Original subtitles

You ready, Jamey?

Oh, we have a tremendous case of gold fever.

It's bad.

[Christine] Gold is at the highest price it's ever been.

And so it's an absolute real reason to be out here.

Gold fever is a real thing.

[Jamey] Hold on, Christine.

Something's going on with the water.

Okay. Copy.

[Jamey] Freddy, Juan,

we really, really could use your help.

With every fix that we come up with,

it creates three more problems.

We should have left the plant the way it was.

Each season in passing, it's getting worse.

If we can't increase our gold recovery,

make this work this year,

then I think we're done.

-This will be it. -This will be it.

[narrator] Freddy Dodge...

I'd rather have gold in the bank than gold in the mountain.

[narrator] ...and Juan Ibarra...

Not bad for building a field.

[narrator] ...want to make you rich.

It turns your dream out here into reality.

[all laughing]

[narrator] In the past five years,

the value of gold has doubled.

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

-[narrator] But rookie miners... -[man] Whoa, whoa, whoa.

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

If we don't recover more gold,

than we could lose everything.

[narrator] But there is hope...

Miracles, they do happen.

[narrator] ...to turn desperation into fortune.

Freddy and Juan have one week...

What you just did is genius.

[narrator] ...to deliver a golden payday.

They have a future and they know what they need to do.

-[Freddy] I'll take a fudge nut parfait. -[man] All right.

[Juan] Uh, let me do a brownie delight.

Good call on the ice-cream, Freddy.

[Freddy] It's melting quick, Juan.

[Juan] Look at that view, Freddy.

-[Freddy] That's pretty, huh? -[Juan] Yeah.

We gotta be really close to the Grand Canyon from here, huh, Fred?

The old timers set up...

so there's definitely gold here.

Do you know when the first prospectors got in here?

The old, old timers was 1880s.

-[Juan] That's cool. Well, should we go see the girls? -Let's do it.

[narrator] Freddy and Juan

are en route to Chicks with Picks claim

owned by Jamey D'anna and Christine Crnek,

who in the last two years

have spent thousands of dollars

on their new wash plant,

to turn their hobby mine

into a professional operation.

The hostile desert conditions and lack of water

slowed down the first wave of stampeders in the 1880s.

But those who were hardy enough

recovered over $13,000 ounces of gold

worth nearly $30 million

in today's money.

Now, with gold at a staggering $2,300 an ounce,

Freddy and Juan have one week

to decode this operation and turn it around.

-[Juan] Hello. -Hello.

-[Freddy] Hi, ladies. How you doin'? -Welcome, gentlemen.

-Hi there. -Good.

-Juan. -Christine.

[Freddy] Nice to meet you, Jamey.

Well, let me ask you ladies a question.

What got you into gold mining?

-Basically, since COVID. -COVID started everything.

Yeah.

I am a hairdresser for about 20 years.

When COVID hit,

with the, you know, mandated shutdowns,

we were part of it.

[Christine] Jamey's business shutdown.

Mine was doing nothing, you know.

and we said we need to get outside.

[Jamey] Christine's father,

he's had this property

for over 30 years.

He started talking about gold.

[Christine] He was considering selling it.

And we said, "Wait a minute."

And when we really found out

how much gold is out here,

we decided that we wanted to purchase it all.

The idea of a treasure hunt, to me,

it was, like, "Oh, yes. Let's do this."

[Christine] We knew right there we had gold fever.

This is the place we wanna be.

We wanna mine gold.

So we said, we're gonna give it a go.

We both have enough experience

in business and production

and figuring things out. We're girl MacGyvers.

[narrator] With gold fever set in,

they invested in a professional set up.

[narrator] But then, life threw them another challenge.

Two years ago, I got diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis.

And sometimes,

it cripples me to the point where I can't get out of the bed in the morning.

[narrator] Rheumatoid arthritis or RA

is a degenerative autoimmune disease

that attacks the joints.

[Jamey] Christine tries to muscle through

and lot of times people don't even realize

she is as sick as she is.

You know...

[Jamey] It's just really sad

to watch her suffer.

To see Freddy and Juan here,

it feels like the cavalry is here.

There's hope that we can turn this around

because I can't do it on my own.

I just-- I can't.

Unfortunately, I ought to take a medicine twice a month

that is thousands of dollars.

And we really need help to find more gold

to get stuff taken care of.

