father-son trip

than going out and working your tail off

and losing a bunch of money.

Definitely one.

[narrator] In British Columbia,

Freddy and Juan are en route to the Long Bar Mine,

where father and son team, the Allens,

work a 3000-acre claim

along the Fraser River.

[Juan] Historically, the Fraser River's produced

a lot of gold over the years.

Yeah. But you know as well as I do,

gold's where you find it.

It's not everywhere.

We've got a really tight corner here, Juan.

[Juan over phone] All these mines we go to,

they're in rough spots to get to.

-But that's just gold, huh? -[Freddy over phone] Yup.

[narrator] In the 1860s, the Cariboo Gold Rush

drew thousands of miners up the Fraser Valley

in search of fine gold flakes

along the river bars and benches.

Those who endured the unforgiving terrain

pulled in over $8.5 billion worth of gold

at today's prices.

[Freddy] Another mine, huh, Juan?

[Juan] Yeah, good to be here.

-[Travess] Hi, guys. -[Juan] How you doing?

-Hi, I'm Travess Allen. -How you doing? I'm Juan.

[Freddy] Nice to meet you in person, Travess.

-[Andrew] Andrew. -Andrew, nice to meet you.

-Andy? -Oh, good to meet you, Travess.

Good to meet you as well.

-How you guys doing? -[Freddy] Doing all right.

-How are you doing? -[Travess] Yeah.

My son and I are down here

hacking away at Long Bar, trying our hardest.

Make it work. [laughs]

How long have you guys been out here?

This is our second year of mining here.

How much gold you do?

Last season...

That's the thing. We only did about 5 ounces of gold.

We hadn't figured out

how really the ground worked here quite yet.

We've learned through trial by error

that it's mostly flood gold here.

Small gold, then.

It's all very small gold, flour gold.

Do you have any of what we can look at?

Yeah, you bet. This is what we're chasing here.

This is Fraser River gold, some of the purest gold.

[Freddy] What's the purity of it?

[Travess] High 90s, you know, closest to 100% you're gonna get.

My family has always been

in the mining and logging industry.

When I was 16 years old,

I wanted to leave the family logging outfit

to learn how to gold mine.

I met an old fella from Salmon Arm, BC

and joined his crew,

and I literally saw 5-gallon pails full of gold.

Oh, that was totally the minute

I became a gold junkie.

I love being on gold mines. It's awesome.

I'm really good at running the excavator

and feeding the plant.

I'm pretty confident about that.

[narrator] Two years ago, Travess set up Long Bar Mine

to create a legacy for his son.

I have learning disabilities,

but I know I can become a mine boss.

I'm trying to show my dad

I'm trying to put as much effort into it as I can.

[Travess] Andrew's my whole world.

I'm trying to install the work ethic that I have

and give him the mining experience he needs

so that he's able to thrive and succeed in this world

just like anyone else.

[Juan] What's your investment out here?

Well, we're, uh, we're in the ballpark

of, you know, $400,000

spent in the last two seasons here.

And you only got $11,000 worth of gold last year, huh?

-[Travess] Yeah. -[Juan] You're a ways away.

-Yeah, a long ways away. -[Freddy] Yeah.

My son and I are out here

picking away at this ourselves,

trying to make it work the best we can.

Now what's your goal for this season?

My goal for this season is 25 ounces.

What's on the line here?

Well, it's kind of everything on the line this year, Freddy.

A good friend of mine, he's owed over $50,000.

And if we don't get on the gold this year,

Andrew and I are looking at,

you know, possibly losing something

in the value of $50,000,

you know, an excavator or a loader.

We wouldn't be able to bounce back

from something like that.

So, without the gold,

we're not gonna make it, Freddy.

Gold's money and money is gold.

[Travess] Yes, sir.

That's why we're desperately in need of a hand

to get on track here, so...

What we like to do is come in, we'll do a four-hour test run.

We wanna watch the plant, we're not gonna get involved,

and that way we can kind of get together and figure out,

you know, what we can do to help you.

[Travess] Thanks, Juan.

Well, let's go look at the plant.

[dramatic music playing]

[Juan] So, out of curiosity, what's all this about?

[Travess] Well, my son and I have been buying stuff

all over the place at auctions,

trying to piece together a good operating gold mine.

But I don't really know how to put it together

the way that it's supposed to.

