The ALICE CREEK placer mine is located adjacent to Alice Creek, approximately 1 kilometre upstream from its junction with Mary Creek in the Cariboo Region. The Toop Nugget (Mary Creek) mine lies approximately 600 metres to the southeast on Mary Creek. The Alice Creek mine site is approximately 6 kilometres northeast of the community of Cottonwood and 29 kilometres northeast of Quesnel.

There are several placer gold deposits along the Cottonwood River and its tributaries, such as John Boyd Creek, Norton Creek, Mary Creek and Alice Creek, which have been worked since the 1860's. The deposits are located in benches ranging in height from about a metre to several metres above the present course of the river or its tributaries. The gold is derived from interstadial and pre-glacial deposits. The majority of the gold from the Mary Creek and Alice Creek area is hackly, irregular-surfaced coarse nuggets, leading to the opinion that the gold is locally derived and associated with local bedrock quartz veining.

The pre-Tertiary geology of this area consists of mafic volcanic and sedimentary rocks of the Upper Triassic to Lower Jurassic Nicola Group of the Quesnellia terrane. The area is regionally underlain by Triassic argillaceous sediments and felsic volcanics of the Nicola Group.

Gold-bearing gravels and sands at the mine, interpreted as low-sinuosity braided river deposits, are overlain by approximately 30 metres of diamicton, gravel, sand, silt and clay. The auriferous deposits are 9 to 14 metres thick. The poorly to moderately-sorted gravels are manganese and iron-stained and discontinuously cemented. There is a downward increase in gold values, with the highest values in the lower 3 to 5 metres over highly fractured argillite bedrock. The pay channel delineated in 1988 was estimated as 5.79 to 7.62 metres thick by 36.58 to 115.82 metres wide by 356.62 metres in length. It appears to be largely unexplored to the north, south and west (Assessment Report 35047).

In 1983, M. Poschner acquired the Alice Creek placer ground and discovered a buried high-grade placer channel and with a test adit confirmed impressive quantities of coarse gold. From 1986 to 1988, 135,000 cubic metres was moved and 11,000 metres was washed, producing 43 kilograms (1375 ounces) of gold. In 1988 Cumorah Resources conducted mapping and drilling programs over the Alice Creek gold showings. A total of 35 large diameter auger holes drilled to depths of 30.48 metres succeeded in delineating the southern extension of the Alice Creek pay channel.