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Updates From The Corporation and Joey (read from bottom up...most recent at top) Updates - 2007/2008 (2006 updates can be found here) Hello everyone, It has been a while since the last update and basically there has been little change from last time BUT in order to provide further insight into our project and perhaps to give a better understanding of what is going on behind the scenes, Suzanna and I have decided to take a different approach to this update. Mainly, we wanted to be able to give you more information than we have been able to give over the last several months, so we asked Dave, the project owner, if he would update you directly and let you know exactly what was going on. He readily agreed, of course, and we have put together the following questions and Dave has answered them. We also realise that you may have your own questions that you feel need answering and that are not covered by those below, so as long as your question does not jeopardise the integrity or confidentiality of our project then we will send a follow up Q and A to Dave containing questions that come as a result of this update. Thank you, Joey & Suzanna Q. What have you done over the last year to try and raise the necessary funds to restart the project? A. When I first arrived back in Canada after almost 7.5 years in the Philippines, I had anticipated that it would only take a few months to find the additional funds necessary but I had to go to work (construction) and make some money to cover our living expenses. During this time, I sought the necessary capital evenings and weekends, including via a number of personal contacts. While there was initially some interest, most of that interest seemed to come from Europe and we found that a number of potential investors who responded to our Canadian Angel Investment website postings wound up being "scammers" or wanting large sums of "up front" money to find project funding (with no guarantee's of their performance of course). Late in 2007, we had commenced working with gold and mining ore transactions as agent to introduce buyer to seller and vice versa in an effort to generate the necessary funding from commissions generated. While it has taken some time to arrange, we appear to be fairly close to completing a transaction processing high grade precious metal concentrates on behalf of the holder/seller through one of our precious metal refining consultants. Incidentally, the concentrates have an assayed gross value in excess of 500 million US Dollars of which we are due a small 2.5% percentage in commission when the project takes off. In addition, at the present time, we have an offer of 20 tonnes of gold bars for sale to the Royal Canadian Mint through one of the mints approved clients (one of our buyers). This gold is situated in Hong Kong but is owned by a client in the Philippines. The buyer is currently conducting their due-diligence on the metal and if proven, the transaction could commence within several weeks and payment of our commissions would occur about two weeks later. It is anticipated that the gold would be moved to Canada at a rate of 5 tonnes every few weeks. Our share of the commissions amount to about $1.5 million USD which would be adequate to commence repayments to our investors – this will include your group of investors of course, with initial payments being limited to the seed capital loaned or portions thereof – with some of the funds utilized to restart the project. Incidentally, this client has significantly more gold and this is our "test" buy. Q. Is there anything other than the lack of funds stopping us from restarting the Tama project? A. Essentially 'no'. I am prepared to move my family back to the Philippines within 2 to 3 weeks of receipt of funding. It will likely take about 60 days to obtain the necessary permits and make the necessary arrangements as we have had the site cleared up for about a year. Depending on the actual timing of funding and other considerations, such as whether it is the rainy season or not, I would suggest that 120 days (+/- 30days) would be realistic at this time of the year with Christmas coming up. Q. Will the recent global financial market problems affect our project? A. The crisis has certainly made it much more difficult to find the funding we need and has effectively stopped some of the potential "Revenue Streams" we had been pursuing through our contacts in the Philippines and the U.S. Treasury (UST). While not alluded to in the previous questions, one of our closest financial advisors has excellent connections to the upper level UST administration and through our network we had been able to locate some assets the UST had been seeking in the Philippines. The UST almost signed off on these assets and then came the current financial meltdown. Unfortunately, due to the current crisis, the UST is not in a position to redeem the assets and it appears that these efforts shall not generate any of the revenues originally anticipated in the short term. As such, it now may be years rather than months before we can realize funds from this source. On the other hand, the crisis has caused a global shortage of gold which could be of immense benefit for us in that we have direct access to relatively large supplies, providing that we can find the capital necessary to make provisions and show the sellers that we have the financial wherewithal to pay them for their gold after it has been assayed and refined to Good London Delivery (GLD) standards. As such, we have been putting extensive effort into finding investment capital ranging from $350,000 USD up to our self imposed ceiling of $1,550,000 USD, an amount adequate to acquire one 75 kilogram bar (2400 troy ounces) which is valued at over $1,800,000 on the spot market. We can increase the volumes and investment amounts easily with sellers or buyers becoming involved in the organization as noted elsewhere in the Q&A's. Q. Has your commitment or belief in the Tama project ever wavered? A. In reflection, my belief in the Tama project is and has been continually reinforced with each discovery or find we made. All of our years of "on the ground" research before commencing the active recovery and since I returned to Canada last year has served to increase the belief in the project and what is there. I can assure you that we know that there are significantly larger volumes than we have previously indicated (in an attempt to be quite conservative). It is difficult for many people to believe that there is possibly 10 tonnes available. When you have the indications of the sizes of the numerous deposits we have been able to find, coupled with knowledge of how these deposits were placed, and then take into consideration the fact that one tonne of gold in bar form takes up only about two cubic feet of space – the size of an average PC or small conventional TV – the actual numbers are somewhat staggering and would be extremely difficult for most people to believe. The one tunnel itself has deposits every 25 meters over the approximately 1200 meters that we tracked it. These are small deposits of approximately one to two tonnes each and are buried two meters away on the northerly side of the tunnel. Each deposit has a booby trap (bomb) midway between the tunnel and the deposit. These deposits were originally planned to be Phase Three of the recovery project. The three deposits in the southwest corner where we were working were approximately two meters by three meters with the height unknown. The reason for such prolific deposits is that our 'Tama' site was a major Japanese airbase during WW II with three garrisons of troops stationed in the immediate area. The sea port was less than 10 miles away and it was on the west side of the Bay where the Japanese Commanders had their R&R facility and drew lots on who was going to take care of which shiploads of commodity arriving from the other Asian countries. Hence the 'richness' of the site – garrison, airbase, port all in 'one' so to speak and providing the Japanese ease of import and distribution with the army garrisons to provide the necessary security. Yes, there have been some disappointments when the finds were not what we had hoped, such as with the "snake head markers" recovered at approximately 38 feet below the surface. Some types of equipment showed gold indications emanating from these markers and which we had hoped contained gold bars… but didn't. We may now have a more informed indication on these apparently 'wrong' readings. About two weeks ago, while conducting further research on gold and refining metals, I met with another of our consultants and an elderly Engineer in Portland, Oregon whose company builds high tech gold and platinum group metal refining facilities as well as doing a lot of classified nuclear power work for the U.S. Government. This gentleman showed me, through a special microscope, and explained, by various laws of physics (most of which went over my head, I might add), how gold and platinum group metals have numerous forms and can be brought out through special processes, processes unknown to most gold miners and mining engineers. It was also suggested we should build a refining facility at the site to recover the free gold we found in abundance from 10 to 13 feet below the surface, as well as to look very carefully at the black sand for gold and platinum group metals contained therein, whereas we had previously only been looking for gold bars. To describe other scenarios would take a book or two and I simply do not have the time to go into it. But I certainly learned a lot. As for my commitment, there is hardly a day goes by that I do not spend a good portion of it working towards acquiring the financial resources we need to continue the project. We have maintained our residence and storage facility in the Philippines and have retained our Mining Engineer with the crew ready and waiting to go back to work. In addition, while some of the older equipment was disposed of in preparation for the acquisition of newer, modern equipment, the retained equipment has been repaired or upgraded and is ready to go back to work. Obviously, it will now take significantly more capital to restart the project than while we were still operating it. Q. Is there any other reason (apart from the Tama project) for you returning to the Philippines? A. I have been back to the Philippines since bringing my family to Canada in 2007. Our organization developed a network of business representatives in the Philippines who regularly bring potential gold and other commodity transactions to us. There are numerous gold bars available, coming from similar sources as our project, that have been presented for our consideration/purchase and marketing. We are presently trying to arrange adequate funds to acquire an established offshore Foundation and Corporate structure and to be able to acquire a minimum of 12.5 kilograms of gold. The gold is available to us at a substantial discount of 25% of gross which is unheard of in most jurisdictions. The organization being acquired has a well funded bank account and a lengthy history enabling the organization to conduct large financial transactions without undue scrutiny or encountering bank holds or account flagging, tactics employed in the financial services sector particularly after 9/11. This acquisition is only possible as the result of a long term, high level relationship, by our primary financial advisor and business associate, with the government of that country. What is unique about this opportunity is that of the minimum $350,000 USD required to commence this operation only $100,000 would be lent to or invested in the organization while the buyer/investor would become a Working Director of the organization and the acquisition funds would be maintained under their signatory control. The Director's "investment funds" shall be utilized to pay for the gold bullion which shall be transferred directly to the buyers named entity completing the transaction and, if desired, the Directors subsequent resignation simultaneously accepted. Additional acquisitions can be conducted in a similar manner until the buyer has obtained the quantity sought or until the supply is exhausted. By so doing the buyer can promptly achieve their precious metal acquisition requirements at significantly lower costs while legally revealing less information to the multiple financial and government entities encountered in domestic or international transactions. This is an ideal situation for anyone seeking to acquire gold and our organization benefits with increased profits. For the past few years, physical gold has been difficult to acquire and all precious metals are currently getting more and more difficult to obtain in any requested quantity. Many of the usual sources such as refining facilities, mints, producers and other gold sellers are not able to obtain adequate volumes of gold to satisfy the demand of their customer requirements. We have numerous buyers wanting to purchase gold and, at the present time, we are able to obtain in excess of 100 metric tonnes of gold through three different suppliers. In reality, we could conduct at least one transaction per week. Within 8 transactions the transactions would be occurring two times or more each week and enough profits could be generated to increase the acquisition schedule to between 18 and 20 kilograms per transaction. Another 6 to 8 transactions would provide the additional funds required to repay the gold acquisition investor and commence the repayment of our investors in the recovery project as well as provide adequate capital to restart the recovery project. There is a downside to the acquisition of Philippines