Because, you know, it's stressful.

-[Jamey] Absolutely. -I can see that.

It makes it very hard for her, physically,

so to help alleviate some of that manual labor,

-that would be fantastic. -[Juan] Understood.

Now, how long have you guys been running this year so far?

Uh, we've been out here, what, like, uh...

-In the March. -...eight weeks.

-Yeah. -Between eight to ten weeks.

So little two and half months.

So what kind of money you have invested into this?

-It's about $150,000. -Okay.

This is the type of gold that we have here.

[Freddy] That's some pretty gold.

They're mainly finds, huh?

Yes. Our first season was pretty decent.

Especially, being the first season.

-[Freddy] How many ounces did you do? -We did ten ounces.

[Juan] Okay, it's not bad.

[Jamey] The second season wasn't as good.

Uh, we did about five ounces.

And this year, we've barely done over an ounce.

Really?

What's your goal for this year?

[Christine] We'd love to be at 50 ounces this year.

This is the goal that we wanna be able to run at.

[Freddy] And that's before summer runs you out?

[Christine] That's what we're shooting for.

So you've got about 50 days left then.

-[Christine] Yep, absolutely. -[Jamey] Yes.

[narrator] Arizona season runs

from October through to June

as monsoons and extreme heat

make summer mining impossible.

[Freddy] It takes a special breed of person to be out here in the desert.

Christine and Jamey,

they've worked their butts off to do what they've done here

in the time they've done it.

But at the same time,

these ladies did ten ounces the first year.

And now they've got a target goal of 50 ounces.

So whether that can be done or not, I don't know.

So, uh, tell us about the plan.

[Christine] All right. Right this way.

That's the funky gold machina.

-[all laughing] -From Canada.

[narrator] Jamey and Christine

have invested $30,000

in a water running trommel.

Adding their own bush fixes

to try and increase efficiency.

[Christine] So the mining standard

out in this area

is typically dry washing.

Uh, because of the lack of water,

um, and having to have it trucked in.

But we have found that with the type of pay dirt that we have,

it really is more beneficial

to use water as opposed to dry washing.

That's a good thing if you know what your ground is.

That determines what you need for wash plant, right?

-Right. -So you guys made a good decision there.

[Christine] Okay, good. Thank you for that.

Well, are you ready to do a test run, ladies?

[both] Let's do it.

-[Freddy] Fire it up. -[machine whirring]

Here we go.

First bucket going in.

-Four-hour run, right? -Yeah.

Okay.

[narrator] Pay dirt in Jamey and Christine's wash plant

is fed through a four-foot hopper

into a double trommel called reverse helix.

Rocks are washed in the inner drum

known as a scrubber and discarded from the back

while finer pay dirt

drops into the outer drum.

Here, corkscrew ripples push

heavy gold-bearing material

back into the sluices.

To conserve water,

the entire system is on a closed circuit

with waste water returning to the pond

to be pumped back to the plant.

[Juan] That helix trommels,

if you look at all that materials bouncing right pass the spray bar.

-[Freddy] Yeah. -[Juan] Lot of material

that should've cleaned and being sluiced

and it's coming right at the end of the trommel.

That's how it marches out of the spray bar.

[Juan] I just wanna look at it

and see how much of the finds we're missing.

Uh-oh.

Juan's over there checking our tailings.

I'm seein' him panning.

[Juan] So look at all those finds right there?

Almost every bit of that should have been sluiced.

So I'm gonna pan that real quick to see if there's any color in it.

[narrator] If the plant isn't washing this gold-rich dirt off the rocks

and into the sluice box,

Christine and Jamey are losing gold.

One sizeable piece.

So, you know, that doesn't seem like a whole lot,

but over a full day running,

and that could be 20, 30 pieces,

so it adds up quick.

Oh, I'm sure that they're looking at the lack of the water flow

to keep everything running.

[Freddy] The problem is,

they got a three-inch pump, three-inch line,

and it's going into a two-inch square tube

-to feed everything. -[Juan] They're restricting it right there

-at the beginning. -[Freddy] Yeah.

[narrator] Jamey and Christine

have fitted a narrow pipe to their trommel

as a bush fix.

So it uses less water.

[Freddy] Jamey's up there having with the hoe all the time.

And then we've got the material coming down here.

Manual labor to get it down.

