Speaking of Gold

We're still in Ross - that thriving little rural community on the West Coast. Ross started life as a gold town as mentioned in my last post, died a natural death and good folk like my father in law took over as the town's biggest employer for many years.
Now the town is in decline and once again gold is the mainstay. The town used to boast two excellent walkways - one still exists, but the other, which lead up this dam (see image) was destroyed over recent years in the pursuit of that gold, now using modern methods. The old dam was built by the early prospectors and fed the many sluice operations at the time. It is now nigh on impossible to get to this dam - the track is long gone or overgrown, the gorse is thick in the new tailings. The owner of the current mining operation tells us there is still $2,000,000,000 (read two billion) worth of gold under the town!!
Small fry I guess when you think of what it is going to cost to rebuild Christchurch. Or was that the whisky talking??