gold, in that at the present time we are only able to get permits to export about one tonne per month. However, we can sell all the gold available to the Philippine Central Bank through a Philippines based refining facility affiliated with the Swiss refining giant – Metalor. The owner of this facility is a Swiss national and one of our long standing consultants. On any normal day, 7 days a week, I make between 3 and 12 telephone calls to the Philippines with regards to these transactions and the recovery project. I have not stopped my pursuit of funds to complete this project and intend to continue until we are successful. As mentioned, we still maintain our residence close to the project site and hope to be able to complete the purchase of it before the end of the year. My wife is from the Philippines and both my wife and our 7 year old son regularly ask when we can go back, especially as we now have a 'new' baby boy who is now 7 months old and most of our Filipino relatives have never seen the newest addition to the family. Coming back to Canada was kind of a double edged sword for me. While I had originally only planned to be gone for a month, I been away from my homeland and family for 7years, 5 months, 26 days (and counting) so I needed to return to visit family members especially my mother who had encountered some medical problems. I also felt that I stood a better chance of raising the necessary funding if we were actually in Canada, rather than continually trying to do it from the Philippines. The first part worked well as I was able to visit all my immediate family and introduce them to my wife and son and now his younger brother. Sadly, so far we have had little luck in raising the funds we need to go back to work. Q. I was recently asked by a couple of investors about some personal details and how I got involved with precious metals and the recovery project. A. I am 52 years young and worked as an Aviation Consultant as well as being a contract helicopter and fixed wing pilot. During my aviation career, I had built several special Short Take Off and Landing Aircraft and had integrated special electronic systems into aircraft for mission specific applications. While I have no military background, the systems were originally developed for military applications and I adapted them for civil use, primarily in the resource sector. I had also held positions as Chief Pilot and Operations Manager for a few Canadian aviation companies. While I had some background with gold exploration and mining operations, in 1998, a Canadian gold refiner whom I had previously provided aviation consulting services for asked me to setup an aviation operation for their Philippine recovery operation and to fly their helicopters and airplanes moving the gold. This took place in 1999 and early to mid 2000. During this time, I became quite involved with recovery operations and locating potential recovery sites as well as a myriad of other details. The Canadian Refiner did not get the funding necessary and we eventually went our separate ways. But the experience was a good initiation into recoveries and the potential sites. Tama was a site I had originally looked into on behalf of that group and they had not acted on it so I have actually worked on that project since early 2000 and, while it isn't the biggest one that we knew of, I believed it to have the best potential for a number of reasons. But again, that information is quite extensive with the original business plan I developed for our organization being over 100 pages so we won't get into details. Q. Can we still access the main Tama site where we were less than 40 feet from the 'blue'? A. Yes, we can still access the site but will have to approach it a bit differently than what was done previously in order not to draw undue attention to ourselves. Q. Do we still have all the equipment we need to start digging again? A. While this question has been answered previously, some of the equipment (the crane truck, bobcat and cement mixer) were sold with the funds used to "reclaim" the site and cover the expenses incurred prior to stopping work. In part, this was done to maintain a good reputation with government agencies as well as being the proper way to conduct the business activities. With regard to the big Melroe 943 Bobcat, we had been having some problems with the diesel engine and when in the shop, the mechanic had recommended rebuilding the engine and the hydraulic pump. When these expenses and the cost of new tires were taken into consideration, we determined it more beneficial to sell the Bobcat and purchase newer and more suitable equipment at the appropriate time. Incidentally the Bobcat is not suitable for use during the rainy season while the cement mixer was simply too small for the major work which would be required in cementing our way down in the excavation and we decided to dispose of the unit rather than store it. That should provide a good start to this Q&A session, I do hope this answers a lot of your questions. As Joey and Suzanna have said I will be happy to answer any other questions you may have. Thank you all for your support and patience. Rest assured your wait will be worth while, as we will succeed with this recovery project, we just don't know when. Best regards, Dave August 1, 2008 Hello Everyone, Yes it has been too long since our last update. But it is very difficult to send out the same news each time when there is no news. Our program manager is still in Canada working DAILY on finding corporate funding for our project. There is some real progress being made and we hope to have some very good news for you soon. We will be needing to update our records so that we have fresh information in regards to EB account numbers and amounts loaned. Suzanna will be working on that shortly and will send out an email to each participant with the info we have on file to verify if it is all still current and correct. We will update you here when those individual emails are ready to be sent, so you know to look for them. As soon as we have any progress to report, we will send an immediate update and believe me we are looking forward to that as much as you are! In the meantime, know that we are still very much here and feverishly working away in the background doing whatever it takes to get the final funding for the first phase of our project and get it completed. Joey March 31, 2008 Hello Treasure Hunters, We apologize that it has been a moment between updates, but between having nothing to report and then waiting for news we thought would be coming any minute that we wanted to include, we are finally getting to it now. But please rest assured, the project is still viable and is ever being worked on. The search for sufficient funds being the main focus. Below is the update by Joey. The site manager is BACK in Canada after a brief trip back to the site, not only to verify that all is well (it is) and to pick up the scanner to get the software updated by the company so we can get more accurate readings, he went primarily to enter into some high level negotiations regarding funding for the project. We will update you on this as we get news, which should be very soon. More from Joey below. We are still here! Of course we are! Hello everyone, We have gone nowhere, and we have no intention of going anywhere until we recover the ‘blue’. We are, as I write this, actively trying to raise funds to complete your project, my project, our project, we will not rest until we have raised those funds and have gone back to digging for the gold bullion. We know it to be there and we know exactly where ‘there’ is, remember the updates when we were last digging? We have just 30-40 ft to go vertically down, but in some ways it is the most hazardous and difficult 30-40 ft that we will dig even though it is all soft sand, no rocks, no clay. But if you recall, that soft sand is full of problems, not the least of which are the booby traps and possible explosive devices left by the Japanese when they buried the treasure, but we are fully prepared for these eventualities and have explosive experts on standby for when the time comes to defuse these horrors. During the past couple of months we attracted potential investments from what we thought were 2 serious groups. The first promised us a sum that would enable us to complete the project in style, they said it was ‘Arab oil money’ which seemed feasible considering the price and dwindling supplies of gasoline right now. It all checked out, we put in hours of painstaking due diligence but when, after more hours of negotiations by telephone and e.mail, not to mention the exchange of reams of documents, we were told that the funds were in a Spanish bank – they has supposedly originated in the UK – and that we had to deposit 6,000 Euros to release them to our account we smelt a scam. We said ‘OK why not release the funds and we will pay the 6,000 Euros from the released funds’ and we gave the supposed funds manager a legal undertaking to do just that, and then ‘poof’ they were gone. We never heard from them again, e.mails went unanswered, telephones were either disconnected or not answered and the bank account that supposedly contained the funds now no longer existed, despite us having been assured by the bank – a major Spanish bank – that the account did exist when we carried out our due diligence! In other words an elaborate scam with seemingly someone on the inside of the bank involved as well. The other offer was for considerably less but enough to complete our first phase and again the funds came out of the UK and again all looked good until the last moment when they said that our project manager/owner had to fly to the UK – from Canada - to complete the transaction. Well this would have cost best part of $10K which we did not have and we pointed out that why not fly from the UK to Canada and then when the paperwork was finally signed and the funds transferred we would be happy to reimburse the air fairs for the lending party. Again all seems to have gone very quiet. These efforts are ongoing, we will not stop in our quest to raise the funds we need to bring our project to a successful conclusion. They do take up an amazing amount of time and effort and basically that is what we have been doing since the last update. Everything at the dig site is in mothballs and ready to go, we just need that final push to get back to doing what we do best, digging for bullion! We have other funding offers that we are currently investigating and other ways that we may be able to raise funds all of which we are giving 110% of our attention time and energy. We would like to thank everyone for your patience and understanding during this lull in our project. It is not unusual in any project of this size and complexity to have to sit out periods of seeming inactivity. But this will not last, we will raise the funds we need and then go back to work. We would like to end on a slightly brighter note; I know you have all been following the rise in the price of gold, at the time of writing it is approx $980 per ounce. Well when we started this project it was approx $600 per ounce and all of our projections and returns were based on that figure, so as the price has risen so will your returns rise. No I cannot say exactly what the returns will be, as I have no idea what the price of gold will be when we recover and sell the bullion, but I do promise that your return on investment will be retrospectively linked in some beneficial way (to you) to the $600 ‘strike’ price and the price at the time of sale over and above the returns that we have promised you for loaning us your funds. There is nothing else to report really and I will finish as I stated by saying emphatically that ‘We are still here’ and we will never go away until we succeed. As soon as we have any news then I will put out another update and share all with you. Until then all I can ask is patience and trust. I for one hope to be putting out that next update very soon. Until then I do hope this finds you all well and enjoying life. Kindest regards, Joey December 17, 2007 Hello Fellow Treasure Hunters! It is a while between updates simply because there is nothing to report. The site manager is still in Canada on a fund raising mission (he is also there on personal business) and is aiming to return to the gold site in January or February. I just spoke with him on the phone last night and we discussed various things, but most importantly that there is new software that is coming for our scanner that will help us determine depth of targets, which has been a very sore point in our digging. And secondly, that the shoestring budget approach is not working and he needs to find a large amount of funds to do get the project going and keep it going until it is finished. When we started the project, it was fully believed that there was a target box of "blue" that was "in reach" and we have thought this several times, gotten to the target spot and found nothing. Our current dig, which has brought up over 600 markers, is 99.9999% certain to contain "blue" at about 65 ft. But we need funding to continue in this spot and details on that can be found in the last dig update below. If any of these targets had been reached, it would have supplied enough funds to pay us back, keep going in to the huge targets underneath, and onto "glory". The site manager is now determined to find enough funds to make that happen without depending on hitting a small target first. I also asked him if he could field questions that you may have about the project... any questions at all that you may have while we are in this waiting for funding period... not only will he answer your questions, but because certain