[Juan] It looks like you got most of it,

but there's a lot of little odds and ends that you don't have

-that are kind of important. -[Travess] Yup.

[Juan] Ideally, we would love to do that one,

but I just don't know that we have enough time for that.

You know, when Travess told us

that he's 400K in the hole here, I can see it.

He's got tons of equipment that he doesn't even use.

But, you know, gold fever does that.

So how long have you been running this small plant?

[Travess] That's what we've been running all season.

To be honest with you, it's been a struggle.

We've been managing to do a couple of grams a day,

doing 12 yards a shift type of thing.

[Freddy] So do you own this trommel?

This plant, I'm just renting.

[Juan] What's the payment on that?

$2,500 a month.

That's got us eating out of cans for dinner.

Well, let's run for four hours

and see what kind of gold we get.

We'll show you what a four-hour test run will give you.

Let's get this show on the road.

Start the generator!

[generator revving]

[Travess] Here comes the dirt.

-First bucket launched. -[Juan] There it is.

Washing for Freddy and Juan

does feel a little bit like going to school,

but I respect their knowledge so much.

[narrator] Travess feeds virgin pay onto a conveyor,

feeding a 10-foot rotating trommel.

Spray bars inside wash the pay from the gravel

into a 6-foot wide dual sluice run

where the gold should be recovered.

Water for the plant is pumped from a small holding pond

and recycled from the sluice back into the pond.

Looking at it right now, we can see

-handful of problems already. -The sluice?

That sluice box is about four times too big for that plant.

They don't have enough water

to carry that wide a sluice.

[Juan] That's not enough water for one side,

-let alone two sides. -[Freddy] Nope.

[Juan] And you can look at the drum.

I bet over 50% of it is clogged up.

[Freddy] I bet you're right.

I'm worried about the ground.

[Juan] We can go out there and make them

the most efficient plant in the world.

[Freddy] But if there's no gold to catch in it...

-[Juan] Yeah. -[Freddy] yeah.

All you're doing is washing rocks.

[Travess] How's our trammel looking, son?

Keep a close eye on the tailings.

It's building up.

[Travess] Well, just sweep them away with your hands.

So the reason I have to do this by hand

is because our angle is not down far enough.

We're not able to lose our tailings.

[Juan] He's gotta go in there and clean that out by hand.

How long is that gonna last

before they're worn completely out, right?

[Juan] No, that's a bad deal, Freddy.

There's no one else I'd rather be out here

working with than my son.

This is more rewarding than anything.

Especially if we can bring home some gold.

Better solution!

[Travess] I wanted my son to be able to take the mine over.

So this is going to be a supercharge

for Andrew's mining education.

Working at the logging outfit

is not the same as having your own gold mine.

How long have we been running, Fred?

Roughly two hours.

I don't know if that pond's gonna make four hours, Juan.

[Juan] Well, you can look at how much tailings

-we have in it right now. -[Freddy] Yup.

This water's now turning into a milkshake, right?

So when that water gets thick,

that really fine gold like they have here,

you tend to start losing it.

The thicker the water gets, the more gold you lose.

That's what happens when you sluice out of a mud puddle.

The water's so thick now

that I'll go tell him last bucket

and we'll let that feeder clear out.

Yeah. Sounds good.

[Freddy] Hey, Travess. Last bucket!

[Juan] Shut it all down, let's see what we got.

[Travess] Kid, kill the pump!

[dramatic music playing]

[Travess] Look at all of our black sands

and gold that's piled up here

out at the end of the sluice run.

So, you know we definitely were losing it.

[Juan] Some of the bigger stuff's here,

a couple little pockets.

[Andrew] It's all up at the top, though, it seems, eh?

Do you see any color down that low in the small stuff?

[Freddy] I haven't yet.

You guys wanna get this cleaned up

-and we'll meet up later? -[Travess] You bet.

We'll let you know how we made out.

[Freddy] Okay. Sounds like a plan.

I've seen other people,

you know, in similar situations.

People get gold fever

and sometimes bad things happen, right?

You throw a lot of your money away

and that's what I'm seeing here right now.

So hopefully Juan or myself can help them.

[birds chirping]

[suspenseful music playing]

[crows cawing]

[Freddy] Be curious to see, huh?

[Juan] It's gonna be interesting.

