pjbooks Chapter 17: A Great Harvest
Chapter 17: A Great Harvest
The seawater surged, and black mud and sand stained the azure sea.
The ore is fed into a rotary screen. Under the constant scouring of seawater, the tiny gold particles are blocked by the ore bins through the gaps in the rotary screen and eventually deposited on the felt.
Waste materials and large pebbles and gravel were discharged, splashing water all over the sea.
They worked continuously, turning on all the lights on the ship as soon as it got dark, taking turns to keep the equipment running even when the people were resting, striving to extract all the gold from this place in the shortest possible time!
For any vessel, once it starts operating at night, the lights will attract packs of hyenas.
It's manageable during the day, but if you're a little further away, you might just overlook it. Finding a ship on the vast ocean is no easy task.
But at night, lights are like beacons!
As time went by, all the gold prospectors at sea knew that Albert had sailed into international waters.
Some were unwilling to give up the areas where they had already found gold.
Some people are worried that the fuel will be wasted.
But they were all convinced that Albert had definitely found a rich mining area, otherwise he wouldn't have played such a trick on people at sea.
Although no one wanted the coordinates of this rich mining area to be leaked, there were always those who believed that if you don't let me eat it, then you shouldn't eat it either.
In just one night, the area around this location was teeming with gold-digging boats.
The gold-collecting ship doesn't matter much, since Jason and his team have already snapped up quite a few gold-rich areas, but there will always be some that slip through the net.
But the gold-bearing gravel buried deep inside is not worth their time.
Unless some large gold-digging ships come and steal the food, Albert will still eat the big head.
Albert, who had just switched shifts with Ada, looked at Jason, who was lying in a chair dozing off, and said enviously, "You're really lucky, kid."
You have to understand that when he first went gold panning during the gold rush season, all sorts of unexpected situations occurred, and his gold harvest was pitifully small. How could he find such a rich mining area right away?
Jason's eyes were blurry. "Dad, you have to work hard. Don't forget, there's still twenty percent of my money here."
Albert laughed and scolded, "You brat!"
Over the next three days, the location was constantly shifted, and through concerted efforts, the excavation work here was finally completed.
There is definitely still gold here, but mining it is quite difficult, especially in some rocky areas where excavators are completely helpless.
Brent and Andy also had a good harvest, especially under Andy's guidance, who, with his more than ten years of gold panning experience, successfully found about fifteen ounces of gold here.
It truly impressed Jason.
"Return to port!" After discussing it, Albert gave the order, and the Albert and Lillian returned to port together.
The Lillian is in relatively good condition, but the excavator on the Albert has been working for a long time and the hydraulic oil in the rocker arm has leaked out, so it needs to be repaired.
But the gains this time were so great that Albert wouldn't even hesitate to find a new source.
Two boats, one large and one small, sailed one after the other for more than an hour before appearing at the dock.
On the shore, some gold prospectors returning home gathered around, their eyes fixed on the Albert and Lillian.
For them, the equipment is still under repair.
I've been hearing these past few days that Albert and Jason have found a lot of gold.
Without interrupting their gold panning, they were extremely curious about just how much there was.
"Damn it, there are so many!"
"Why did my boat have to break down these past few days?!"
"Damn it, Albert is so lucky!"
"There's definitely nearly a thousand ounces here, absolutely!"
"Albert, you have to treat us!"
When the felt was rolled up, the dazzling gold in the gold pan instantly made many gold prospectors envious and they cursed.
"Hahaha, please, please, everyone have a beer at Gary's bar," Albert laughed, carefully placing the felt into the plastic bucket before cleaning the gold from the gold trough.
"Stingy Albert!"
"Just one beer, Albert, you're so stingy!"
"Exactly, at least three beers!"
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Albert echoed the envious voices around him, and once all the gold was loaded, he drove straight to the separation warehouse.
Of course, they also took Jason's situation into account, and the speculation that Jason had discovered the gold mining spot in the Bering Sea was confirmed.