details will have to be kept private (like the actual location, the name of the corporation, his name, etc) in order to protect our project's assets, he will have his attorney "notorize" the answers. That way, if there are any doubts or concerns about the authenticity of the project, you can see that the attorney is real and willing to put his license and reputation on the line "officializing" the info the site manager is giving us. I asked him if this was possible because, although I am 100% sure this is a real project, I am sure some of you have started having doubts and so I wanted a third party official confirmation of it to present to you. In fact, I already have third party confirmation, but do not have permission to share it. This will be public and legal confirmation that the entire project is real, that there is real reason to believe there is gold on the site and that your funds are used to further the project. So, please send any questions you have to us here, we will compile them and send to the site manager for answers and he will have the attorney notorize a document reflecting all the questions and answers as truthful and accurate. We will edit out the private info and scan the document to show you on line. And of course, if anyone has any ideas for fundraising, definitely contact us about that as well. In the meantime, have a very Merry Christmas, and a smashing New Year's and we will update again once we get the answers and the notorization on line. Thank you very much for your participation, Suzanna and Joey Sept 21, 2007 Update from Project Manager - Joey Greetings fellow treasure hunters…well not a lot has happened since my last update, in fact this is more of a message to let you know we are still here and are as determined as ever to get that ‘blue’ out of the ground. OK this is what has happened: the typhoon season has been one of the worst on record and it is not over yet! Only a few weeks ago Manila was dealing with flooded streets and houses and in the last week we have had 3 typhoons come through the excavation site, on one occasion taking the perimeter fence right out of the ground. We have used what little funds we currently have to repair fences, continue the program of backfilling all of the various excavation shafts and tunnels with sand – in one of my last updates I explained how we were backfilling the shaft, which we are 99.99% certain contains bullion, with sand which we will use for the cement walls when we start to dig down again – so that in the future we will be dealing with digging out sand and not collapsed shafts and tunnels, which is a much quicker and safer procedure, we have also maintained 24/7 onsite security, more to stop our tools and machinery being stolen than anything else at this stage. The decision to stop work during the typhoon season was made for us by the lack of funds, well this turned out to be a blessing in disguise as if we had of worked through this typhoon season it most certainly would have been 3 steps forward and 4 back!! In short we would have spent most of our time pumping water out of the excavations and continually shoring up the walls of the shaft and tunnels. Apart from the waste of effort and funds it would have been very unsafe to work in the conditions we have seen during the last 2 months and there is no doubt that the crew would have been at some considerable risk, not something we would ever wish to subject them too. Our onsite manager is still overseas spending time with his family who he had not seen for 7 years, he is also about to visit the corp’ that manufactured our scanner to try and sort out the ‘vertical depth’ response sensitivity problem and he has meetings with at least 2 potential investors, so there is still good interest and we remain optimistic that we will raise the necessary funding to complete this final stage very soon, he will be back on-site within the next 2 weeks. I am as frustrated as you all must be, I want to see the completion of the first stage of this project yesterday, like you do!! but it seems as though we must be a little more patient, you need to know, as I said above, that we are still very much here - we have not run off with the treasure!! - and we are still as committed and determined to see this turn into a huge success as ever and like you we also wish it happened yesterday!! I will update you again when we start working again and I have something more substantial to say, I am always here, so if you have any questions or can help the project in any way then just send me or Suzanna a message. I hope this finds everyone well and enjoying either the end of a glorious summer or the coming of spring, until next time… Joey gbpjoey2@safe-mail.net Site Manager Update Greetings from… Canada? Yes… Canada! It has been quite a while since the last official project update went out so the following information will bring everybody up to date. While conducting extensive excavation and tunneling work on the main site in the exact location of the original Japanese wartime excavation, we had located a long subsurface anomaly, which basically originated at the wartime road. The anomaly was approximately 530 feet long when measured from the southerly corner of the property. The wartime road was located several hundred feet further south and west of the property. The 15 to 18 foot wide anomaly ran north from the corner and turned through west back to the south in a 180 degree arc and terminated on the north side of the original Japanese excavation. While we knew the Japanese had driven trucks into many of their deposit sites, this was the first actual indication we had of a vehicle access tunnel at our site. We had previously decided to drill a water well for the local community as their access to a dependable source of water had become very restricted. A dependable well was needed by us as well as them and it would be a good Public Relations gesture, as well as providing a “front” or cover story for digging in that area. Further to the PR aspect, we had anticipated that the well might serve to eliminate some of the thefts and other minor problems or nuisances encountered from time to time. While drilling the first hole we hit extremely hard cement and after two days and several drill bits, decided to move the drill a few feet and try again. While drilling the second hole, some sort of collapse inside the drill hole pinned the drill steel down the hole and we could not even jack it out of the hole using both our 15 and 20 ton hydraulic jacks. For the first time, we actually ripped the pipe apart while trying to jack it out of the hole. After spending a week trying to recover the drill steel, we eventually had to cut it away and replace an expensive 100 feet of drill rod as well as the starter section and drill bit. The third hole was successful and we hit free flowing water. This hole however was only a few meters away from the South Corner Excavation site. Originally, we had anticipated that the South Corner Excavation had one fairly large deposit container located in the middle of the excavation. Further locating activities appear to indicate that there may be several deposit containers located in and around the site… a very pleasant surprise. The actual excavation location was further confirmed by the abundance of Japanese markers, which came out of the site and by the black sand encountered just below the rock layer. Extremely positive results… yes, undoubtedly! However, it also caused additional problems in that the sand layer was used by the Japanese as a booby trap and that one shovel full of sand removed often results in two shovel fulls falling into the hole. Eventually the surrounding soils are badly undercut resulting in collapses. A large volume of ground water also flows into the excavation through the sand layer and just pumping the water results in sand and soil collapses. At the south corner, we got down to about 38 feet deep in the center but had hit fine charcoal gray sand at about 32 feet total depth. That sand layer was about 4.5 feet or 1.5 Meters thick and then we encountered about a 1 foot thick (1/3rd Meter) layer of course black sand that had some sort of thickening material added to it (now we are really cooking! ha ha). It was the color of tar but crumbled apart. After getting through that layer, we got into really soft sand material that the crew were just sinking in. Almost like a quicksand. They probed into the material about 7 feet deep but then the edge of the excavation started to collapse all around them as the sand starts slaking off (as the Japanese had intended it too). It was not dangerous as it was only coming down about 3 feet but it would quickly become a very large or wide excavation with a big overhang if we kept going down. We expect to have to get down to about 65 feet to recover the first deposit. We had no choice but to secure the sand layer by cementing it in as we go down and there was budget for that. Also, when we cement it in, we need to ensure that we have a minimum of a 12 foot X 12 foot excavation for working in so I am had the crew expand the existing south corner excavation to 16 feet X 21.5 feet down to the bedrock layer. We will go through the bedrock at between 15 and 16 feet in each direction so that the finished "cut" through the rock will be at least 14 feet. The extra room on top of the bedrock will form about a 5 foot wide platform or landing at about 20 feet below the surface. The 21.5 foot dimension will enable us to insert 18 inch square cement columns on a 6 meter spacing in the excavation which will become a structural support for the building we put over top of the excavation when we have budget to do so. Our biggest challenge was and is the lack of funding necessary to operate the project. While we initially had tentative commitments for more funding than we anticipated needing, for one reason or another, the funding amounts dropped significantly lower than those figures reportedly available. Funding from all sources had pretty well stopped and rainy season was upon us causing additional expenses. As a result and in consideration of other factors, we decided to backfill the South Corner Excavation to prevent collapses and problems with that site. With the onset of rainy season and the financial shortfalls, a decision was made to return to Canada to try to obtain adequate project funding. After waiting to the last possible moment for some potential funding for the project, I borrowed enough funds from our family to get to Canada. During August, several Typhoons blew through and destroyed the inner perimeter security fence so we decided to backfill the main excavation site as it will also require a cemented “foundation” to eliminate cave-in problems during rainy season. At the present time, we are seeking investment capital sources in Western Canada and I have also been working with other entities who have expressed interest in some of the Philippine assets encountered from time to time. While these assets may or may not produce revenues, if successful, the funding provided by the assets should fund the basic project requirements. Best regards, XXXXXXXX July 17, 2007 Hello everyone from ‘typhoon season’ in the tropics… OK, what’s going on with our recovery project? We are in a ‘holding pattern’ during this typhoon season, not just because of the weather but when you combine that with very low funds; to work would mean that the ‘3 steps forward, 2 steps backwards’ would come into play. Not a way to use our investors funds we think! We have worked through the typhoons in the past but as we are basically going to be digging down into 60ft of sand, whilst cementing a thick wall all around the perimeter of the ‘hole’ as we go down and as typhoons can bring with them huge amounts of water, that doesn’t mix too well with digging in sand and cementing. So we decided that discretion is the better part of valor in this case, especially as we have no funds to cover contingencies such as a wall collapsing due to extreme weather or anything similar. All in all we will make better progress if we wait until the end of the typhoon season when we will also have some further funds. This is not another "maybe" either. We have raised a small amount of funding which will enable us to start the cement wall and the dig hopefully at the end of this month but more likely the middle of August. However we are keeping the security guys on 24/7 and we visit the site every day just to make sure that all is intact and OK. We continue to seek further funding and as of now we have several irons in the fire with several interested parties. Our project manager who has been away from the site for several weeks now on a fund seeking and personal trip is about to go visit the corporation that made our $25K scanner. If you recall, although we have had good success with this device, it has failed to produce accurate depth readings. We have contacted the manufacturers and they have invited us to visit their factory and discuss our problems/requirements. There is a possibility that the scanner or its software is faulty. We will know more within the next couple of weeks. I would have liked to have been the bearer of some really ‘blue’ news for you all but at this time it is not to be. We are still here, we will succeed, we just don’t know exactly when. But as I mentioned above we do know that all we have to do now is dig down through 60ft of sand, of which approx 30ft we put there ourselves as backfill to protect the ‘hole’ and to give us the necessary sand to mix in the cement as we go down. This is nowhere near as difficult as digging into the unknown in terms of hard soils/rock etc, so the going should be relatively easy. Although we still have the possibility