The CALIFORNIA prospect is situated east of the Hurley River and west of the Bralorne-Gold Bridge road, approximately 3.7 kilometres south of Gold Bridge, B.C.

The WHY NOT and CALIFORNIA prospects are in the BRX BLOCK, in the northern extension of the Bralorne Gold deposit trend. The local geology is a general extension of the lithological units at Bralorne. Gold-bearing quartz veins are hosted in Triassic greenstones, diorites and granites bounded by two major fault zones. These veins strike northwest and dip to the northeast, whereas gold-bearing veins at Bralorne-Pioneer strike west-northwest and dip to the north. Historically 10 veins have been defined in the BRX Block.

The "California shear" is traced for 750 metres along the contact between Permian Bralorne Complex augite-diorite and Upper Triassic Pioneer Formation, Cadwallader Group, greenstones. Tertiary sodic granite dikes intruding the greenstone also host mineralized veins. The shear zone, trending northwest and dipping northeast, splits and converges again at depth, with an average width of 2 metres.

Quartz breccia, crushed diorite, and greenstone and minor quartz lenses host pyrite, arsenopyrite, mariposite and a little free gold as disseminations and streaks. The best gold values are reported from where sulphides are impregnated in the sheared country rock. Deeper, on the hangingwall of a quartz vein, a massive chalcopyrite-pyrite zone is reported. A branch vein on the hangingwall, striking north-south is 15 centimetres wide and well mineralized with pyrite, arsenopyrite, chalcopyrite, sphalerite and free gold. Scheelite occurs sporadically, in 60 to 90 metre sections along the contact of greenstone and a sodic-granite dike. Samples from the sixth level of the underground workings assayed 27.43 grams gold per tonne over 2.1 metres (reported as discontinuous) (Property File - Kelly, 1977). The "California shear" extends northwest, into the "Whynot" workings (see 092JNE021). Where the two shear-veins intersect, high gold values are reported.

Work commenced on the underground development of veins in the California area in the late 1800s followed by sporadic work over the following years. A flurry of underground development occurred in the late 1920s and into the 1930s. Further underground development occurred in the mid to late 1940s.

Hat Creek Energy Corporation held the property for about three years from 1979, when they focused on diamond drilling and rehabilitation of 790 metres of underground workings on the Arizona, Golden Gate and Gloria-Kitty claims. In 1984, Levon Resources acquired the property and until 1986 they carried out line-cutting, soil sampling, mapping, VLF-EM surveys and back-hoe trenching followed by underground sampling and mapping at the California 2 level and Why Not adits. In 1987 they drilled 518 metres in six holes on the Rand zone. In addition, two holes totaling 307 metres were drilled on a quartz vein in the Hurley River bed, about 350 metres south of the Arizona portal. In late 1994, Strand Resources Ltd. under an option agreement with Levon, trenched and drilled on some targets on Levon’s 1985 soil survey grid.

All nine holes drilled by Mill Bay Ventures Inc. (in joint venture with Levon Resources Ltd.) in 2003, totaling 726.3 metres, intersected what is believed to be the California vein. In 2004, about 25 metres of drifting occurred in the new adit, developed about 100 metres north of the old dilapidated C3 adit. At that point, the drift face was about 8 metres from the line of Hole 5 where in 2003 a value of 5.65 grams per tonne gold was obtained over a true thickness intersection of 5.39 metres (Assessment Report 27557). Other work includes 750 metres of trenching in 28 trenches and 80 metres of underground development. Mill Bay Ventures Inc drove the cross-cut to access the California vein for grade determination and extraction of a bulk sample.

In 2018, Bralorne Gold Mines (Talisker Resources) ran aggressive programs to evaluate the potential of underexplored portions of the property, including digitization of known information, data mining and integration into 3D visualization software (Assessment Report 38967).

In 2021, Talisker Resources drilled 31 diamond drill holes totaling 16,814.5 metres and 3 reverse circulation holes totaling 1,343 metres in the BRX, Bralorne West and Bralorne East blocks, as well as an airborne magnetic, VLF-EM and radiometric surveys. All 4 holes drilled in the BRX Block intersected mineralization, with low to moderate grade intercepts across broad zones hosted in basalt, diorite and mafic and felsic dikes. The best intercept was in diamond drill hole SB-2021-068 (approximately 650 metres north of California), yielding a composite value of 90.71 grams per tonne gold over 2.25 metres (Assessment Report 40143).

*See BRALORNE (Minfile 092JNE001) for more on exploration, geology and mineral resource estimates for the Bralorne Gold deposit belt.