Inside the separate warehouse, Lillian looked at the gold she had never received at once, her eyes curving into crescent moons.
The group took turns washing up and eating the food prepared by their mother, Lillian, in the separation warehouse.
As more and more gold was extracted, even those who had been panning for gold in the Bering Sea for years found their breathing quickened.
In the end, the existing containers in the warehouse were completely filled, but there was still a lot of gold waiting to be separated.
With no other option, Lillian went home and found several iron basins with a diameter of fifty centimeters, then poured the dried gold directly into them.
It took almost half a day, with several people taking turns, before the gold was finally separated.
The gold from the Albert and the gold from the Lillian were stored separately, but it was easy to tell which ship they came from.
Gold found on gold-digging ships is generally found in the form of fine sand, while gold found on gold-sucking ships is found in large, flat pieces. The gold obtained by the two methods of gold panning is different.
Of course, there were still some flat gold nuggets about the size of a fingernail on the Albert, which were initially sucked up using a gold pump.
However, the gold on the Albert was divided into two parts: one part came from the cooperative gold panning sites, and the other part was panned based on the nautical charts drawn by Jason.
When the electronic scale was placed on the table, everyone held their breath.
After the amount was zeroed out, a gold pan and the gold in the bottle were slowly poured into the pan.
"God!"
"OMG!"
"Yes, yes!"
Finally, after tallying the results, the Albert's catch came to 1157.3 ounces, a number that made Albert and Ada blush and embrace each other excitedly.
Lillian, who had been standing to the side, covered her mouth in excitement, too excited to say anything.
This is definitely my biggest haul since I started gold panning in the Bering Sea!
In his more than ten years of gold mining career, there have been few gold mining seasons with a greater harvest than this one.
But this was just one harvest during this year's gold rush season.
A new basin was placed on top, the scale was reset, and the gold on the Lillian began to be weighed!
100! 200! ... Finally, the value settled at 711.4 ounces.
Brent and Andy embraced instantly, jumping and dancing in the separation warehouse, their faces flushed with celebration.
"Dad, the portion of the gold we jointly panned was 526.4 ounces, and 20% is 105.28 ounces."
"Your gold panning in other places yields 630.9 ounces, while 20% yields 126.18 ounces."
Jason was calculating the amount of gold with a calculator, confirming the result with Albert, and then continuously pouring the gold out.
"Andy, Brent, we currently have 711.4 ounces of gold, and the cooperative gold mining yields 105.28 ounces."
"The total is 816.68 ounces. You can calculate it yourselves to see if it's correct."
Jason confirmed with Andy and Brent, indicating that they should calculate it themselves to avoid any future disputes.
Brent spoke first: "Jason, no problem, this is the price."
"No problem, Jason," Andy grinned, his face crinkling with excitement. "This will definitely be the biggest payout I've ever had in my gold rush career!"
Each person received a bottle, which was weighed in front of them. Jason rounded it up to 8.2 ounces for each person.
"I love you, Jason!"
"Haha, boss, I love you too."
The two men, clutching the heavy gold, burst into laughter.
Albert's smile vanished the moment Jason started settling accounts, leaving only frustration.
Holding a calculator, I kept pressing the keys. After getting the numbers, although it was a large sum of money, I still felt unbalanced.
After deducting the split between the two, Jason reaped 926.46 ounces this time.
Albert's earnings, however, dropped to 925.85 ounces!
Standing next to Albert, Lillian looked at her husband, who was staring blankly into space, and comforted him, "You're not happy with Jason's achievements? At least it shows that Jason has the blood of a true gold rush family."
"I'm not unhappy at all," Albert retorted stubbornly.
Hearing her mother's words, Ada said with a resentful look, "Mother, I'm your son too, okay?"
"Okay, okay," Lillian reached out and patted Ada's head, then shouted to Andy and Ada, "I'm cooking later, come to my house for a big meal! Plenty of beer!"