of booby traps as we get closer to the ‘blue’... If we had the funding now, we could almost give a day and date when we would be bringing the first bit of ‘blue’ to the surface! I will probably not update you again until we restart the dig or something of note happens, but Suzanna and I are always here. You can get me at: gbpjoey2@safe-mail.net and Suzanna at goldbull2@safe-mail.net if you have any questions or suggestions. Here’s wishing you all a really good summer/winter depending on where you all are and here’s to great success very soon. Joey and Suzanna June 12, 2007 Hello Faithful Treasure Hunters! Just a quick update: work is going on at the dig site and the site manager is currently in Canada on a two-fold mission, one of which is much needed fundraising! Just as in the last update, everything is on track except funding. We have a minimum coming in, but need a push to get us over the top - so to speak. We will update you again when there is more news. Hang in there. It will eventually turn "blue" for us, there is no doubt. Suzanna and Joey From Joey: I have not received any messages from xxxx in the last 2-3 weeks but have spoken with him on two occasions the last being at the beginning of last week. The crew have almost finished the backfill at the site and will then start to construct the cement foundation and interior walls, funds permitting and really that is all the news I have from the site at this stage… From Site Manager: Hello Joey, I arrived in Canada a couple of days ago and have been doing the family thing since arrival. Leaving the Philippines was 5 hours to Manila airport, about 14 hours on the airplane, 5 hours standing in line with customs and immigration. Then we had a chance to spend about 2 days with my daughter and a few hours with my sons. We sat at the terminal for several hours then 18 hours on the bus. Pretty well needless to say but I certainly did not feel like sitting for some time after that (and still don't). Canada has been cool and rainy and great for sleeping (no air conditioning needed). I finally managed to get online about 30 minutes ago and yours was the first message received. A friend/investor from Vancouver called and chatted about the project for the last 15 minutes so. Also, if you need to contact me, I can be reached by email or by telephone at xxxxxxxxx. I should now have regular email access except for the coming Sunday and Monday as I have to go to a meeting. Yesterday, I met with a couple of potential investors and the meetings went quite well. They would like some more information. I have talked to xxxxx a couple of times since arriving in Canada and he is doing all right but I need to try to get him some funds for Saturday. Sorry to hear about the food poisoning and flu. "Bin there - done that" and do not ever want to go through that again. Best regards, XXXXX May 18, 2007 Hello Fellow Treasure Hunters We have the latest from the site manager (below) and as you will see from the first paragraph, they will be getting back to working at the site again. The Japanese ‘recovery’ mentioned is just one of several recovery operations that the Japanese have mounted over the years and they are always successful. They are usually very large scale operations disguised as bona-fide major civil engineering projects, in this case the construction of a major highway close to our site (which I actually saw when I visited the site about 12 months ago). Although we have funds enough to recommence work we still need further funds to continue. We are trying, as always, to raise funds in several different ways knowing that it is just a ‘numbers’ game. That is, the more we try the more the likelihood of us finding the funding to keep going to that day when the ‘blue’ actually comes out of the ground. We will try and update every week to 10 days from now until recovery, although quite often there will not be a lot to say until we get back down to where we were about 4 weeks ago at 36 ft. from the surface. Until we do get down to that level, we will be building the reinforced concrete ‘shoring walls’ that will line the ‘hole’ to provide safety for our crew from soil collapse and water ingress and then we will be going down again into virgin territory as it were, all the while building the concrete walls as we go down until we find the bullion chamber. We have several irons in the fire regarding funding, and we are hoping that one will happen soon to provide the 85K we need to complete this first recovery. Once again thank you all for your patience, your belief in our project and continued support, it will all be worth it. For those of you who know of Florence Scovel Shinn, I thought the following affirmation was appropriate for us at this time. Any of you who care to use it may be surprised at the result! "I now release my gold mine within me. I am linked with an endless golden stream of prosperity which comes to me under grace in perfect ways" Joey and Suzanna From Site Manager: Hello Joey, It has been a hectic week. With the Japanese doing their major gold recovery project (a new ‘highway’ locally), there are no trucks available to haul the sand we need to backfill the current excavation site until sometime next week so we will commence work when they are available. It looks like that will cost at least $2200 USD to bring in all the sand we need to fill the hole and have sand stockpiled for making the cement rim initially and about $1200 for ¾ inch crush gravel, Portland cement and rebar. Fortunately at this time we have the funds needed for this part. Monday I was in several meetings including one with a friend who may be able to arrange some project funding through Arab Oil Money from a group in Switzerland and he wanted to include our project in his overall business plan. Friday morning I was back to xxxxxx to have meetings with a gold buyer, a gold seller and a colleague, an airline captain, and we were trying to make arrangements with the Swiss Group. It was raining heavy yesterday and with the construction on the road, it took almost 8 hours of travel time by bus instead of the normal 2 hour maximum each way. I am off to the internet now to check my email and send these out then will go talk to the truckers to find out what day they can start. I could sure use any funds available ASAP. I have enough for the sand and cement as mentioned above which will enable us to get get started but nothing after that. Best regards, xxxxx May 4, 2007 Hello Treasure Hunters, Below is the latest update from the site manager. The good news is that we will recommence work this week mainly to secure the 'hole' and make it easier and safer to dig down in the future. While we have sufficient funds to keep going for about 2-3 weeks, we are clearly still lacking adequate funding in general. There is no question that this won't pan out, but the "when" is unfortunately an issue at this point. Along with the funding efforts mentioned below, we are also negotiating at this time to bring in one investor who is prepared to finance the entire final part of this initial stage of the project. As with all of these negotiations, it may come to nothing but a few e-mails and a couple of telephone conversations. But we are in action, so to speak, as far as looking for more funding. From all of the site personnel, Suzanna, and myself, we would like to thank you one and all for your patience, trust and dedication. You know, as we do, that it will all be worth it eventually! Thank you, Joey From site manager: Hello Joey, Further to our telephone conversation of yesterday, the gentlemen who left from his site visit this morning has agreed to deposit funds into our project. Along with what you have available, that would enable us to get started again and have adequate funds on hand for about two weeks work and the materials we would need during that time. I have a further commitment for an additional amount within three weeks so that will hopefully keep us going until other funds become available. While we are technically "digging," due to the small rains we have experienced in the last few weeks and the resultant soil collapses (making it extremely difficult, expensive and now dangerous, to place the cement structure as per our original plans), and with typhoon season expected to start within 45 to 60 days, we have had to revise our plans. While the revision has not changed our overall recovery plans as such, it has been deemed necessary in order to overcome the soil collapses and potential problems caused by trying to get to the target with an inadequate budget for the past few months. For this revised operational plan, we shall bring in approximately 30 truckloads of sand (480 cubic meters) and backfill the excavation while mixing cement in with the sand in strategic locations where the soil collapses occurred, in order to provide necessary support to the surrounding soil and the cement structure when re-excavating. Then we shall construct the surface cement foundation which shall be approximately 22 feet long by 18 feet wide by 4 feet deep with two foot thick walls. This structure shall be raised approximately 1.5 feet above the existing terrain and will not only form the surface support structure (enabling us to close in or secure access to the excavation as needed, to prevent the typhoon rains from entering if nothing else and there not having to pump out water everyday for approx half a day before digging can start), it will also form part of the foundation for the 70 foot wide by 130 foot long multi-level shop / office / security / crew quarters facility which will eventually be built over the excavation area. This building is planned with a 70 foot long by 30 foot wide and a 32 feet high ceiling work area above the excavation site and, when completed, will provide a completely secure facility. It would enable our crew to stay and work within the facility without the need to go out anywhere during the week (maintaining low visibility). It is expected that surface structure work will take us three to four weeks to complete and then we will commence going down. The sand "re-excavated" from the site shall be used to make the cement required to cement in the walls as we go down. We expect to be able to excavate six feet (of sand), then place the steel mesh and rebar and cement in the walls. Then the next six feet, etc. While it would sure be nice to have the budget to have a cement mixing plant and shotcrete machine for this phase, our financial situation dictates doing it by hand. In this manner, not only will we be working again and making progress, but it should also be easier to obtain funding with an operational project. Basically, at the present time, we can only count on funds for the next three to four weeks which will be very tight, but will work. More would be better but I hope this will suffice to get us going in the direction of the 'blue' again. While we still have some other "irons in the fire" with the potential gold bullion transactions, I have had to look at this without counting on those possibilities as they have not panned out yet. Best regards, xxxx April 13, 2007 Hello Treasure Hunters, We are at a critical stage in our quest to recover the gold bullion. We have no doubts at all that it is there and that we are digging in the correct place – all of our scans indicate a ‘target’ directly below our excavations in the southern corner of the site, the ‘markers’ that we have found and brought up and the various stages of the excavation are ‘classic text book’, Japanese gold bullion burial procedure, as documented by several scholars, including the Seagraves, whose definitive book “Gold Warriors” and the accompanying CD’s contain so much detailed information, that if it were fiction they would still be writing it! We are however completely out of funds. This in itself is nothing new, BUT right now when we are so close and yet so far it is extremely frustrating on a personal level and critical as we close in on the Typhoon season on a practical level. If you recall last year we had a lot of problems with water entering the excavations during the Typhoon season and the day usually started with a mammoth pumping operation, which of course took up a lot of digging time and valuable financial resources for fuel etc. We know that if we can get the funds we need now, then we will not have to endure another Typhoon season, as it will be all over rover! During the last 2-3 weeks we have NOT been excavating the southern corner site, where we brought up all the markers etc, as we are in the ‘sand trap’ and as I said above we are also out of funds. This ‘sand trap’ is a layer of fine soft dry sand about 10-20mt thick that extends for maybe a 50 x 50mt layer at about 12mt down. The problem with this is that if we dig straight down, and it is easy digging compared to some of the heavy clay and rock we have dug through, without shoring the sides with reinforced concrete, the sand will constantly collapse into the centre of the dig, just as the Japanese designed it to. In effect anyone trying to dig down now without shoring the sides as they go will be trapped in soft sand with possible fatal consequences and it is just too dangerous to continue without implementing the safety measures mentioned above. So this brings me to the core of this update. The funds to continue to be able to work safely…as you know, we don’t have any! Although we have not been digging the past few weeks we have been actively seeking out funding for our project. For our part we have been trying to put gold bullion buyers with gold bullion sellers – having been in and around the gold bullion business for some 6-7yrs we have some very good and reliable contacts - and in the process we would be paid a commission