Become a world champion in gold panning

Do you have a special liking for films about the gold rush? Do you imagine what it would be like to pan with your own hands even just a single nugget of gold from a river?

Head to Zlaté Hory for the World Goldpanning Championships and make your dream come true.
The tournament will take place on 16–22 August at the Open-air Mining Museum (Hornický skanzen) in Zlaté Hory in Jeseníky Mountains. The championship will be open to the public, thus offering truly everyone the opportunity to pan for gold. The competition will be divided into the following categories: men, women, veterans, juniors and national teams. Some of the most interesting unofficial categories include traditional panning – Klondike pan and batea pan – and night panning.

A rich accompanying programme also will be prepared for both kids and adults. They can learn to pan for gold on the Olešnice River and participate in speleo-therapy. A special event for adults will be the slow pipe smoking competition. In Zlaté Hory, visitors also can take a look at the market of minerals and jewellery made from stones as well as an exhibition of photographs from the Zlaté Hory underground and take trips around the surrounding area with the possibility of visiting the Municipal Museum (Městské muzeum) and the Gold Mine Mills (Zlatorudné mlýny). During the Championships, in front of the town hall on Náměstí Svobody (“Freedom Square”), participants and visitors will be able to enjoy Irish and Scottish tap-dancing performed by the Irské sestry (“Irish Sisters”) dance ensemble, a whip show, fireworks and performances by various music groups.

Thanks to its mining past, the Zlatohorsko region is a popular tourist destination. The Open-air Mining Museum, visited by tens of thousands of visitors each year, was founded with financial support from the Olomouc regional government and the Ministry for Regional Development. The museum features miners’ cabins and fully functional replicas of pulp-mills and mills for processing gold ore. The premises are located in the so-called Valley of the Lost Adits (Údolí ztracených štol), an area of historical soft mines.

“The Mayor’s Gold Challenge Pan” gold panning competition has been held at the museum already for 16 years. According to the competition rules, the winner keeps the winner’s pan for 1 year and the following year he or she must defend the title. The museum also hosted the European championships in 1996 as well as the Czecho-Slovak open championships in 2001, 2005 and 2009. In 2007, in the Finish town of Tankavaara, the World Gold Panning Association (WGA) decided that the World Championships in 2010 would be hosted by the Czech Republic at the Open-air Mining Museum in Zlaté Hory.

Zlaté Hory, formerly Cucmantel, was founded in 1224. This area is the most prominent in Silesia in terms of the presence of gold. It is no surprise, therefore, that the town’s history is connected with its extraction and mining activities. Gold mining reached its greatest boom in the 16th century, during which time gold nuggets weighing 1,385 g and 1,780 g were discovered in 1590 and 1591, respectively, when digging the “Three Kings” (Tří králové) drainage adit. A period of decline followed, however, and attempts to restore mining to its former level failed. Modern mining operations were terminated in 1994.

The event will be held in cooperation with the Czech Goldpanning Association (Česká asociace zlatokopů) and the Moravian-Silesian Goldpanning Club (Klub moravskoslezských zlatokopů) under the auspices of the Commissioner of the Olomouc Region.