Gold
A Life with Gold
I had the most amazingly happy childhood. Not for me hours in front of television and computer screens, but rather building tree-houses, dens and cooking over open wood fires. Many people seem to have had dull childhoods, mine was absolutely fantastic.
My childhood memories are mostly of thrilling travel: deserts, mountains, rivers, wild people and camping in some really remote places. Gold was the theme through all of this. I was born in a wonderful little cottage in the heart of Rendlesham Forest, Suffolk. We then moved to southern Scotland and lived in a farmhouse on a windy hillside - I think this toughened me up and gave me a great love of the outdoors.
The wonderful thing about having gold as a major theme and thread throughout my life is the people and places. At only four years old I learned how to pan for gold, either for natural gold in streams and rivers or at the extremely colourful world goldpanning competitions. In 2007 I was selected to be a member of the five-person British Goldpanning Team competing at the World Championships in Dawson City, Canada. The team won, and I am so proud to have a world gold medal.
Most people are interested in gold and because of this the media often picks up on gold stories. I have probably done a couple of dozen television, radio and magazine pieces. The biggest recent story was about how my husband and I prospected for the gold for our wedding rings, and then helped to make them. The story was picked up by several newspapers, Radio 2 and Radio 4, and was published in European newspapers. Because of this long experience I'm very comfortable in front of the television camera: in fact, one of the best things ever was to do seven minutes on the Richard and Judy show.
The most exciting thing that I'm currently doing is diving for treasure on a shipwreck! My father's interests have moved from simply hunting for gold in rivers to hunting for sunken treasure. I have joined him each summer for the last six years as one of his team of divers. I am a fully qualified sub-aqua diver, and this combined with my understanding of gold deposition makes me one of my father’s most useful divers. Diving for shipwrecked treasure has to be one of the most thrilling and exhilarating life experiences that a girl could have!