[narrator] But by using less water,

they need to rely on friend Greg

to help keep the plant running.

It's a lot of hard work. [laughs]

But, um, yeah, these girls, I love 'em.

When we have a plant like this,

you should be able to run it with this one person.

So it's a very labor-intensive plant.

-There it is. -[Freddy] Last bucket.

-Hey, Christine, last bucket. -Okay.

[Christine] Well, it is what it is. We'll see.

[Jamey] I'm gonna shred the trommel.

You go ahead and shred the water.

Ladies, if you wanna get it cleaned up.

-Okay. Sounds good. Thank you. -Sounds good. All right.

[Jamey] I saw a lot...

[laughing]...of head nodding

that, you know, like,

-mmm, I don't know about this. -[Christine] I'm not sure about this. That's right.

[Jamey] A lot of eye contact between the two of them.

So it's a little unsettling because it's not an eye contact,

like, way to go.

-Hey, yeah, you're doing great. -You're killin' it.

[Christine] We're just not the give up kind of people.

You know, we wanna push forward.

And make people see that this industry can be

handled by anybody.

[Freddy] Well, here's to see how much gold is in it, Juan.

[Juan] Yeah.

-[narrator] In northern Arizona... -Hi, ladies.

-Hello. -Hi.

[narrator] ...female miners Jamey and Christine

have the gold ready to weigh from their first test run.

[Freddy] Weight it up, Juan.

[Juan] Quick question. What's that scale about?

My dad...

he gave this to us.

He said, "I want you to use this scale to weigh your first 100 ounces."

-[Juan] That's cool. -Yeah.

[narrator] Christine's dad, Bill,

began hobby dry washing

on the claim in the '90s.

[Christine] When we told my dad

that we're interested in being out here,

as soon as he saw the operation,

it warmed my heart that he could believe in us

that we would be able to do this.

My dad passed away about five months ago.

We just wanna continue this legacy

to be in the family for years to come.

It's near and dear to me.

-It really is. -Yeah,

-that's a little balance. -[Christine] Yes.

[Freddy] Well, moment of truth, guys.

-[Christine] All right, there we go. -[Jamey] Moment of truth.

[narrator] To hit their season goal of 50 ounces

and cover mining and medical expenses,

this weigh needs to deliver half an ounce of gold

from the four-hour test.

Well, we're little over tenth of an ounce.

0.29, 0.30.

-[Juan] 0.31. -So, 0.31.

Yup.

Almost a third of an ounce.

[Christine] Yeah.

Getting a third of an ounce in four hours,

it's decent, but it's not where you need to be.

[Freddy] For you guys to hit your goal,

you're gonna have to just about double what you got there.

-Yes. -Yes.

Juan and myself, we'll put our heads together and try to figure out

some ways to make your plant more efficient.

We would really appreciate that.

Here's your gold.

-Okay. Thank you. -Thank you so much.

-We appreciate it. -[Freddy] See you guys soon.

-[Christine] Thank you, guys. -[Jamey] Thank you.

All right.

You could only go for so long

investing more money,

more time, more labor,

you know, not paying the bills.

[Jamey] We really, really need to turn this thing around.

[Freddy] They are a pleasure to work with.

They both work really hard.

They're passionate about what they're doing.

But, uh, that plant

is a bottleneck attached to another bottleneck

attached to another bottleneck.

The moment they fired it up,

I'm like, they're dead in the water.

'Cause they don't have enough water.

So that's one of main goals.

There's a laundry list of things we can do there, Freddy.

But I think we need to focus on what's gonna give 'em the--

-Biggest bang for the buck. -Yeah.

Yep, no, I agree.

-So let's focus on water system. -Water system.

-Hopper. -Hopper.

Sluice box.

[Freddy] Raise the hopper. Fix the water.

Get 'em manifolds in there,

so they get the proper water into the plant.

All right. Well, I like that.

Let's do it.

We got our work cut out for us, that's for sure.

[narrator] To reduce the pay dirt build up,

at the front end of the trommel,

Freddy and Juan will modify

the four-foot long hopper

with adjustable legs

as well as adding an additional spray bar

so the pay can self-feed into the trommel.

Christine and Jamey

have inadvertently starved the plant of water.

Freddy will increase the supply

by building a distribution box

known as a manifold.

This will produce pressurized water

for the new spray bar and the hopper

and feed a spraying crosspiece

in the inner drum of the trommel.