[narrator] At the Long Bar Mine in British Columbia,

the results are in for the two-hour test run

on the Allens' wash plant rental.

[Juan] How we doing, gentlemen?

Good. Hi, Freddy. Hi, Juan.

So here's our dried gold, Fred.

Okay.

Let's see what we got.

[tense music playing]

0.03.

[narrator] 0.03 ounces worth just $69.

-[Freddy] It's not good. -Not good at all.

It's not enough to cover the fuel that you used.

Not enough at all.

You can't continue to mine that way.

-No, definitely not. -You know, the more you run,

the quicker you're gonna go broke.

Yup, that's a hard way to go broke.

At this rate, a fast food job

would be paying you a lot more.

I appreciate, uh, the harsh honesty of things

for sure, Freddy.

But, uh, hope is not lost.

We're gonna sit down and have a chat,

see what we can do with the plant.

That would be fantastic.

My son and I really need the help

at this point as you can tell.

[Juan] Yeah, you do.

[Freddy] Here's your gold, sir.

Don't spend it all in one place.

[Travess] Thank you, Freddy.

-Well, let's go have a chat, Fred. -Yup.

-[Freddy] Not good, Juan-o. -[Juan] No.

We didn't wanna burst their bubble,

but $70 worth of gold is not acceptable.

Not even close.

So it was a little bit of a reality check

but sometimes that's needed.

Having this bad news from Freddy and Juan

is definitely humbling.

I think if we can focus on making a few fixes,

there's still a chance of saving the season.

[bird screeching]

[Freddy] They're sure some nice guys.

[Juan] And I love the fact that he's doing this

to be able to set his son up.

[Freddy] It's always good to see a family operation.

But, you know, they're, uh,

they're kind of in a rough shape.

-In really rough shape. -Yeah.

That plant that they got is basically a prospecting plant.

It's one step up from a hobby mine right now.

And really with the gold that they have,

-it's not gonna cut it. -Yeah. It's not enough.

And it's gonna plug on him nonstop.

Yeah. But really more than that,

-it's not his plant. -Mmm-hmm.

He's renting it right now, you know.

He's got money going out the door

before he's got money coming in.

So, I'm really thinking that,

you know, he has all those parts there.

Let's set him up with his own plant.

[Freddy] Yeah.

He's kind of like a used equipment hoarder.

He's got a bunch of stuff laying around,

-but none of it works. -Well, none of...

It's all mismatch, right? You know, like none of it

was really designed for each other.

But I think with what he has there,

-it's kind of a good start. -I agree with you.

I think what we can do

is take that old shaker deck and repurpose it.

We would have to build a new catch pan for the bottom.

And this screen has no water system,

-so we're gonna put spray bars on it. -Mmm-hmm.

We'll have to build a manifold then, Juan.

-Yup. -And we should also modify

and reuse that yellow sluice box

he's got sitting there.

That's perfect.

But we can only use one side of the sluice.

Yeah.

He doesn't have enough water to run full width,

but if we get it into one,

then we'll be in good shape.

It's a lot of work,

-but at the end of the day... -That's all right.

...he's doing this to be able to set his son up.

So I'd be happy to waive our labor fee on this, the labor.

He covers the material, we cover the labor.

-I'm good with that. -Yeah. Done.

[Juan] All right. Let's do it.

[narrator] In an ambitious plan,

Freddy and Juan will send back

the trommel rental

and resurrect Travess' boneyard shaker deck.

A new hopper will be fitted to feed the plant.

They'll install a complete water system

to wash the pay

and make the pond four times bigger.

The lower screen will be replaced

to trap extra fine gold.

And a new distribution chute

will direct gold-bearing concentrates

into one side of Travess' secondhand sluice.

[suspenseful music playing]

[Travess] Hey, Fred. Hey, Juan.

-[Freddy] How's it going, guys? -[Travess] We're doing okay.

[Freddy] We went and talked things over.

[Juan] Yeah, we came up with a couple ideas.

Um, one of the things that we really wanna do

is whatever we do here, we wanna make sure

that we do it on your plant.

[Freddy] You don't own the trommel,

so we'd be fixing up somebody else's equipment

-if you lost it. -Yeah.

So we wanna work on your screen

that you have, that you own.

That's fantastic news.

But it's gonna be a lot more work

than what we anticipated.

We're gonna have to build a feeder pan.

