The Hoop claims were located a few hundred metres east of Hoopatatkwa Lake and approximately 50 kilometres north of Kamloops. Access in the 1980s was by helicopter or float plane.

The known mineral occurrence is limited to a "trace of malachite stain" in granodioritic rocks of the Late Triassic to Early Jurassic Thuya batholith. Small flecks of molybdenite and possible chalcopyrite were also noted on the claims in the generally unaltered granodioritic rocks which underlie the claims.

In 1982, Pickands Mather & Company completed a sediment sampling program and detected copper and molybdenum anomalies. Follow-up soil sampling in 1972 and 1973 outlined several copper and molybdenum anomalies. One hundred and eighteen claims were staked and in 1973 were subjected to a program of linecutting (115.7 kilometres), magnetometer surveying (104.7 kilometres), soil sampling (992 samples) with analyses for copper, molybdenum and silver and geological mapping.