for arranging a successful transaction, which would be enough to fund the final stage of our current excavation and effect a recovery, but so far we have not been able to put together a completed deal but we are still working away at this as I type. Whilst you guys have been very supportive and we all thank you most sincerely for that support and investment, in fact without you we would not be here standing on the brink, as it were. As with any project I also understand that there is a limit to what anyone can invest. And with the funds just dribbling in I guess that limit has been reached within our present group. The solution seems to be to open the project and hence the funding up to a wider audience. So we are in the process of deciding whether to advertise on the net for further investors. Problem is there is the risk of attracting the ‘crazies’ who lurk out there with the seemingly sole intention of sabotaging any and every thing that they can. While we are deciding whether or not to go down this route we have gone ahead and put all the pieces in place, well almost! This is just another small challenge along the way, we will overcome this as we have overcome all sorts of challenges that have been placed in our path over the months and years. We are going no-where, we are staying right here and seeing this valuable worthwhile project through to its final profitable conclusion. If you know of anyone who may be interested in investing, friends, family members etc, then please direct them to us at the goldbull2@safe-mail.net address and we will guide them through the designated procedure, please don’t share the main web site URL with anyone until they have signed the ND doc. There may be another way of raising the funds we need, something we have not ‘seen’ or have no experience of. If anyone in the group has any ideas then please send an e.mail to: gbpjoey2@safe-mail.net and we will work with you to give life to your idea if practicable. It goes without saying that only ideas that are simple, honest and inexpensive to execute can be considered, thanks for that. Hopefully the next update will contain info on how much of a success this exercise has been and we will have started work again and we will all be that much closer to our ‘golden dream’! Once again, thanks a mill for all your past and ongoing support, financial and otherwise. Without you guys we would never have gotten this far. Kind regards Joey & Suzanna PS. For your information: Current Cost Analysis to continue digging safely and securely (Will download a PDF file) March 19, 2007 Hello Faithful Treasure Hunters, Here is a brief update from the site manager. It is actually a tad "old" but I wasn't able to get it out to you before now. We are at a really crucial place in the dig, but the funds are only trickling in (not only from us, but his other lenders as well) so in fact, there is currently NO DIGGING at this time. Plus we are approaching typhoon season in the area, so will need to eventually set up the warehouse structure in order to continue once we do find more funding. The good news is that there are a couple of outside projects he is working on that may finish our funding problems for good. We hope to bring you better news soon when he can continue to dig in the manner necessary at this point (more than just digging... but shoring up as he goes. See below for details.) Until then, funding IS still open and anyone that can jump in with an amount 10k or more, please contact us ASAP. We will get in contact with you directly and you will have direct access to the site manager and Joey. We will get to the blue, one way or the other. Of this we are sure! We are closer than ever! Thank you for your participation, Suzanna and Joey 3/10/2007 Briefly, at the south corner, we got down to about 38 feet deep in the center but had hit fine charcoal gray sand at about 32 feet total depth. That sand layer was about 4.5 feet or 1.5 M thick and then we encountered about a 1 foot thick (1/3rd M) layer of course black sand that had some sort of thickening material added to it. It was the color of tar but crumbled apart. After getting through that layer, we got into really soft sand material that the crew were just sinking in. Almost like a quicksand. They probed into the material about 7 feet deep but then the edge of the excavation started to collapse all around them as the sand starts slaking off (as the Japanese had intended it too). It was not dangerous as it was only coming down about 3 feet but it would quickly become a very large or wide excavation with an big overhang if we keep going down now. This is much different than the material in the 91 foot deep excavation we did in early 2005 which is only about 65 feet/20 meters due north. We now have no choice but to secure the sand layer by cementing it in as we go and, as you know, there is no budget for that today (or yesterday). Also, when we cement it in, we want to ensure that we have a minimum of a 12 foot X 12 foot excavation for working in so I am having the crew expand the existing south corner excavation to 16 feet X 21.5 feet down to the bedrock layer. We will go through the bedrock at between 15 and 16 feet in each direction so that the finished "cut" through the rock will be at least 14 feet. The extra room on top of the bedrock will form about a 5 foot wide platform or landing at about 20 feet below the surface. The 21.5 foot dimension will enable us to insert 18 inch square cement columns on a 6 meter spacing in the excavation which will become a structural support for the building we put over top of the excavation when we have budget to do so. We try to plan ahead for all eventualities... Now if we can just get the funding we really need! Best regards, xxxxxx March 1, 2007 Hi Treasure Hunters, Well just a mini-update which is mainly photos. We have had some really exciting markers come up from the southern corner excavation, rocks (man made and 'real') with heaps of markings/carvings on them, the most significant being the ones with the 'eyes' that have always been pointing down, this is the way the Japanese indicated that the treasure was in that exact spot but vertically further down. You will see from the text that the Tracker, who is so excited he is almost wetting himself when some of the big markers come up, has interpreted the markings to mean we have just 16ft to go - remember this guy has been involved in several successful recovery operations in the past and he has a wealth of experience of bullion recoveries, so we trust his judgement in this, but we still keep our fingers/toes crossed! At the other excavation on the same site, the northern corner, we are still showing three targets and we are now about 6ft above one of them as far as we can tell - we have found that even though our 25K scanner is very very good at locating non-ferrous material, it's main failing is in giving accurate depths, which in some ways is the most important measurement for us...we have checked to see if there is anything better out there and unless we are prepared to spend about 100K++ we currently have the best. We are investigating the possibility of using modified software to help us with this but it is taking forever to get the manufacturers to understand what we want, we don't give up though - ever! We are almost out of funds again but we need to keep the crew going for at least another week or two, so if anyone out there wants to invest we are keeping the funding open until we make the first recovery, which could be very soon if all the markers - over 600 now from that one excavation in the southern corner - and our trackers experience are anything to go by. For larger investment amounts please contact Suzanna or I at gbpjoey@safe-mail.net Well that's it for now we will be updating again very soon, recovery or not. Hopefully this will find you all well and enjoying the spring/fall depending on which hemisphere you are in...kindest regards Joey From Suzanna: I will be off line from March 3-10th, but funding is open if you are wanting to make a spend, go for it! Will be back on the 10th/11th for any emails. No worries. Thank you, Suzanna From Site Manager: This does not really qualify as an update but the attached photos will be of interest. The photo entitled 07-02-17 shows the tunnels on the north corner of the main excavation. We have tunneled about 35 feet through 3 targets horizontally and dug down about 6 feet over one of the targets and got some signs there but all we could tell for sure is that the targets are still below us.  The photo entitled 07-02-26 S Corner Exc was taken on Monday and shows the South Corner excavation. Today, we broke through the larger rock layer and are now into a sand/gravel mix at about 30 feet below the surface, which should make the digging easier for a while.  The other photo entitled 07-02-28 Marker Rocks is, for me, the interesting photo. The surface features can be hard to see, especially in a photo so we have highlighted the features with chalk. Note the flat carved surfaces and the 'eyes' which were all looking down. There are some rocks with black asphalt/paint and also red, pink, brown and white coloration. The one is another small snakehead and one is shaped like an elephants head. Interesting and the tracker is excited. He thinks we now have only 16 feet to go. Note that the one also indicates a bomb.  I have to get back to the site now, wish us well for the next week. Best regards, xxxx Feb 19, 2007 Hello Fearless Treasure Hunters, Below is the latest update from the onsite project manager but first a few words from Joey just to help clarify all that has been written below. Joey: The team are focusing most of their efforts on the excavation centered around the drill hole that brought up 18K gold flakes 3-4 weeks ago, this is the one in the southern corner. Now here is the strangest of things. When they got down to the end of the drill hole at about 22ft there was NO gold. In fact there was nothing there, not even a chewed up Spanish Dubloon or some small gold artifact. There was just nothing other than more dirt and markers!! How this is explained is just beyond all of us. The gold flakes came up, they were witnessed, they were photographed, they were taken away and independantly assayed and the assay results were consistent with gold from that pre WW2 era.  To explain that last statement: Gold has become more refined as time goes on, so to roughly date gold you simply see how pure it is ie. today gold can have a purity of say 99.9999% but back in those days it was only about 99.9977%. So we know the gold flakes that came up were from the correct era, but where is it? It is also perhaps relevant to know that the whole crew and management are one thing, if nothing else; totally honest and trustworthy. Apart from meeting all of them when I went out there almost a year ago - and I don't know about you but I get strong 'gut' feelings when something is not quite right or someone is telling me lies or generally being dishonest - I know that everything the site manager says is absolutely correct; no exagerations, no half truths, no lies. Right down to the fact that his crew are of a faith that will not allow them to cheat, steal or lie. They are very honest hardworking guys and I for one am proud to know and be associated with them all. The crew continue to dig down further and all the time they are uncovering markers and pointers, all of which indicate that we need to dig deeper. By the time you read this the crew will be down to about 30-35ft. It is hard going so it is slow work by hand. As well as this, they are digging towards a couple of other targets in the main excavation and tunnel complex where recently the tunnel walls collapsed in places. The tracker (one of the very best at what he does and with vast experience which he has accumulated over many years of being directly involved in successful recovery projects like ours) is getting very excited, especially seeing the sheer quantity of marker rocks that are coming up, now over 550 in this one excavation. We all know it has to be there! We just need to keep digging until we find it and all indications are very very good. It is extremely frustrating that nothing has been found yet, but in no way is that because of lack of effort. Everything that we are able to do is being done, many things happen behind the scenes that we don't always speak about and they are all done to help speed up this recovery project. Below is a brief description of just one of the more unusual measures we have employed. Our efforts to speed the recovery have utilised some very esoteric measures such as having the whole site "spiritually cleansed". Not that I or the site manager could explain exactly what or how that works, but the important thing here is that we are all open minded enough to take such measures seriously and allow the experts in such matters - incidentally who are investors themselves and were before we called upon them to perform their craft - to carry out their tasks. We also use "dowsing" amongst other methods to help us locate the targets and again although we may not be able to explain exactly how this works, we can tell you that work it certainly does and very accurately, if using our scanner as a base line is anything to go by. We will leave no stone unturned! The following update from the site manager is long but informative, as usual, and describes the current excavation status accurately. With regards to funding: we have decided to let it remain open until the first recovery is made and then of course we will be self funding and a whole new ball game will start! So if you want to fund please just go to the Loan Spend page on the web site, thanx for that guys. Although Suzanna