Then at the bottom, we're actually gonna have

to build a funnel to be able to funnel

all that concentrated material

into the sluice box.

[Freddy] And reuse that yellow sluice box,

but only half of it,

because you don't have enough water

to run 6 foot a box.

You get enough water for 3 feet.

[Juan] We still have to do a water system.

We'll have to build a manifold.

We'll have to build spray bars.

But I think all in all,

that's gonna be a better plant for you guys.

-Absolutely will. -[Freddy] And you own it.

-[Juan] Yeah. -Yes, sir.

And what we came to is $5,100.

And that's strictly material.

Uh, we talked about the labor.

We're gonna donate our labor 100%.

Well, guys, I really appreciate that.

That helps us huge.

Um, $5,100 is a... Is a pretty big number.

[Freddy] I'd say send this trommel back

so you aren't paying 2,500 bucks a month.

[Travess] Yeah, I agree.

-It's a deal. Thank you, Freddy. -[Freddy] Yeah.

Meet us down there, you guys can help us.

-[Travess] Absolutely. -Yeah, we're gonna need your help to get this done.

And we'll teach you some welding skills.

-All right. -Excellent.

-Thank you. -All right.

Good stuff, son.

-Well, let's get to work, huh? -Yup.

[narrator] Freddy and Juan have less than four days

to resurrect a boneyard wash plant

and turn the Allens' fortunes around.

[Freddy] What do you think?

-I'm gonna start cutting. -Okay.

[Juan] I'll do that screen and then the discharge chutes.

I might go look at some ground real quick.

-Yup. -All righty.

Let's make it happen.

We're gonna cut this out of one sheet of steel.

[narrator] First, Juan fabricates an extra fine gold screen

for the new wash plant.

[Juan] Right now, they're screening way too big

for the gold that they have,

so we're gonna cut that down a little bit.

The better that your classification is,

the better the concentration is gonna be.

And you won't be having that larger material

compete with that smaller gold

and pushing it out of the sluice box.

[narrator] To recover the fine gold,

Juan's plasma cutter precisely carves

3,000 one-eight inch holes,

four times smaller than the shakers' original screen.

We're gonna have about five hours

of cut time on this screen,

but we don't have any room for error.

Right now is not a time to make mistakes.

[machine whirring]

-[country music playing] -[birds chirping]

I'm extremely concerned

about the amount of gold in these gravels.

So, I feel like I'm in a little bit

of a hornet's nest here.

[narrator] Freddy's first priority,

get eyes on the ground Travess has been mining.

[Freddy] Are all these your tailings

or was somebody in here before you?

No, this is my tailings from last year.

Whose tailings are those?

They're all mine.

[Freddy] And you only got 5 ounces out of all this?

[Travess] Yeah.

[Freddy] Oh, man.

Yup. I wish I would have known when to quit.

[Freddy] Rough estimate, you ran 5,000 yards.

[Travess] Wow.

Yeah, I had no idea we washed that much gravel.

[Freddy] There's a tenth of an ounce per hundred roughly.

[narrator] Travess needs to recover

10 times this amount of gold to turn a profit.

Travess wants, you know,

this to be a legacy for his son.

And as of right now, I don't know

if there's enough gold here for that to really happen.

[birds chirping]

[Freddy] Did you test any of this material?

[Travess] We just weren't testing

the way we should have been testing

and we ended up washing gravels

that were not great.

This is your most important tool out here

to start with.

There's one of these in every piece of heavy equipment, right?

Whether it's a loader, whether it's a dozer, whatever.

Every piece of equipment that I owned

had a gold pan in it.

And if you run across something that looks neat,

you know, get out and pan it.

It gives you kind of an indicator on...

-Direction you're going. -Yeah.

[Travess] So this is what the bank looks like

when you cut into it.

[Freddy] That's what I wanna see.

It's definitely been reworked by water,

which is a good thing.

See our flat rocks?

So when water flows, it can't stand up, right?

Your flat rocks go flat, and they shingle up.

[narrator] The flat rocks are a sign

that the gold-bearing Fraser River

once flowed through this part of the cut.

[Freddy] The layer at your knee is the best...

-[Travess] Yeah. -[Freddy]...that I can see.

Would you go a little deeper and see what's down there?

Try it and see.

You know, it may change or maybe a layer under this

that has a different matrix to it.

You aren't done yet.

