Robyn and Roy came over for the weekend and we made a little trip into gold country.  Coloma, CA is the site of the Marshall discovery of gold  in 1848. Marshall was the co-owner of the Sutter Mill on the American River. Apparently, one day they needed the trailrace deeper and, after some excavating had been done, Marshall was walking in the trailrace and found the first gold.  And, as they say in this state historic park, the world rushed in.

The flooding rains in February, 2017, caused this fork of the American River to rise until it almost covered the Sutter Mill monument in the last picture.

 The park was well worth visiting for all the information about different ways gold was mined and some of these instruments used to crush stone to harvest the gold.