and I keep hoping that we will get THE CALL at any moment, the "blue" remains elusive. In closing we all want to thank you all for your faith and perseverance, we WILL recover it and it WILL be worth it. We just wish we knew when! Joey and Suzanna 07-02-15 GOLD BULLION RECOVERY PROJECT UPDATE Greetings from xxxxxxx: How time flies! It has been almost three weeks since the last update went out, 38 weeks since we started digging and just over 40 weeks since we acquired the property and started erecting the security fences. That only leaves us 12 weeks to meet our stated goal of recovering the first deposit within a one year time frame. As noted in the last update, we started work on the south corner - the current main excavation site - in the fourth week of January while drilling for a water source. We used the water as a reason to dig in that area as it is close to the small local community. While we had planned to keep two men working in the upper tunnels (original diggings) toward a couple of identified targets, in order to get everything setup and secured, we had the entire crew work at excavating the south corner. Cracks had started to develop in the roof and walls of the lower tunnel - the original excavations - and we had some large soil/rock collapses in the lower tunnel including a large “support column” which was intentionally left in place. At that depth, we had not found the brass or copper object encountered with the drill (December 15, 2005) - another example of the drill finding a metal deposit but when we dig there is nothing there. And the signs and markers - all of these 'signs and markers' are definitely man made (which in itself gives us great hope. I mean why would anyone put these objects under the ground if there was no reason to do so?) - and are pointing us to go deeper. Before moving the boom truck over to the South Corner site, we removed the shoring from the main tunnel system which was at 30 to 36 feet below the surface. It was a good decision as the roof of the lower tunnel continued to collapse which resulted in at least 10 feet of the south westerly side of the main excavation sloughing off and collapsing into the main excavation. We really need to use heavy equipment to remove the weakened area and the material from the bottom of the excavation, however we just don't have the funds to either purchase or hire that sort of equipment right now.  In this photo (SW View Main Exc) you can see the extent of the soil collapses and the work previously accomplished. The two yellow outlines show the shallow tunnel (now separate tunnels) at about 19 to 25 feet deep. The single yellow lines vertically are only there for the purpose of indicating the existing tunnel and planned extensions. The dark blue lines show the extent of the existing shallow tunnel while the violet color lines indicate the original (existing) lower/deeper tunnel and branches which have been excavated. The irregular white line running through the yellow tunnel entrances show the area where the roof of the lower tunnel collapsed resulting in the south westerly side collapsing. When viewed from above, the collapse area is almost circular. The red squares indicate precious metal target locations. The same color coding will be utilized as applicable in the other photos.  This photo (North View Main Exc) shows the area of the tunnel on the opposite side of the excavation. The shadow in the photo makes it difficult to see the details but we had driven a narrow tunnel in the north corner from where the water pump discharge pipe comes up out of the excavation. The tunnel ran directly towards the vehicle access gate for about 8 feet towards the red square which was a target we found to be deeper than the tunnel. The tunnel than turned about 45 degrees left towards the second red square as we hope to have a target at the depth of the tunnel in that area. We planned to have two men work in that area at the same time as the rest of the crew was working in the South Corner excavation - current excavation where the gold flakes came up recently. The red square which is located farthest to the left is another potential target at a similar depth (less than 25 feet deep). Interestingly, directly under that red target indicator, a green moss grows on the wall of the excavation where the water comes through and there are 5 lines of heavy moss growth in that “patch” which I suspect may be the result of copper sulphate or some other “growth enhancer” leaching through the soil from a deposit container. At this time, that is pure speculation on my part but there has to be a logical explanation for the enhanced growth. The red target location in the background towards the vehicle access gate is the location where a potential original Japanese tunnel entrance has been identified.  This photo (SE View Main Exc), shows another view of the collapse area as well as the area above the short tunnel which we cut into the easterly corner. The red target indicator closest to the fence in the upper right portion of the photo is the third brass/copper target we hit with the drill in December 2005 (drill hole indicated by vertical green line). If you look closely, you can also see three drill holes on that side of the excavation. In addition to the holes shown, inside the fenced area, within the photo are an additional seven holes which were drilled during the exploratory drilling program in 2005 and 2006.  The above photo (South Corner Exc Area) shows the recently erected Sawali (woven bamboo) fence around the South Corner Excavation. While the fence is primarily to keep the locals from watching us constantly, it also prevents children and animals from falling in the deep excavation. Each morning and each night, we move all of the equipment in and out of this work site to our main excavation area as it is much more secured and we have an armed guard on security duty at night to prevent having our equipment stolen. Now that the South Corner site fence and area is pretty well finished, we plan to move two crew members back into the tunnel shown in the North View of the main excavation and have them continue tunneling towards the other target.  And this photo (South Corner Exc) shows the view down the hole. The deeper section is down to 27 feet deep. The crew had exposed an area of very concentrated iron oxide (rust) which was in front of the shallow tunnel and something we had not previously encountered. It widened out into an area about 8 inches thick and 30 inches wide. Yesterday, I had the crew follow it back into the wall to find the source (just in case it was a metal box filled with valuables) but the rust fizzled out about a foot into the wall so, we continue to dig down. The digging is still going well although the crew is into a lot harder material now so it is taking substantially longer to go down. Despite extensive effort and actually ripping the top pipe apart from the pressure exerted on it trying to “jack out” and recover the drill steel, we were not successful at recovering the drill steel and it was actually getting worse as we worked so the drill crew was instructed to recover as much drill rod as they could and we were able to recover the top 10 lengths of drill steel. The machine shop fabricated a couple of new bits and the starter section so that we could move the drill and start drilling a new hole. The machine shop also fabricated 10 new sets of drill rod couplers so that we have an adequate amount of drill rods. Our welder finished fabricating the new rods yesterday afternoon. The drill is now back down to about 140 feet and drilling through what we suspect and hope is a tunnel containing free flowing water. We also had to replace the crane lifting cable - which is a special 'non-rotating' cable - as it broke one of the outer strands a few weeks ago and another outer strand several days after we cut the cable to remove the first broken strand. THE BIG QUESTION On a somewhat different matter, a few days ago, I received a phone call from one of our primary investors who represents a group of investors. The conversation basically went “so why are we not finding this gold” and he also passed on an email from one of the investors that he represents that went something along the lines of… "well they must have excavated about 99% of the site by now, so where's the gold”? and “so why doesn't the $25K scanner pinpoint the gold”? He then went on to say “Maybe in your next update you could address the reason or reasons as to why we haven't struck gold yet as it would make my job an awful lot easier and the investors would feel an awful lot better, that I know". (Note: This is 'Joey' who made the call mentioned above.) These questions or observations are not that easy to answer and I guess that to properly answer those questions would likely fill a book but I neither have the time nor the inclination to write a book. However, as it is part of my job to try to keep everyone up to date and provide the answers to questions such as these, we shall try to address some of these inquiries now and would welcome other questions you may have which I will try to address in future updates. ( Please send any questions to: gbpjoey@safe-mail.net ) One of the little known facts about World War II was that, in the same manner the Japanese Military sent spies into to many countries to identify the holders of any and all wealth, the Japanese Military Engineering teams also came to the Philippines well before the war to plan their elaborate tunnels and caches for the purpose of storing this wealth. I personally know of one engineering team that arrived in the Province of Tarlac and began their tunnel work 18 years before WWII even started! It is a well known historical fact that the Japanese had long range plans for the Philippines. Japan and Germany were allies during WWII and Germany supplied the Japanese with both engineers and tunneling technology know-how (as well as a lot of aerial bombs the Japanese used to boobytrap the tunnels). During the war, they had hundreds of experts including ceramics experts responsible for closing up the sites with extremely hard cement (concrete) and make it look like it was part of nature and that it had not been touched. There are several books which provide details on some of these deposit sites and I would suggest that one of the better books is called “Gold Warriors”, written by Sterling and Peggy Seagrave. The book is published by Bowstring Books (www.bowstring.net) and has an ISBN 0-9724146-0-6. If possible, get the version containing the two CD Roms as they contain a lot of information which is not in the book. (Suzanna: Amazon has the paperback and the hardcover, although I did not see the edition with the cds) The location where we are working is along the “Bataan Death March” route and was the site of a WW II Japanese airfield. The site is located adjacent to the first line of defense of both the American and Japanese military. There was a 9000 man Japanese garrison here and our research indicates that there were actually three garrisons in the area. Undoubtedly, the area was of strategic significance to the Japanese Military. There was also a military hospital in the area and the Japanese were known to bury their treasure in locations next to garrisons, airfields and hospitals, we have all 3! (Incidentally one of Ferdinand Marcos' big recoveries was right alongside a hospital.) We have known since beginning the project that the bulk of the gold deposited in our site is quite deep and will take a significant period of time (possibly years) to recover. However there are also shallower deposits that we are targeting to provide the funds necessary to work our way into the main deposit chambers. This is standard Japanese "burial" practice, the shallower deposits were there simply to (fund) enable the work to recover the deeper deposits to continue. Unfortunately, we have been unable to find any equipment capable of accurately providing exact depths to the targets. Although our super scanner is really good, its one failing is on depth prediction or indication. We have also found that as we have tunneled through these areas, the signal we are trying to find does not disappear but remains in the same place indicating that the target is at a deeper depth. We continue to seek out other types equipment which will do a better job of locating and identifying the targets and the target depths but, to date, it appears that a Ground Penetration Radar system with borehole antennas, used in combination with our drilling rig, while having limited abilities in some of the soil types encountered, is the only equipment capable of providing this type of information. Equipment of this nature costs in the vicinity of $100,000 to $125,000 USD which is well in excess of our financial capabilities at this time. As noted previously in the update, we had anticipated that it may take us a year to get to the first deposit and this week makes 40 weeks since we started so we are still within our time frame target. However, we have completed the work so far with far less capital resources than originally anticipated (in actuality… about 30% of our original planned budget) and that has undoubtedly caused us significant delays. In October and November, there were limited funds available and we experienced several weeks with no real production. In spite of that, we have excavated the main shaft down to over 50 feet deep (with the last 25 feet dug out three times during the typhoons and rainy season). The lower tunnel was driven about 130 feet through boulders and clay with the tunnel being about seven feet high and an average of at least seven feet wide. The upper tunnels were significantly smaller in size but still total almost 45 