-Just keep testing. -[Travess] Absolutely.

-Thank you, Freddy. Looking forward to it. -[Freddy] You're welcome.

My worry is he's got gold fever.

And when he sees, you know,

three specks of gold, he gets excited.

Hopefully the things we're teaching Travess here,

he'll keep embedded and he'll get on the gold.

[birds chirping]

We have a lot of stuff to do today,

so we just got to get rolling here.

[narrator] On the Long Bar Mine

in British Columbia.

Test lift first.

[narrator] In a bid to save their mining operation,

the Allens move their scrap shaker deck

to Juan's fabrication base camp in the Boneyard,

where it can be worked on more easily.

[Travess] You're coming with us, big girl.

[tense music playing]

You can feel the strain even on the undercarriage.

Don't get too close, sunshine.

Big load.

It's heavy.

[Juan] Let's set it right here.

Perfect. Right there.

[narrator] Shaker deck in place,

Juan starts work on a new hopper.

The hopper's gonna be where we drop the material in with the excavator,

and that way it can feed on top of the screen,

but also it'll have a water port on the back

to be able to push that material in.

If I can get everything cut out

between today and tomorrow morning,

hopefully we'll be able to start getting things on the plant

in the next day or so.

It's gonna be a lot of build.

[Freddy] It's definitely faster to refurbish half this sluice box

than to build a whole new one.

I'm gonna put all new angle clips in.

'Cause you see how this one's already bent up?

-[Travess] Yes, sir. -[Freddy] Well, it's just welded on the top,

so it lets you use a wedge on this three or four times,

it's gonna snap them off.

So we need 14 of these.

[Travess] Sure, Freddy.

No worries.

Nothing is cheap at all in gold mining.

The sluice boxes were around $5,000 each.

So it's good to see them being put to use

instead of just sitting there getting rusty.

[Freddy] Hey, Andrew, I might get you to grind for me

where these angle clips are gonna go.

[Andrew] Sure.

[Freddy] Grind that whole area.

[Andrew] You bet.

-Like that? -[Freddy] Close enough.

So, you enjoy working with your son?

I really enjoy working with my son, actually.

-[Freddy] Good. -We're very close.

I can definitely tell you guys are pretty close.

I pretty much raised him since I could hold him

in one hand by myself.

It was tough as a single father.

The early years were really good.

The older he got, I started to see changes in Andrew

that had to do with, uh, his special needs.

It's a type of autism

that not very many children have,

but he's got what he needs here to make it.

I will help him to learn the ropes

so that he's able to take the reins.

This is protection for him,

for his future, for both of us.

[Freddy] Thanks, Andrew.

I think it looks pretty good.

I'll start welding on this.

[dramatic music playing]

Just trying to get in here on the good level ground

so we can get all the good pay.

[narrator] While work continues on the sluice,

Travess follows up on Freddy's tips

in the Long Bar cut.

Finding out that our gold averages are so low

is hard to take.

But like Freddy said,

try to follow the pay layers.

That's interesting.

Bigger rock here.

Let's go a little deeper.

Looks like we've got an obvious change in here.

I think I'm gonna go get a gold pan

and test some of this pay.

Freddy had some great advice.

If we're breaking the ground,

we should be panning it before it hits

any kind of a wash plant.

Starting to get down to the good stuff now.

It might be small,

but it has gold.

[dramatic music playing]

[Travess] All right. Freddy, I found another layer.

I thought I'd show it to you before I take it down too far

and lose any.

[Freddy] Don't be scared of losing a spec.

Time's money, right?

[Travess] Yeah.

[Freddy] It's got gold in it, 10, 12 colors.

-[Travess chuckles] -[Freddy] Well, that's better

than the other stuff by far.

Dig it up. We'll run it.

[Travess] All right, Freddy, thanks.

[Freddy] No worries. Thank you.

[dramatic music playing]

So right now I'm working on the manifold.

These are the side pieces, and we'll just build

this big rectangle that'll be the manifold.

[narrator] One's manifold

will distribute pressurized water

to the spray bars above the hopper and pay screens

to separate the extra fine gold from river gravels.

Well, there it is.

That'll be the four-inch coming in,

and then three inch and a half valves for spray bars.

Two inch valves for a spray bar

on the back of the feeder.

Also, when he gets a bigger pump,

he can cut a hole in here

and put a six-inch port

so he can run a bigger pump.

