29 November 2009

Leader: Tony Gibson

On this medium plus trip, our party of five explored an old goldmining area in another historic Coromandel valley – the Maratoto.  The first discovery of gold in the Maratoto area was made by Richard McBrinn in August 1887 on a tributary of the Maratoto Stream which now bears his name.   

From a small quarry near the road, we followed an overgrown bulldozed track up the east side of McBrinn Stream and after about an hour reached some old mine workings consisting of a partly collapsed and half buried tin hut, a mullock heap and old pipework.  The track continued a little further passing other scattered relics and terminating at an adit which was promptly investigated.  However, we had presumably stumbled across the Walker’s Maratoto workings and not the location Tony had intended.

We backtracked down the valley and picked up another old track which eventually led us up the main stream to some small adits and on to the Maratoto GMC’s pan amalgamation treatment plant, our intended destination, located just below a prominent waterfall.  To our delight much of the machinery installed at the amalgamation plant around 1888/1889 still remains on site, including a steam boiler and McKay amalgamating pans and a separator.  Two of the three steel tanks which have the double winding and locking wheels attached were used for crushing the ore with the crushing plates lowered as required.  The third tank with a number of pipe outlets was used to agitate the finely ground ore.  The higher outlets letting the lighter waste escape while the heavy contents, through the bottom hole, got mixed with the mercury and flowed over the wilfley table.  This plant was originally run by water power only but a steam boiler had to be added as in summer there was a shortage of water.

Again we investigated several adits nearby and, aboveground, skirted several (deep) mine shafts.  One needed to be careful in this area.  Satisfied with our exploration here, we made our way back to the car and decided not to climb the Maratoto “sugar loaf” on this occasion, although Tony did a quick recce to check that the track to it was still able to be followed.

Tony, Bevan and Steve finished off the day with a dip in the Maratoto Stream.  The weather, somewhat gloomy, did not hamper our day’s exploring and we were back in Papakura by 4pm. 

Marlene