feet in length and that tunneling activity will resume in the next few days. In the South Corner, we have sunk a 12 foot by 12 foot shaft to an average depth of about 26 feet in only three weeks. This is our current main digging area and where the gold flakes came up on the drill 3-4 weeks ago. With an adequate budget, we would have a large hydraulic excavator, a bulldozer and other necessary heavy equipment in place and simply dig the entire selected area (or 99% of it) down to a depth of 30 to 40 feet. However, bear in mind that we have completed all of the excavation work so far by hand with the boom truck and Bobcat Loader, cheaper in some ways 'yes' but much slower. I trust that you will understand that we are not complaining or making excuses, but just trying to answer the questions and provide the reasons. One of the primary considerations to take into account is that there are no published, “tried, tested and true” methods in the recovery work we are doing. There are no authorities or experts, unless you happen to be one of the few, still living Japanese Military Officers responsible for one of these deposits. And even if you were, you would have to do the recovery in the area which was under the immediate control of your former commanding officer as each of them used different methods. Another consideration is that we have to work in three dimensions and need to try to obtain accurate target depths rather than just with two dimensions with horizontal positioning in the ground. As mentioned, it would be wonderful to have a big hydraulic excavator and just dig away to our hearts content in the appropriate area but, unfortunately, our budget has not allowed us that luxury so far. We have literally recovered hundreds of Japanese markers - throughout the site - with extremely positive indications in our current 'hole' so we just need to keep going for a while longer. Earlier this afternoon, I checked with xxxx, the tracker, and he has logged over 550 different rock markers, most of them having come out near the middle of our excavation with the majority of the markers appearing in the last 10 feet. As I mentioned before all of these 'markers' are man made or at the very least man positioned, for instance how else would a "horseshoe" be sitting on top of a rock 15 ft underground with a mark indicating to 'go deeper'? xxxx was also trained as a member of a Marcos Recovery Team and has spent several years in various locations within the Philippines with initially the Marcos Teams and has been involved with several successful recoveries both for Marcos and others, we are very fortunate that he is now working for us. The last marker to come out was on the westerly side of the hole and indicated a boobytrap (bomb) which we had already located - with the scanner - before starting to dig. There is actually one bomb located a few feet into each wall and one positioned near the center of the excavation but these are still below the point we are working at now. I also had a business associate check with a family friend who was one of the most trusted “treasure finders” of Marcos number one General (General Ver) during the martial law period. When I met with him Tuesday (February 13, 2007) at noon, the business associate was very excited as the elderly gentleman also reported that our project site was positive in several areas and asked if we could provide him with transportation from the Manila area enabling him bring his equipment and come out to the site and personally check the site physically rather than from the satellite photos I had provided. Marcos Recovery Teams had spent a considerable amount of time in this area and he is now the second former high ranking member of a Marcos Recovery Team who has verified the area. In late 2005, the first former member guided us to the original Japanese excavation site identified in the satellite photos which were sent in previous updates. I would have to say that the hardest part of my job is in raising capital and our biggest problem recently has been with funding, or rather the lack thereof. It appears that some of my other - not recovery - work stands a pretty good chance at bringing us in a sizeable amount of cash within the next month or two and, if so, I will buy the heavy equipment we need to expedite the recovery. But, as the saying goes, you can’t count your chickens ‘til they’re hatched and we need to keep the project operational until it does happen. While we have done without for sometime now, these things have a tendency to catch up with you at some point. It appears that one of the smaller “catch up” points was with the recent equipment repairs which have now drained the account completely. At this time, we have no further commitments for any funding. While I spend a significant amount of time each week trying to raise capital and in finding new or potential investors, it does not always happen before you need it and this week we really need some additional funds. If you or any of your colleagues are able to provide any operating capital, I would certainly appreciate your contacting Joey or Suzanna at your earliest convenience. Unfortunately, the financial situation has gotten to the point where, as an old auctioneer in Canada used to say… “Ladies and Gentleman, if you are done, I have to be!” until I am able to find additional capital. Best regards, xxxxxx ============================================================================= Jan 27, 2007 Hello GBRP Treasure Hunters, We have an update from the site, and while much progress is being made and some very interesting events have happened, there is still no "blue". You may be asking, how is it we are so close to so many targets and yet we can't get to any of it somehow? We also are getting frustrated, believe me. One thing that we need to consider is that this operation is on a totally shoestring budget and that often that ends up costing more in the long run, in terms of money AND time. It is like using a blunt saw to cut down trees; Rather than spend the money to get a sharpened saw so the work can be more efficient, we keep expecting that we can soon sell the logs to buy that sharpened saw with and so keep plugging away with the dull one. That was a long analogy, but I hope you see my point. They are digging an ocean with a worn out spoon. Another point to consider is that the "targets" are really just information on the scanner, along with hints from certain signals found on the site (like the marker rocks), information from test drilling and lots of intuition and hope. Every target that has been reached has turned up nothing but more clues and more scanning info that in fact, the booty is there, but deeper still. The fact that they are finding man made rocks and signs underneath all this dirt is alone enough to keep me encouraged. The gold bits they brought up on the drill a few weeks ago even more so. So while we thought this was going to be a quick turn around when we started the project early last year, and every week we are on the edge of our seats due to the most recent discovery the team has made, we must just keep going with this until they finally hit the paydirt. We know it is there.... there really isn't any doubt about that. It is simply taking longer than we thought to find it, but they are doing the very best they can with what they have to work with and I really feel for the guy when he says he can't wait to find even a small recovery so that he can finally concentrate on the full recovery instead of spending so much time and energy finding more sources of funds to keep going from week to week. Stick with this and you will be rewarded. I sure hope it is sooner rather than later, but you are funding a worthy project and even if it is a longer term one than we had planned on, the returns will be well worth the wait and the support you have shown. Until further notice, we are accepting more funds as we need to help keep them working and digging. Spend info is here. It's a longer wait than we got in line for, but WOW! What a ride! Thank you, Suzanna and Joey Bits and pieces of info from site manager that was in emails on other matters: Jan 3: XXXXX, the mining engineer and I are both in agreement that we should be going into the corner of the property where we are presently drilling for water and we will dig down to the hard rock area where the gold chips came to the surface. We have let it be known that the excavation will be for the purpose of digging a cistern (an underground water storage tank). Today the drill finally broke through the bottom of the rock layer in that area at about 31 feet deep and I would expect that we should be able to complete drilling the initial well bore hole down to about 200 feet deep before the end of the week. As such, it is our plan to have part of the crew start digging for that gold next week and have the other crew members continue to work in the main excavation tunnel system. In this manner, we should be able to maximize the labour efforts and cut down to the area the gold chips came from in less than two weeks from the start of the new excavation. Jan 10: When the crew removed some of the rocks from the tunnel and the signal disappeared from the area but moved with the rock to the surface, I started checking the rocks and we broke one of them without apparent success. However, the last large marker rock we moved to the surface has both a signal and markings on its surface indicating that we may have Spanish Gold Coins or some sort of coins inside. We plan to try to cut it open in the morning if I can find the money needed to buy diamond blades for our cutter. We could also use the jackhammers but that will destroy the rock and we really do not want to do that. Jan 17: I took lots of pictures (of the rock) and the crew is working their way into what we anticipate are deposits at 20 to 25 feet deep. I have been at the site early and late most days and have done quite a bit of scanning/locating. Today, both potential deposits the crew are working toward showed up on the EM system so I can only hope that we are at the correct depth this time (20 to 25 feet below the surface). We were planning on starting to dig down where the drill is working but we are drilling through very hard material (starting at 143 feet below the surface... again - may be significant) and have not hit water yet. Interestingly, while I told you previously about the "ramp", yesterday I tried to find the end of it and found the "anomaly" makes a 180 degree turn and ends under the wood in our site (please see attached photo). The blue lines are roughly the tunnel system that I found which appears to have steps descending to what can only be several different levels. Jan 25 (Official update from site manager) 07-01-25GOLD RECOVERY PROJECT UPDATE Greetings : It has been an interesting past few weeks as well as an exciting day today. After cutting and breaking the marker rock from the bottom of the main excavation, we found several smaller rocks within the rock and I will take samples of each to the Bureau of Mines for their professional analysis. I did have some sort of precious metal signal emanating from rock before, during and after the time we were breaking it but we did not find bars or coins (unfortunately) in the rock.  I then had the crew work in towards other potential targets at the 20 to 25 foot depths from the main excavation. After cutting the tunnel through the northerly area, the one target for which I had obtained a direction heading from inside of the northerly side of the excavation was still there but it showed that the target was still considerably deeper. When I tried to figure out why it was not at the location indicated, I obtained an indication of a target at that 20 to 25 foot depth pretty well in a straight line from where I had checked from inside the excavation but about 8 or 10 feet further out so there is still something there that we will work towards at the appropriate time. I had assumed that the closest target I had found from the surface was the target when actually, the shallow target was further away. I learned something new again. While it is good to learn, it would also be very nice to get a bar or two to turn into cash so that I could focus on the recovery instead of continually having to try to find operating funds to keep us going. Last Friday, after a short discussion between xxxx and myself, we both agreed that the area we had drilled into and recovered the gold flakes from (the southern corner of our property – yellow square on the satellite photo) while looking for free flowing water should be given priority. As you know, we were not looking for gold in the area when we started to drill but were rather trying to find the water primarily for humanitarian reasons. I cannot help but feel that this specific location has the potential to save us years of work, if it is indeed a tunnel or ramp which the Japanese used to access the main deposit chambers. As such, last Saturday, we gave most of the crew instructions to commence excavating towards that target from the surface. We expect to get down to the 21 foot depth within about two weeks as two crew members will continue to work in the shallow, narrow southerly side tunnel at the main excavation. There is only room for two to work in the tunnel at one time. Yesterday afternoon, the crewmembers in that tunnel hit a number of larger rocks and I have an indication of gold and copper/brass being very close to that location. We are still trying to find that elusive brass or copper target containing gold that we hit with the drill December 15, 2005. The new excavation in the southerly corner is 12 feet by 12 feet and at a depth of six feet below the surface, we encountered the first markers. The initial “center of object” marker was recovered about midway from the center point to the wall so the chosen location appears to be good and I anticipate that the excavation location will bring us down on top of the cement where I suspect a descending tunnel or ramp starts down to the main excavation site (following the white markings on the most recent satellite photo).  