_ = 2 = _

Over the Next week, Greg gave Becka a crash coarse in gold prospecting and when Friday rolled around Becka joined Greg on an excursion out to his claim. The drive was long and winding but the area was lovely. They set up camp and got down to business.

"So, this is what a gold claim looks like huh? Not quite what I was expecting."

"Ah. bet you were expecting something like a mine shaft or tunnel in the mountainside yes?" Greg asked with a grin.

Becka nodded. "Something like that, yeah." the Badger said looking around.

"That would be hard-rock mining or lode mining what I do out here is called placer mining searching rivers for gold washed out from lode deposits over time, it is much easier, cheaper and far less dangerous... and much more Fun!"

"Oh, okay cool, I like fun, what do you need me to do?" Becka asked almost bouncing on the balls of her feet in excitement.

"Okay, why don't you grab those buckets outta the back, I will get the sluice set up. What we are going to do is fill buckets with classified material and feed it through the sluice box to get our concentrates."

"Ooh, classified material, huh, so that means it's secret?" Becka asked with a giggle.

Greg gave her a double-take before laughing. "Well I suppose that's one way to look at it." the possum shook his head "We screen it down to a quarter of an inch, it feeds faster through the sluice. The stuff we were running back in the shop was about fifty buckets worth of material concentrated down to about ¾'s of a bucket of gold rich panning sand."

"So this job involves a lot of shoveling, got it. But I will say I love being out in the fresh air. I hope you don't mind, but I tend to get a bit randy whenever I am in the great outdoors." The Badger said with a wink.

"No worries, there will be plenty of time for that after the daily clean up. Hell we are far enough out in the puckerbrush that you can walk around topless or naked if ya feel like doing so. We agreed to start you off with a quarter share, and working your way up to half Interest in this operation. You still okay with that hon?" Greg asked before they got started.

Becka looked pensive, looking around at the river and the great out doors and nodded. "I like that idea, just might do that, Yeah, a quarter share's fine with me, I am in the learning phase and the sex and play are side benefits. I don't mind playing 'C __amp_ W ench'_and if what you told me before was half as accurate, one can make a decent living doing this. so... Yeah, I'm good. Thanks for giving me this opportunity Greg, you are one of the most interesting guys I have ever met.

"Well thank you darlin, you are my first Badger, and I am darnd glad we hooked up. Let me show you how to set up a sluice box and we can get to classifying." Greg said taking the rectangular box with the flared end to the edge of the waterway.

"To operate correctly and insure proper processing and water flow over the riffles, the standard rule of thumb is a one inch drop for every foot of length, this box being about 3 foot the calculation is easy." the possum looked at his student as she watched him position it.

"Oh! A three inch drop." Becka said smiling at his nod.

"Just so... Now you don't want to feed it too fast you will figure it out in time. Fill that bucket with water and we can begin."

Becka did so placing the classifier on the bucket as Greg shoveled river gravel into the top. Becka sifted it using the water from a finish pan to wash off the larger rocks allowing the finer material to pass through.

"Now, before you dump the washed rocks, give them a look see for nuggets larger than a quarter of an inch. This place isn't known for them, but they are not unheard of I found one a few years back so it makes sense to go through it before ya dump it." Greg grinned watching Becka carefully searching for the flash of a nugget amongst the rocks.

"Shovel, wash rocks, repeat, simple process." Becka said dumping her fifth classifier of rocks.

"Say Greg, do you know if there are any good fish in this river?" the Badger asked standing up to replace the bucket pouring off a bit of water to reveal a uniform mix of sand and gravel and hidden gold.

"Yeah there are some tasty trout and steel-head swimming around, fill a few more buckets and take a break to try your luck if you like." Greg chuckled "Morning is generally best, but if they are biting you may just land a few for supper."

With four buckets of material they moved over to the sluice box. "Now use this hand shovel to feed the flare of the sluice." he instructed stepping back to observe his eager apprentice.

"Wow, this is so neat!" Becka said as the material worked it's way quickly down the sluice box.

Looking at the ribbed matting he grinned "Well lookey there, we already got some color." pointing at a few flakes of gold in the black assay mat.

"Really?" Becka asked squinting at the front of the Sluice. "Oh my God! That is soo cool!" she said resuming the feeding of the sluice, after dumping the dregs from the bottom of the forth bucket through, Becka looked again. The black mat showed lots of speckles of gold. As Greg brought over two more buckets of 'Sluice Feed.'

"Welp, there's definitely gold here alright." Becka chuckled. Mind if I take a break and try drowning some worms and see if I can invite some fish to join us for supper?" she asked peeling off her tank top and wiping her sweaty chest with the damp cloth.

"You are doing a fine job hon go right ahead we have plenty of time to work the claim, and I must say, you look good like that." Greg grinned openly admiring Becka's 'charms.'

"Why thank you good sir, it sure feels good to be free enough to do it. Being out here is timeless this could be any time in history. hell, we could be back in the gold rush days no more modern world. I am loving This. Thank You Greg. She leaned over and kissed him as he gave her breasts a quick fondle.

