"On a February morning back in the mid-1980s, with a bitter east wind slicing down from the ridge, I discovered a man crouched above the ice-rimmed boulders of our hill stream, swirling water in a black wok, Yukon-style, to sort its sands and gravels. He was, indeed, panning for minerals, and, trowelling a sample into a numbered bag, affirmed that the stream was 'quite good on the heavies'."