Finally, Juan will replace

Jamey and Christine's makeshift sluice,

upgrading to a custom-built one

with carpet and riffles

to improve gold recovery.

I'm really hoping that that 50 ounces is not a pipe dream.

That's a huge hill to climb.

Yeah, I would agree with you, Juan.

-Hey, ladies. How we doin'? -[both] Hi.

Good.

[Juan] So, we, uh, we kinda sat down, and figured out

-a gameplan for you. -[Christine] Okay.

What we're looking at is that you don't have enough water

-to run the sluices that you have. -[Jamey] Okay.

And without that, your riffles are packing up

which doesn't allow

the gold to find a home for itself, right?

-[Christine] Absolutely. -So we're gonna work on the water system.

[Juan] We can see it's been messed with.

It goes from a three-inch lay flat to a two-inch square.

-So you're restricting it right there. -[laughing]

[Juan] Right off the get go.

So what Freddy wants to do,

he wants to go in there and actually build you a manifold

where you have valves to be able to turn on and off

-and adjust to pour water. -[Freddy] Get you some more water.

Oh, wow, okay.

[Juan] And we're gonna build you a new spray bar for the top of your hopper

to eliminate, you know, you from being up there,

raking all day long.

On top of that, we wanna focus on your recovery as well.

You know, the sluice box, it's basically a highbanker box.

[Freddy] It is what it is, a hobby box.

So we can build you a new sluice.

So we can actually get you closer to that 50-ounce gold that you need.

Okay, that sounds amazing.

But one of our big goals here,

is we need to find a new role

for you, Christine, on this mine,

-that does not involve a ton of manual labor. -[Christine] Okay.

[Freddy] Which is why I'm gonna take you prospecting

and see, uh...

what we can find for better ground.

-[Christine] Wow. Okay. -[Jamey] That's great.

[Juan] So between all of that,

we kinda sat down and figured about $2,000 material

that we're gonna have to get.

Right.

If we get you your double,

then you pay just material.

We're not charging you any labor.

Just strictly material.

Uh, if we don't get you double,

no charge.

-Even for the material. -Yeah.

That's generous That's fantastic.

[Freddy] We know you guys are in a tough spot here.

With the medication that you need,

it's a big financial strain on you guys.

So we're happy to do it.

-That's great. Wow. -Okay, yeah.

-That sounds wonderful. -[Christine] Yes.

I could throw in a haircut.

[laughs] I don't really need one.

-I could definitely throw in a haircut. -I have little left.

[all laughing]

[Juan] Well, the ladies are good with it. We're good with it.

We'll get to work.

-All right. -[Juan] All right, ladies. Let's start.

[Christine] Thank you. Thank you.

[Jamey] I had myself emotionally prepared

for them to say

go back to cutting hair, just...

make your life easy,

and, you know. And so for it to be quite the opposite,

it is, yeah, a gamechanger.

[narrator] While Juan preps the steel for the new sluice box...

[Juan] Perfect.

[narrator] Freddy's first job is to get more water into the plant.

[Freddy] One of the biggest issues

Juan and myself have seen

when they were running is water issues.

They don't have enough water.

The problem is, we've got a bottleneck right here.

We've got a three-inch hose

going into a piece of two-inch square tube.

So it's just choking it.

We're gonna try to straighten that out.

This square tube here is gonna be our new manifold.

We'll have this welded on the end of the square tube.

For it to come in with water here,

I'm gonna cut and weld fittings on top of it here.

[narrator] Freddy's manifold has a large three-inch inlet

to increase water pressure.

A number of outlets then wrench from the central tube

to evenly distribute water around the plant.

It's a system that should increase water volume

by over 30 percent

and get more yards of pay dirt through the plant.

-[Freddy] So, just give me a hand to mount it here. -Okay. Absolutely.

[Freddy] Getting it tracked on.

Hopefully, these fixes Juan and myself are doing are going

to eliminate a bunch of your labor.

-[Jamey] Especially for Christine... -[Freddy] Yeah.

[Jamey]...it's greatly appreciated

and greatly needed.

Thank you, lady.

These ladies need to be able to run this plant

without as much physical labor as they're doing,

especially Christine.

So a big part of this fix is gonna be

finding her a role

where she's not hurting herself

on a daily basis,

and they don't have to bring extra help in.