On Tuesday afternoon, after removing all of the steel and wood shoring from the main excavation tunnel system, we moved the boom truck over to the new excavation in order to support it as the hole was getting too deep for the crew members to throw the dirt out of. So far, the tracker has identified about 30 different markers which have been recovered from the new excavation. I just returned from the site and the crew is down to about 11.5 feet so we are making good progress. I checked it for booby traps and found indications of five bombs at the new excavation. We must be just about dead center as the bomb indications are a few feet into the wall roughly centered on each side of the excavation and one more bomb almost dead center in the excavation and within a few feet of our drill hole. The bottom of the excavation is now about twelve feet below the surface and I get an indication that the bomb in the center is less than four feet below the level where we are working. Having bombs there is a very good indication that we have a shallow deposit and are going down in the correct area. We are still drilling for water about 10 feet away from the new excavation and, last Saturday, apparently the walls of the drill hole collapsed pinning the bottom 6 lengths of drill rod and the bit (about 63 feet in total) in the bottom of the hole. If there is too much turning resistance when drilling, the drill motor automatically reverses and the driller did not realize what had happened until he started pulling the drill steel to check the bit late Monday morning. There were only 13 lengths of pipe on the drill (not the 19 he had expected. After several unsuccessful attempts at reattaching the pinned drill rods, on Tuesday afternoon, I made about a one foot long guide pin and had it welded in an offset position inside one of the drill rods. We inserted it in the drill hole and after several attempts, the pin did its job and we were able to rejoin the drill rods to the lost rods. This was very fortunate but the “fun” was only beginning. After getting the drill rods to turn in the hole, we were unable to lift the steel rods with the drilling rig winch and apparently burned out the winch drive motor trying. After using most of our remaining funds to replace the motor, I had the crew build a special fixture which was clamped to the drill steel and we have two 15 and 20 ton hydraulic jacks which we will use to jack the drill steel slowly out of the ground and try to free it up this way. As it has been a very slow and tedious process, this morning I used the rest of the funds on hand to buy a 5 ton chain hoist in hopes that this will provide the extra force needed to recover the drill rods and bit. It is worthwhile to recover the drill rods and bit as it would cost roughly $2000 USD to replace the drill steel plus two weeks of drilling time and the total associated costs of about $1000 USD to drill another hole. This afternoon, we broke the jacking rig and will have to fabricate a heavier duty unit. Yesterday, I checked the ramp/tunnel shown in white on the satellite photo and it appears that from the starting point under our new excavation to where it terminates under the wood in the original Japanese excavation, the ramp/tunnel is approximately 530 feet total length. I am trying to calculate angles for vehicle access/egress and potential depths where the main chambers could be and how that would match up with the other tunnels we know about. In hindsight, and based on my previous tunnel locating and mapping activities, I do not think that there is another descending ramp/tunnel going out the other side towards the southerly corner but I will try to check that tomorrow as it is certainly possible. Considering that the tunnel/ramp appears to start at about 30 feet below the surface, at 530 feet long, a 15 degree slope (approximate pitch of 1 in 4) would allow a maximum depth of approximately 162.5 feet (132.5 plus 30) while a 20 degree slope (approximate pitch of 1.3 in 4) would result in a total depth of approximately 202.25 feet (172.25 plus 30). It is not likely that the slope would be steeper than that if the trucks were expected to crawl back out of the deposit chamber. While I suspect that the final chamber is 250 to 300 feet below the surface, time will tell. Best regards, xxxx xxxxxxxx PS - Just as I was completing this and preparing to head off to the internet, xxxx called me from the project site to say that they had found another marker rock with a horseshoe pointing down (see photo) which should be only 10 feet above the target which means that our drilling results match with the horseshoe marker.  xxxx was so excited about the horseshoe marker that he brought it to my house. After I washed it, I found that not only did it have the horseshoe marker but it also has a small dot in the middle of the horseshoe which indicates “TREASURE UNDER”. We now expect to find three rocks closely spaced together a short distance below. Now we have one further problem in that we are getting a lot of unwanted attention and have to put up a high Sawali and chainlink security fence around that excavation too. =========================================== Jan 11, 2007 GOLD RECOVERY PROJECT UPDATE Monday, the start of another week… The day started with the removal of the largest marker rock encountered in the recovery project to date. The marker rock was dug out of the sidewall of the main excavation under the new tunnel on the south easterly side in order to be able to get deeper, trying to find that elusive target hit by the drill December 15, 2005. Due to the size of the rock, on Saturday, the crew spent some time trying to break the rock into smaller pieces so that we could get it out of the hole. They only succeeded in breaking several smaller pieces off the rock that may have reduced the weight by a hundred or so kilograms but we were able to lift it out with the crane. Then we removed another much smaller rock which was pinned underneath the first rock and the crew spent the rest of the day digging out another large marker rock, similar in size to the first one and which was also positioned below and behind the first one lifted out this morning. We managed to get it rigged by the end of the day and will lift it out of the hole in the morning. As xxxx commented, “these rock markers are significantly larger as compared to the rest of the rock in the layer so they obviously had significance”… but it would be nice to know exactly what significance they had for the Japanese Military. The markings on them point to some deeper identified targets but they have more significance than just that. While I say rock, these are man made “rocks”, fabricated by the Japanese Army and Navy during WW II and each one has significance, as does the different series of markings utilized by each of the Generals in charge. However to properly expound on that would take a book to explain and a lot more knowledge on the subject than I have. With regard to our knowledge of the markings, we are only at the proverbial “tip of the iceberg”. The excavation crew reached the target point in the north end of the westerly tunnel on Saturday when they removed several mid size rocks that appeared to be shaped as snake heads and skulls and which were pointing down. I checked the tunnel early this morning and we have a target below the floor at the end of the tunnel but I will try to check it with the EM System before spending more time there digging down. While the main recovery crew worked in the new tunnel (southeasterly side), when the crane was not needed to support the work at the bottom, I had the other crew members cut into the main excavation northerly sidewall about 22 feet below the surface in order to check one of the gold targets indicated at that point. Almost immediately (within a foot), they encountered a fairly hard grayish blue soil which, as you likely guessed, is certainly not natural. An elderly Japanese military engineer whom I first met on a project which xxxx was managing for our former associate, repeatedly told us “follow the blue”. So as “the blue” is leading us in the direction indicated by the locating equipment, we are following the blue! I only expect to have to cut in about 6 feet or two meters to get to the target area, but that may take another 2 or 3 days with the working conditions and soil type. Someone recently asked why it takes so long to do the excavation and tunneling work? Well, they say a picture is worth a thousand words so the best way to answer most of that question is with the attached picture (it may save several thousand words)… This morning, for the photo, we had most of the crew stand, arms extended, on top of the pile of rock which we have removed from the excavation site. Most of the crew members are between 5’6” and 5’11” tall. xxxx’s truck is a 4X4 and the roof must also be about 5’6” high and he is about 6’3” or almost 2 meters high. My 4X4 Safari at the far end is also about 6 feet tall. As you can tell, the pile of rock is close to 6 feet (or just under 2 meters) high.  At the far end, it has to be about 20 feet (6 meters wide) while at the close end, it will be about half that width. While we did not measure it lengthwise, the pile of rock must be at least 70 feet in length. Some time ago, we sold four large dump truck loads of the smaller rock to a local contractor and we still have about one dump truck load inside the fence to be moved out to the pile which would make it quite a bit larger still. Now, imagine dragging a 275 pound (125 kg) or larger rock, anywhere between 5 and 55 feet inside a tunnel in mud and water, than loading it into the crane cage where it is lifted some 38 feet to the surface and then removed from the cage before being loaded into the Bobcat bucket to be moved outside the fence. And that is only the rocks (although fortunately many of them are much smaller in size). The sawali (bamboo matting) attached to the exterior of the chain link fence around the security compound is 8 feet high. While you cannot see it in this picture, we have dirt from the excavation piled as high as the fence in the southerly corner and have likely increased the average depth of topsoil inside the compound by at least 2.5 feet. If you calculate that volume, not including the rock, it amounts to some 2062 cubic yards (or 1577 cubic meters) of dirt which has been removed from the excavation and tunnels by hand. Some time ago, I looked up our Recovery Project Site on the Google Earth website. The attached photo shows a “close up” of the site from the satellite and must have been taken in late 2004 or early 2005 which I was able to determine from the blue tarp material we had placed as a sunshield over the first excavation we had done at that time (a blue diamond shape marked with number 1).  While somewhat crude and not to scale (it should be quite accurate however), the yellow line represents the surveyed border of our property and outer perimeter fence line, the green line is the inner perimeter security fence, the red border around the 3 blue diamonds (marked with number 4) approximates the main excavation site and the white rectangle indicates the original Japanese excavation where we drilled and found the 3 foot thick layer of decomposing wood at 64 to 67 feet below the surface and other layers of decomposing wood down to almost 100 feet deep. The light blue circle containing the black diamond shape is the area of the mass grave we had previously located. The mass grave is the area where the Japanese Military placed the bodies of all the executed slave laborers after they finished placing the large volumes of gold, silver and other valuables, in the site. The long blue line is an underground tunnel which I suspect is filled with water running from a free flowing well (beside the satellite compass rose showing north) and touches into the southerly corner of our property. The yellow rectangle in the southerly corner is where we are currently drilling for water and where we recovered the gold chips about 3 weeks ago (see update 06-12-21). Locating activities have indicated an additional “line of targets” at regular intervals running north from the southerly corner, across our property and continuing for some distance beyond our fence line (an area we planned to “acquire” or expand into, in the future). We tentatively plan to continue drilling in the southerly corner until we hit the free flowing water at which point we will dig down to the hard rock layer to recover the gold encountered at that point and construct a cistern (underground water storage tank) as our “reason” for digging there. Inside the main excavation for the next several days, the crew will be split with some working in the tunnels and some working towards the potential target at about 22 feet below the surface. For those of you who are not familiar with the background and history behind our gold recovery project, while there are a number of books and authors who have written on the subject, I would highly recommend that you obtain a copy of the book “Gold Warriors (The covert history of Yamashita’s Gold)” by Sterling and Peggy Seagrave and published by Bowstring Books (www.bowstring.net) with ISBN 0-9724146-0-6. A version is available with two compact discs which contain a lot of information not published in the book. Best regards, XXXXXXX |