[upbeat music playing]

[Freddy] You wanna cut some carpets, Andrew?

-[Andrew] Sure. -You can see

we're six foot wide and eight feet long, right?

[narrator] In the Boneyard,

Freddy and Andrew make new sluice mats

to trap extra fine Long Bar gold.

So we need four,

4 foot by 3 foot sections of carpet.

[Andrew] Okay.

Grab the tape.

Measure twice, cut once.

[Andrew] Yup.

[Freddy] So just follow your line and cut them.

[Andrew] Yeah, I will.

I am very excited

to learn things from Freddy and Juan.

It's important for me

if I wanted to become a mine boss.

Freddy, I got some finished carpet there for you.

[Freddy] All righty.

-So let's put him in. -[Andrew] Sure.

[Travess] Watching Andy work next to Freddy is amazing.

He's learning from me, and he's learning from Freddy and Juan.

[Freddy] Now, let's grab our miners moss

and put it up top.

[Travess] I think these are all footsteps

going forward for him,

taking the reins one day.

[Freddy] There you go.

[upbeat music playing]

Hey, Juan, what have we got going on here?

So this is the beginning of the chute.

The material that's been screened properly

will drop into this, and then all the oversized material

can go right off the front of it,

-out into the muck bay. -[Andrew] Uh-huh.

[narrator] To keep gold concentrates

clear from the tailings,

the new chute will make a 90-degree turn

into the sluice box.

[Andrew] Can I help you with anything?

Have you ever done any welding before?

I was pretty good when I... Back in high school

when I was doing it.

If you wanna get that welding coat on...

-[Andrew] Yup. -...those gloves and that hood.

Yeah, sure.

[upbeat music playing]

[Juan] Well, let's see what you got.

So you strike it like a match.

Yeah.

A little closer, a little closer,

a little... There you go.

Perfect.

Let's weld up to there and see how you do.

-Okay? -Okay.

[Juan] It's always a big worry of mine

to take on such an ambitious build,

knowing that we only have a few days to do it.

I'm hoping with Andrew and Travess here,

uh, we should be able to get most of this done,

but, uh, we'll see.

-There you go. -Good job.

Thank you, Juan.

[Juan] Well, we just got the chute all welded up,

so we're gonna get it installed.

This bottom goes on the bottom of this.

Okay. Let's get this side up.

Can we just twist it?

[Freddy] Yeah, you're gettin' her.

Keep going. Whoa.

[Juan] Lift it up tight.

That pan's all [bleep] up.

With a gap like that, water's gonna splash out of it.

[Juan] It's definitely gonna be hard for Freddy

to be able to weld it in place, 'cause right now

it's probably got a three quarters of an inch of gap.

[narrator] The Boneyard shaker deck

has warped with age

and they can't connect the new chute.

When they built it, they didn't build it strong enough

to be able to hold its shape,

so we're dealing with it now.

[tense music playing]

I was thinking of putting a jack off there,

-if I can reach in there. -Yup.

[narrator] At the Long Bar Mine,

Freddy and Juan fight

to connect the new discharge chute

to the beat up shaker deck.

Any gaps could leak fine gold.

[Juan] Underneath the screen, it's bowed.

So right now, Freddy's trying to pull that chute down

to be able to get it close

to the new discharge chute that we built,

to be able to weld it in place.

[dramatic music playing]

Well, we got it pulled down most of the way.

I'm gonna run a bead of silicone through it

to seal it up.

We're just stopping a little bit

of water splash.

[narrator] With the gap below closed,

the sides must also be welded.

[Freddy] Hey, Juan.

[Juan] Hot tack it?

Try it.

I'll hit it right here.

It'll take me a second to bridge it.

Yup.

One more.

Okay.

Yup.

-Perfect. -Yup.

That's what you call hot tacking.

When you got a gap,

get a tack in the middle of it,

hit it with a hammer and smash that weld in

and it'll pull the weld in.

So I had a gap like that, now it's pretty tight.

[Juan] That's one of the big pieces we had to put in.

We still have a hopper we have to install still

and the complete water system.

So we're getting closer

but we still got a lot to do.

[dramatic music playing]

[bird caws]

[Freddy] How's it going, Travess?

All good, Fred. How you doing?

[Freddy] Oh, doing all right.

[Travess] Good stuff. It's starting to come along?

