Hey /out/ I need some legal(or maybe not so legal) advice, what would you do in this situation? I live in California and have been prospecting for gold around here for a year now and finally found a nice little creek deep in the Sierras with a fair bit of gold. Not exactly enough to strike it rich but it's very consistent so far, almost every pan of dirt I grab from the clay layer is littered with lots and LOTS of tiny gold flakes.

Problem is, well, this is California. The laws here regarding prospecting are really fucked up and motorized equipment mining is pretty much illegal or extremely difficult to get a permit for. I've been coming back here over a dozen times already and so far got almost an ounce but I had to do it by hand, literally digging the gravel out of the dirt and panning it. At best doing this alone I can only dig up around 250lbs worth of gravel and get maybe a gram of gold a day if I'm lucky, usually less. Without machines to make this easier this just isn't worth it at all when even a shitty wagie job at Mcdonalds would earn me more money per day with less danger.

What should I do, should I just give up? It just drives me nuts that there's so much gold here, literally MILLIONS of dollars worth but I can't dig it up by hand! I'm already a millionaire but I don't have the means to legally dig it out of the ground and process it!