"Heh you are quite welcome darlin ya got a mighty fine set of Tits. You are just the type of person I have been lookin for. Go try your luck with the rod and reel, I'll work a few more buckets and we can break for lunch." Greg said with a nod admiring the snug shorts Becka was wearing, as she made her way up the bank to camp to try her luck with the fishing gear.

Wondering back to camp she pulled the fishing gear out of the back of the jeep, assembling the rod before grabbing the tackle box and a bucket heading back to the river about forty yards from where Greg was working. Looking around she really loved it hear, the sun was out, the sky was a glorious sapphire blue, the peace and quiet of the mountains the calming effect of the river, she hadn't felt this free in years.

Baiting the hook she landed a nice cast and waited, looking back over the events in her life up to this point had been nothing more than eat, work, sleep. she had lost herself in the day to day grind of 'materials management' lugging crates in the warehouse, the pay was decent enough, but it was mindless drone work... a tug on the line brought Becka's mind back and with a quick flick she had hooked her first fish! A nice twelve inch river trout. Good eating! She dropped it in the bucket she sat on and continued to fully enjoy providing for the camp. Over the next hour she landed five more including two eighteen inch steel-head! Yumm.

Greg, hearing her hoots and cheers grinned to himself yup. He thought it was good to have someone along and this Badger just may work out to become the long term partner he had been looking for almost as long as he had been searching for gold.

Breaking for lunch Greg was greeted by a topless Becka with a bucket of fish, "Those will be darnd tasty looks like you had some really good luck hon, well done."

"Why thank you sir, what would you like for lunch?" she asked placing a hand on the curve of her hip.

"Whelp we can crack open a couple cans of stew, or grill up those steel-head and save the trout for supper, up ta you hon." the possum said. "Tell ya what, you caught em, I'll clean em, deal?"

"That sounds like a great idea! I wasn't sure I could wait tel sundown to have some fresh fish. I am really loving being out of the city."

"Yup, no better livin' can be had than in the great out doors, hand me those two and get the fire going and we will be eatin like kings."

"Oh gods, that was unbelievable." Becka said patting her belly . "Never in my life have I ever had fish that fresh or tasty. So what's next, back to the buckets, or you fancy a quickie in the tent?" the Badger asked grinning wickedly.

"You weren't kidding when you said being in the great outdoors gets you horny... well relax and let those tasty fish settle a bit it'd be a shame to lose yer lunch in the middle of some horizontal square dancin in the tent." he chuckled reaching into the cooler tossing her a can.

"Here, have a beer, and I will tell you what I have in mind for the afternoon."

Becka caught the can and ran it over her breasts sighing at the wonderfully cool can causing her nipples to stiffen to craggy peaks as the chilled can past over them.

"So far we got ten buckets through the sluice, so we do a quick clean up then grab the buckets classifier pick shovel and pry-bar and poke around the bench over yonder, There should be some good gold tucked up in the rocks that was where the river ran a while back it will take some digging, but I figure we can pull probably two or three ounces if we find what I suspect up there." Greg said taking a pull from his can, Becka almost dropped hers.

"Ounces!?" she exclaimed. As the unopened can settled between her thighs.

"Oh, probably, should be some good chunky gold tucked up in the boulder field that bench has been dry for fifty or maybe a hundred years, if you know where the drift of the river was then you can get a good idea of what you might find. Gold flows every year. Constantly moving in the high water from the spring floods which is why it is sometimes called flood gold. But there are some good size rocks on that bench meaning it's a natural drop point for gold. It will take some work, but I think it will be more than worth putting the effort in... you up for a treasure hunt?"

Becka retrieved her can nestled between her thighs and popped the top taking a long pull. "Oh hell yeah, I can't believe I never considered doing something like this... gods, I am such a city girl." the Badger chuckled shaking her head "Thanks for the Beer, it's a perfect finish for those fish. I guess things move at a slower pace out here." Becka observed.

Greg nodded. "Yup, out here I tend to move more at nature's pace, no reason to beat yourself up, the gold is here, it has been patiently waiting for us to come find it, if not today, then probably tomorrow. If we keep at it we will bring it home. So why not enjoy yourself?" The Possum asked

"That makes a lot of sense. Ya know, back in the warehouse it was move move move eight to ten hours a day, five days a week. I like moving more at nature's pace." Becka sighed in contentment sipping her beer and enjoying her place in the movement of nature.

"Okay, now we will do a quick Clean-out of the sluice, bring that blue bucket over here will ya Becka?" Greg asked as she held the bucket steady.

"Try and lift the sluice evenly out of the water as you wouldn't want ta lose anything out the ends then ya set the back end in the bucket and bring the other end up and in it goes, then wash it out with the gold pan two minutes and you are ready to go."

"wow, that's quick." the Badger said looking in the bucket at the surprisingly small amount of concentrates from ten buckets of material equaling maybe a third of a bucket?

"not much to show for ten buckets of classified material." the badger commented

"True, but it is the important stuff from all those buckets, that is where we will find our gold." Greg said pouring off the excess water and taking the blue cons bucket back to camp, not bad for a few hours work, they could pan it out in the evening or process it back in the garage back home, but right now he wanted to take a crack at that bench to see what was to be found under the boulder field.

Back in camp Greg stopped at the car setting the cons bucket in the back.

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