Little by little.

Today, we gotta get water in here

'cause without water, we can't sluice.

-[Travess] Absolutely. -[Freddy] 'Cause when we ran two hours last time

and it silted up.

I'd like to raise that dam on the far side of the pond.

Raise it another foot or so, so we can get more water.

-For sure. -[Freddy] All righty.

I'm gonna get to work.

Thanks, Freddy. I appreciate it.

Talk to you soon.

[narrator] To pump cleaner water into the plant

and improve fine gold recovery,

Travess raises the Earth dam

to make the pond four times bigger.

[Freddy] Travess, he always may not know everything

about gold mining,

but one thing's for sure, he's a... He's a good operator

on that track hoe.

He's one of the guys I trust.

[Travess] Raised it up a little higher

and packing it in a little tighter,

and see if we can't make it hold water.

I think it's going to be high enough for now.

Hey, Freddy, what do you think of the berm?

[Freddy] She looks good, man.

We're one step closer, Freddy.

We hook everything up and then start pumping.

I'm gonna get back at it.

Okay, Freddy.

Thank you.

[narrator] At the cut trailer...

That's the beginning of the spray bar.

[narrator] Juan fabricates new spray bars

to wash the pay gravels.

Just used the plasma table to blast out all my holes,

that way it goes a little easier

instead of having to go in there

individually drill every hole.

We have four bars that we have to build,

so it's quicker this way

just to set up the table and burn them out.

[Freddy] Spray bars are in place.

We still gotta get the screen in.

And then, you know, we also...

There's that thing about running it.

[Freddy] Pick up on that screen,

so Juan can get his forks under it.

You bet.

[Freddy] Go ahead, Juano.

[narrator] The Allens help Freddy transport

and install the 200-pound fine gold screen.

Let's just slide it on manual, guys.

It's all yours, Juan.

[Juan] Thank you, Fred, watch out, buddy.

Coming up.

Keep going back.

Shove it up there, son.

Watch your fingers.

-Now, give her grief. -One, two, three...

Go.

[grunts] There we go.

Got her.

She's all coming together.

-Piece by piece. -[Freddy] Coming up.

[narrator] The final piece of the puzzle

is Juan's new hopper.

Go.

[dramatic music playing]

-Steady there, Juan. -That's it, buddy.

Well, this build took a little longer than what we expected,

but, uh, now, it's a mad dash

to get the plant dragged back over.

Stick up, stick up.

[narrator] Travess moves the upgraded shaker 300 yards

to the pad for the second test run.

[Freddy] It actually looks like a plant now.

[Travess] A week ago, this wash plant

was just sitting in the corner rusting.

It really looks good to see it back together.

Curl your bucket in.

Come on.

One of the most exciting days for a gold miner

is happening right now.

Oh.

Crack in a little bit more.

[Freddy] Whoa.

[Juan] We're in good shape, huh?

[Freddy] Perfectly center.

Perfect.

Both you and Juan, you're gonna change our future.

Thank you. That means a lot.

[Juan] Let's get out of here, huh?

Put things away and get ready for a test run.

Let's do it.

[Juan] It's a huge transformation.

We basically took essentially scrap iron

and built a full functional plant.

Hopefully, tomorrow, we're gonna be full of gold.

But, uh, we'll see.

[Freddy] Come here, Willow.

[narrator] In a moment of downtime,

Freddy gets back to his ranching roots

with dog Willow.

[Freddy] You see those chickens?

-Come on, Willow. -[barks]

[Freddy] Get around those chickens. Herd them up.

I grew up on a ranch. We had cow dogs.

Lots of sheepdog with a desire to herd something.

That's the instincts that those dogs have.

I can't get those instincts out of her today.

Herd them up. Get around.

Get around.

It's not my day for a dog trainer.

Well, I tried.

[country music playing]

[Travess] Hey, Freddy. Hey, Juan.

What do you think, Travess?

You guys ready to run?

Yeah, you bet.

Well, let's run.

-Let's go. -Let's do it.

[machine revving]

[narrator] At the Long Bar Mine,

the Allens fire up their new wash plant

for the second test run.

[Travess] Let's see if she shakes for us.

[machine whirring]

[Freddy] Looking good, sunshine.

Here's the first scoop.

[Freddy] First bucket, Juan.

-Four-hour run? -Yeah.