So that's gonna be a tough one,

but I think it can be done.

[western instrumental music playing]

[narrator] Morning on the Chicks with Picks mine.

And with just 72 hours left on the build,

Christine struggles with her condition.

[Jamey] I think we're just to a point

of where you know you just can't...

-Right. -...push your body like that.

I think it's a great opportunity

with Freddy and Juan being here

to dive into more of the...

-Prospecting aspect. -...the prospecting.

Right. And I can spearhead

the more intense physical side of it.

I can be the Watson to Detective Dodge.

Well, cheers to that.

I don't know if he's going to buy it,

but I say go for it.

Time to get to work.

-[Jamey] Okay, well, let's go get it. -[Christine] See you in a bit.

All right.

I feel sad that I cannot do what I used to be able to do.

But I really don't like to dwell on it.

I'm about getting up, being as positive as I can.

So with prospecting and research,

there are so many things that I can do

in the operation for our team.

[instrumental music playing]

So what I'm doing here is

I'm getting the sides of the new sluice box

tacked in place.

[narrator] Juan's new sluice box will replace

the old clogging sluice

with an expanded steel riffle system

to suck down heavy gold into the mats.

Hey, Jamey, you want to give me a hand?

[Jamey] Yeah, absolutely! I'd love to.

[Juan] Put this on first,

-and then you can put the gloves on. -[Jamey] Okay.

[chuckling] Wow, look at that.

[Juan] Haha. [chuckles]

You know, just by wearing that shirt

makes you 20% a better welder.

-I'm in. -[both laugh]

[Juan] With Christine in her situation, you know,

you're doing a lot more of it yourself.

-Yes. -You know, one thing Freddy and I always say,

if you don't have a welder,

fabricator and a mechanic on site,

you don't have a mine site.

I would agree.

[Juan] You're going to strike it

-like it's a match, right? Real slow. -Okay.

[Juan] I'll pull back, get a little puddle,

then I'll push back into the puddle,

-come back, get a little puddle going. -Okay.

[Juan] So you're just stacking.

-What you're doing is what you're stacking. -Okay. Okay.

-[Jamey] Like that? -Yeah.

[Juan] Get a little closer. Get a little closer.

Get closer.

There you go. Okay. Pull back.

Pull back. Pull back. Stop.

So look at it right now,

-you see how hot that metal is? -Oh, yeah, yeah, okay.

-[Juan] So you're long arcing it. -Okay.

The further you get away,

the further that arc has to jump

and it'll actually start dissipating that heat

-amongst, you know, both pieces of steel... -Okay.

...and actually gets hotter.

-Okay, I see what you're saying. -So-- So--

So you need to constantly keep

your rod about that distance right there.

Right, okay, I gotcha.

[tense music playing]

[Juan] Don't worry. After we're done with this,

you can teach me how to give a haircut.

[Jamey chuckles]

All right. I'm in.

[Juan] A little slower.

Perfect.

That was good. That was all you.

That looks good.

[Jamey] You're a great coach.

Thank you so much.

With everything that has happened with Christine,

I am willing to step up and give 1,000%

and make this a successful operation.

[Freddy] Let's walk down here.

[narrator] On the other side of the claim...

This is actually the most important thing.

You can have the best wash plant

in the world,

but if you don't have the gold in the ground

or if you're digging in the wrong spot,

you know, you ain't going to make it.

[Christine] Right.

[narrator] ...Freddy teaches Christine

her new prospecting role on the mine.

[Christine] It's just really valuable

for me to go out with Freddy

and have him teach me these things directly

so I can, you know, be a bigger part

of that part of our operation.

So that building up there is the old part of King Tut.

[Freddy] Okay.

[narrator] The King Tut mine sits alongside

a string of hard rock claims

and was discovered in the 1930s

by female ranch owner Ollie Duncan.

The mine was soon bringing in

hundreds of ounces of gold a week.

[Freddy] You're right kind of in the outwash of these mines.

Gravity works.

So when mountains erode,

gold and gravel and rocks,

-they all go downhill. -Okay.

So that's the source for all the gold

-in these gullies. -Oh, yeah, I see.

[Freddy] Let's put our detective hats on here.

[narrator] If Christine and Freddy can find

the stream beds or washes

that run from the hard rock mines,

they should find the gold.

[Freddy] This drainage here,

this drainage here,

about one, two, three total drainages.

