I woke up at 8 in the morning with a wonderful 9 hours sleep. I did my daily chores in the morning. After I completed those chores, we got into the van and took off to Coloma, Ca. The ride to Coloma was 2 and half hour drive. The group just relaxed and took a nap on the way. While driving, we all got thirsty and restless, so we stopped at Starbucks. Next to Starbucks, the plaza had Taco Bell, so I went over and had a quick snack for my stomach. Then I walked to Starbucks and got my Ice Tea Lemonade with green tea. It was delish. While Charise was driving, we noticed that the landscape was getting more and more flat because we were entering a desert area. We arrived at Marshall Gold Discovery State Historical Park. Once we stepped outside of our van, it was like a volcano hit us, it was so hot that Angelina had sunburn in 10 minutes.

We walked around and learned how the Gold Rush was started and found out that it was started by James Marshall in 1848. Reading and seeing all the facts was so interesting. One thing did really hit us was that before the Gold Rush was started by James Marshall working at a saw mill, digging in the river, and accidentally found gold. That was how California was founded in 1849. I was just so fascinated with the history and actually have the chance to see the site with my own eyes. Nancy was so happy to see the real site with her eyes because she’s a history teacher for 30 years and she always teaches the Gold Rush. She has been to California so many times and never had the chance to see the Gold Rush. It was so nice to see Nancy have a glow on her face.

Then we walked to the Blacksmith area and there was one man who was demonstrating how to make an S hook from an iron stick. It was awesome to see the process and how they can move the metal. After the man made the S, he actually gave it to us for a souvenir, which was really nice. Also, it was fascinating how the metal will heat up and the men will turn the iron and make it decorative. They made horseshoes, candle stick holder, forks, shovel and much more. I was thinking in the back of my mind, I can’t imagine how hard it would be a man to work as a blacksmith in the hot sun outside while it was so busy because of the Gold Rush. Those men must have had lots of patience to make tools to dig for gold.

After visiting blacksmith, we walked down the trail and happened that Anne wanted to touch the American River. We all agreed and walked down to the river and when we touched it, it was so cold that we all were cooled off. Nancy was so happy to touch the river then she mentioned getting a rock for Barbara French because she admits to save rocks from every river that she touches. So what happened, we got a rock for her. Then we just played around the river and Mike started throwing rocks across the river and all of a sudden, Mike accidentally threw a rock across the river and hit a bird. We all just laughed so hard that we had stomach cramps. It was a good time to see everyone to be relaxed and just be ourselves.

After we finished our walk and sightseeing, we walked to the Gold Panning section in the park and that is when we went panning for gold. It was awesome. It was so cool to see how you can find gold with the sand in the water. All six of us including Anne were so excited to get our gold and gems. While we were panning, we had a hard time to tell which was real gold or fake gold because there was some fake gold in the sand. The difference is the fake gold is very shiny and real gold will be full plain yellow looking. It was a challenge but I happen to get nine real gold and three gems. We all had a good time to find our gold. We also found out that if you had one ounce of gold is equal to $689. Everything was so cool!

When we finished our gold panning, we walked more and happened that we walked into a Chinese area and Kangni was so happy. She interpreted Chinese to English for us because we didn’t know Chinese words and Kangni knew them. It was awesome to see someone have a second language for themselves because that is how you learn from each other. It was a good experience.

Today was good to learn the California history and how Gold Rush was started. I love to see everyone express their curiosity about the history that we all learn. I’m glad we had the opportunity to see that.