Butch Cassidy Pass / Nevada's Johnnie District

[Dakota Slim]

I'm slowly working my way north to my summer fishing grounds and will be checking out the Johnny District near Pahrump, NV this week. All I have heard about the area so far is that the locals drywash out there but I was surprised to see that the Butch Cassidy Pass is marked on the map near the Johnnie Mine. How could one go by there without having a look?

Has anyone had any luck detecting in this area?

[bsumbdy]

Not sure about the Butch Cassidy pass, but I did find a 4 gram nugget in Johnnie this weekend. Most of the detectable nuggetts are under a bit of overburden. Might try the benches.

Chris

I'll be there this weekend

[nvchris]

I did well detecting this area, not so much Jonnie proper but the south west end of the valley, when I lived in Lost Wages. I preferred it to Gold Basin.

[FlakMagnet]

Hi Slim,

I was up in the Johnnie area about three years ago.

I was struck with a couple of things;

it seemed to be pretty claimed up.

People up at the mine did not seem to take too kindly to people nosing around...

and we actually had a contact up at the old Johnnie mine property which is why we went in the first place.

I hasten to add, I do not think that necessarily is the way it is with everybody around there

these guys who were on the mining property at the time were having problems of some sort when we were there.

The problems may be better now.

We did drive around for a few hours on some of the dirt "roads"

and it did not seem to be the kind of place that you could just jump out and find some gold.

I would be interested in hearing Chris' impressions of the area.

I did not spend enough time to form much more than these fleeting impressions.

and, as I said, it was three years or so ago.

I liked the area, it has it's own character and seems kind of unusual as gold areas go

but I have not had enough time to get back there and learn it.

Good luck.

[Bugler]

Hello Slim,

I had a chance to detect in the Johnny area back in the late 90's and did quite well. There seemed to be nobody around at the time and nothing was claimed up where I was working. I did some detecting both west and east of the highway and found nuggets in both areas. I did my work in the washes and there were signs of very old drywashing. I was not aware of the Cassidy Pass at the time and have not been back to the area since. Good Luck!

Bugler

[Dakota Slim]

Thanks guys. I did a little scouting yesterday and met a nice gal who lives near the Johnnie Mine. Her hubby works a couple of the other local hard rock mines. She showed me a piece of quartz with some nice large gold flakes in it.