We got these,

you know, these streams coming together up top.

We've got a stream going into that side.

-[Christine] Right. -Right? Another one.

[Christine] These two washes--

[Freddy] And then these two come together right here.

[Christine] Right.

So, we got double the amount of reworked material here.

-Okay. -We're talking nature's sluice box.

So, in theory, this should be the best gold right here

under my feet.

[Christine] That's pretty amazing.

[narrator] But to get a true test on the ground,

they call in the cavalry.

[Freddy] That'll work. Get over a little bit.

It'll give us an overall look of the material

from the top down to the bottom.

[Jamey] Sorry, you guys, you getting dusted out.

[Freddy] So if you dig into tailings, what is it?

-It's soft, right? -[Christine] Right.

[Freddy] Everything's haphazard in the tailings.

You can see that bottom layer?

[Jamey] Yes, I can.

[Freddy] See the coarser rocks in it

-down there? -[Jamey] Yes.

-[Freddy] You see how hard that is? -[Jamey] Uh-huh.

[Freddy] Right?

-That means it's virgin. -[Jamey] Right.

[Freddy] That should be your best gold.

[narrator] Virgin means never before mined ground,

a miner's holy grail.

Well, let's see what kind of gold, if any,

lives in this, huh?

[Christine] It's going to be a deciding factor

for our future.

Come on, lady, show up.

-[Freddy] Moment of truth, huh? -Right?

[Freddy] Look at that, guys.

Holy cow.

[dramatic music playing]

[Freddy] So we've got

now, one, two, three...

[narrator] In Arizona...

[Freddy]...seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven...

[narrator] ...the verdict is delivered

on Freddy's newly-prospected ground.

Just 200 yards from Christine and Jamey's current cut.

There's 21 colors in the pan.

-[Christine clapping] Yeah! Look at that. -[Freddy chuckles]

[Freddy] We know there's good color here.

There's gold here for sure.

[choked up] Finally, somebody has,

I guess, verified that we are seeing what we're seeing.

We're not making this up.

I'm not out of my mind.

It wasn't too many years in the salon sniffing fumes.

[Christine laughs]

You're not crazy, that's for sure.

[Jamey] Thank you.

I appreciate that.

[Freddy] Well, let me rephrase.

You're not bat[bleep] crazy.

-Just a little crazy. -Just crazy enough to still be fun.

Well, it's pretty exciting finding some good color

fairly close to their plant.

It's farther than they're digging now,

but it's manageable, right?

Let's dig some of this up

and run it through the plant for the second test.

-[Christine] All right. -[Jamey] Sounds good.

[Christine] For him to teach us

how to identify the virgin ground,

that was all so valuable, really.

-Yes. -I mean,

we're going to look at prospecting way differently

-into the future. -Yes.

[instrumental music playing]

Hola.

[Juan] Looking good, my friend.

[Freddy] That's a nice-looking sluice box, Juan.

[Juan] Thanks, Freddy.

[narrator] With just 48 hours left on the build...

Fingers and toes.

[narrator] ...Juan's new sluice box is

ready to be fixed to the plant.

[Freddy] Right now, we've got a lot of stuff to get done

and not a lot of time left to do it in.

All we do now is just keep plugging away.

Huh? You got it, Jamey?

[Freddy] How we looking there?

[Jamey] Perfect.

[narrator] And with it, another master class

from Professor Dodge.

We're going to have just this indoor-outdoor carpet

under these light riffles.

[Jamey] Okay.

[Freddy] It works better than the miner's moss.

[narrator] Artificial turf is followed by expanded metal,

which creates a vortex in water

that pulls down the heavy gold.

So we'll put our middle wedges in first.

[Jamey] Okay.

[Freddy] We want those riffles tight into that carpet.

If not, that water will get under those riffles,

and it can help carry gold right out of the box.

[Jamey] Okay.

[Freddy] Another good thing about wood,

-when the wood gets wet, it even makes it tighter. -Okay.

It's like hydraulics in the wood.

Natural hydraulics, right?

This sluice box is ready to roll.

[Jamey] This really is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity

to work with Freddy and Juan,

building the sluices.

It's something that, you know,

you just can't put a price tag on it.

-[Freddy] We're running out of time... -Yeah.

...so we've got to just do whatever is right,

-but do it quick. Yeah. -As quick as we can now.