It feels great to run this plant

for the first time.

It's been sitting in the field

for a couple of years.

I've never ever thought it would come together.

[Freddy] Sluice is running good,

the plant's running good,

the water's cleaning the material,

the rocks are coming off clean.

I don't think I've ever seen a wash plant

run this good before.

[dramatic music playing]

[Travess] Makes me more confident that we can get

to our 25-ounce gold.

Looks like we're running about double the production.

[Freddy] Overall, I'm pretty happy with it.

You know what we did with this?

We resurrected a dinosaur.

[Juan] Yeah. Something that was fit for the scrap pile,

now it's actually a running plant.

[Freddy] And he owns it.

[Juan] Yeah. Hopefully, we see some gold

in the box.

What is that? Is that four hours now, Fred?

Four hours right on the money.

Last bucket.

[machine revving]

[Juan] Let's go see the box.

There's quite a bit of material in it.

[Travess] Oh, look, here in the carpet.

[Freddy] See, that's why we double layer, right?

[Travess] Yeah, it's all over the top there,

all over here.

Some more bigger pieces in here.

[Freddy] Good.

We'll know more 'cause the scale doesn't lie.

[Travess] You bet.

-Let's go weigh it up, Freddy. -I'm curious.

-Yeah, me too. -I'm worried too.

Yeah.

[Freddy] Where's your gold at, guys?

I got some gold right here for you to weigh.

We did a 0.03 last time.

You know, you gotta be right around

a quarter of an ounce a day, right,

to be able to finish the season off?

Absolutely. That's what we're shooting for.

Let's weigh it up.

[narrator] The Allens' final hopes

rest on a boosted recovery

from Freddy and Juan's upcycled wash plant

and the new prospected pay

from the Long Bar cut.

Well, we're way past the 0.03.

[narrator] After doubling their last two-hour run time,

they need to see at least 0.1 ounces

to save their season.

-Huh. -Look at that number.

-[Freddy] 0.20. -[Travess] Wow.

[Juan] Just shy of a quarter ounce.

Wow.

[narrator] Almost $500

in just a four-hour run.

More than triple the gold recovery

of their wash plant rental.

-That's pretty good. -That pretty excellent

compared to what we've been doing.

You know, in reality is, an eight-hour run,

you'd be closer to half an ounce, you know.

-Absolutely. -[Juan] And that's doable.

-Wow. -[Juan] That's $1,200 a day.

Wow, that's pretty good.

-Well, you weren't gonna survive before. -[Andrew] Absolutely.

[Juan] The way the plant is set up, you're only running at half capacity.

As you ramp things up, you start making some money,

you can get a bigger pump and start, you know,

using both sides of the sluice box.

-And hopefully get an ounce a day. -Exactly.

[Travess] It's nice to have my own plant up and running.

This is actually light at the end of the tunnel for me.

This is the best news we've seen.

Man, do I appreciate it, fellas.

Juan and myself gotta hit the road.

-Thank you, Freddy. -You're welcome.

-Thank you, Juan. -[Juan] Hey, no worries.

-Thank you, Juan. -[Juan] Hey.

Thank you, Freddy.

[Travess] There's our future right there.

[Andrew] Miracle in the pan.

Both Andrew and I are just ecstatic.

Doesn't even feel real

what Freddy and Juan have done for us.

I never thought it could happen.

But it has happened.

We'll make it here.

We can survive.

I wanna say to Freddy and Juan,

thank you very much for coming down to our gold mine

and saving the day.

I can't be any happier.

A miracle has happened for me.

If it was easy, everyone would do it.

But, uh, honestly, I have a lot of hope here.

Andrew is driven

and he's made a decision.

He wants to be a miner

and he's gonna continue with this.

But now, he has the right tools to be able

to continue with this career.

[country music playing]

[machine whirring]

Here's an update from Long Bar.

Since we've seen Freddy and Juan,

the updates have helped us tremendously.

[Travess speaking]

We're washing around a hundred yards a shift

doing anywhere from three-quarters of an ounce

to an ounce a day.

I'm so happy to be able

to share it with my son

and show him this is how we can claw our way

to our future one scoop at a time.

Now we just wanna wash, wash, wash.

We'll be here until the snow flies.

Things just look that much better

for us now and for Andrew's future.

We're able to pay the bills.

Thanks again, Freddy and Juan.