Playtime is over, Fred.

[bleep] gotten real.

[Freddy] We're going to bolt the spray bar down

on top of this,

hook a new water system up to it,

and get a heck of a lot more water

on those rocks.

Get the gold in the sluice box,

not in the tailings pile.

Eyeballs!

[narrator] As Freddy starts on the spray bars...

[Freddy] It's all hands on deck now.

[narrator] ...Juan gets to work

on making the 400-pound hopper adjustable...

[Juan] We put this pin in.

...and installs it with mine helper, Greg.

[Juan] We made a bunch of holes in the legs,

so that way when we get it adjusted to where we want it,

we can pin it, and then we're ready to go.

[narrator] To prevent pay dirt clogging at the top

and speed up the plant,

Juan raises the angle of the hopper

by modifying a set of adjustable trailer jacks.

[Juan] We got this trailer jack,

you're able to crank it here,

get the pressure off these pins

you can see right there.

Then what I can do is pull the pins out,

crank it to where I want it,

get the pitch that I need on the hopper,

re-pin it,

you got an adjustable hopper there.

[Greg] Trailer jacks, how simple.

Working his magic one more time.

[Freddy] Let's hook this hose up.

[Jamey] There we go.

-[Freddy] Oh! Perfect. -Too much?

-[Freddy] I like it. -All right.

-You like it? -I do.

Oh, their ideas are coming to shape,

and things are coming together.

Wow, it's just so amazing

to see the differences so far.

Well, ladies, water's hooked up,

piping going to everything.

So I guess,

tomorrow morning...

-Yeah. -...we do a four-hour test run, huh?

-[Christine] Yeah. -[Jamey] Sounds good. Yeah.

-[Freddy] See you in the morning. -[Jamey] All right.

[Juan] Well, the proof's going to be in the pudding, Freddy.

You know, for this test run,

we're going to have to be at least half an ounce or better.

For them to meet their goal

-of an ounce a day. -Yeah.

I guess time will tell. Let's run the plant.

Let's do 'er.

[motor starts]

Mount up!

-[Freddy] Are we ready? -[Jamey] Yeah, we're ready.

Let's do this, guys.

-[Juan] Perfect. -[Freddy] Let's make it happen.

[tense music playing]

Let 'er rip!

[Christine] It's all come to a head,

and this is the moment of truth.

I'm nervous.

I'm legitimately nervous.

-[Freddy] First bucket! -First bucket, Fred.

[Christine] Let's see if this machine is

going to pump out some gold.

This is the first female duo we've ever had,

so we want to cut them out a little sign for their plant.

The name of the mine is Chicks with Picks,

so I'm doing two picks representing the two chicks.

I got all the letters cut out, and I got the picks cut out.

So now we're just going to cut the frame out.

-Hello, ladies. -[Jamey] Hi, guys.

-Freddy and I kind of had an idea. -[Jamey] Oh, wow!

[Christine] Wow! [chuckles]

[Jamey] That is fantastic.

[Christine] Oh, my gosh. That is so cool.

There you go.

[Jamey] Now it's official.

[Christine] Yeah! It is!

[tense music playing]

[Jamey] Perfect.

All right!

[narrator] From the edge of the Grand Canyon,

it's do or die

for female miners, Christine and Jamey.

[Juan] The hopper's doing great, Fred.

That spray bar's doing really good.

And the pitch now, you know,

it's pretty much able to feed on its own.

Yeah, the spray bar system's working great.

[narrator] Instead of needing

to manually rake down the pay dirt,

Juan's ingenious adjustable hopper

and Freddy's spray bar self-feed dirt

into the trommel.

Usually I'm up there raking all the material down,

so I'm almost out of a job.

[narrator] Freddy's manifold pushes more water volume

into the trommel

to spray fine pay dirt into the brand new sluice.

The material's coming out way cleaner.

So this used to be just caked with mud.

So that's awesome.

That sluice box, I felt it. It's good.

-I'm happy with it, Freddy. -I am, too.

[Juan] We got a Ford Pinto,

and we put Ferrari parts on it.

-That's what we did. [chuckles] -[Freddy chuckles]

-[Juan] Right? -You're right.

So who says women can't be gold miners?

Last bucket!

[Christine] Last bucket!

[Christine] Shut it off!

Shut it off!

[Freddy] Thank you!

[Juan] How's it look up there, Fred?

There's so much sand in it that it's hard to see.

See anything in there, Juan?

[Juan] Uh-uh, nothing yet.

I'm not saying that there's nothing there, but...

-What do you think, ladies? -[Juan] Hello, ladies.

-Uh... -Oh. [chuckles nervously]

-That knot is in the middle of my stomach. -Right.

We got a third of an ounce before,

-we need at least a half now. -[Juan] Yeah.

Let's see what it is.

-[Jamey] Oh. -[Christine] Oh, my goodness.

[narrator] Half an ounce in four hours would mean

Jamey and Christine could hit their 50-ounce season goal

and secure their future as full-time miners.

There's a tenth of an ounce.

There's a tenth.

-There's a third of an ounce right there... -[Juan] Right there.

-...so that's how much we did the first cleanup, right? -[Christine] That's good.

-Our goal is a half, right, before? -[Jamey] Yeah.

[Christine] Yes.

Well, there's a half an ounce right there,

-exactly a half an ounce. -[Juan] There's your goal.

-Okay. -[Freddy] There's your goal.

There's still more in there.

[Christine] Keep going, Freddy, keep going.

-[Freddy] Well, there just happens to be... -[Jamey] Wow.

...three quarters of an ounce there.

-Wow. -[all laughing]

Go, Freddy, go!

-[Freddy] Okay. -Oh, my goodness. Wow.

Well, let's keep going here.

There. We're at nine-tenths of an ounce.

-[Jamey] Wow. -[Freddy] Oh, there's 1.17 ounces.

-What? -What?

-[Freddy] In four hours. -Oh, my God, you guys!

What?

1.25.

-It's actually an ounce and a quarter. -[Juan] Ounce and a quarter.

[Christine] Oh, my gosh, you guys.

-And that's no BS. -That's straight up.

-Wow. That's gonna change our lives. -Oh, my gosh, guys.

That's how bad your plant was running.

-[Juan laughing] -[Christine] Right.

Can we stick with the positives?

[all laughing]

[narrator] Over 50 days, Jamey and Christine could make

125 ounces

worth $285,000,

150% more than their goal.

Do you think you guys can make it on that?

-[Christine] I think that would be amazing. -I think we can.

That's a lot of haircuts.

[all laughing]

The fixes have just changed everything.

It has completely opened up

a whole new avenue of possibilities.

[Christine] We're not quitting.

This is go.

We want to be an inspiration for other females

and to show them you can be a miner.

If you put your mind to it, you can do anything.

-[Christine] Wow. -And just think

about how many of these gullies

you guys have, right?

And they're all going to carry gold.

[Juan] But do us a favor. Let us know how it does.

-Yes. -Right.

Well, I guess you guys can actually add that

to your scale there,

-your dad's scale. -[Christine] Oh, happy to do so.

-[Juan] Yeah? -[Christine] Yeah.

Yes. Right?

[Christine] At this point,

I know my dad's proud of us.

I know he's proud of me.

I know that he's down here watching

and looking in the sluice,

hoping there's some big gold nuggets.

-[Freddy] You ladies take care, okay? -[ladies] Thank you.

-Thank you, ladies. Appreciate it. -[Jamey] Thank you so much.

[victorious music playing]

It's a win. Huge win.

[softly] What just happened?

-[chuckles] -Um.

-[Freddy] On to the next one, Juano. -[Juan] Let's go.

[Freddy] These ladies are on a track now

where they can come out here

and they can make a darn good living.

[Jamey] Oh, that's so beautiful.

[Freddy] I was confident

that we could double the amount of gold,

but we way more than doubled it.

We did 400%.

Yeah.

If they want to sell this place, I'll buy it.

Freddy and Juan, we wanted to give you an update.

We have been running for another three weeks,

and we've been getting around that same amount

when you guys were here,

and oh, my gosh, it's made such a huge difference.

We wanted to share this pan for you.

-Oh, yeah. Right? -Oh, my gosh, we are getting consistent running.

We've gotten in three weeks almost 42 ounces,

-which is about $95,000. -Yeah.

-Yep. -Oh, my gosh, right?

This is so exciting.

More than double the goal.

[Jamey] The truth is we're rocking it.

-[Christine] We're so grateful. -Yeah.

[Christine] It's just changed our world.

Chicks with Picks, signing out.

Until the next time.

-Bye. -Bye.