Golden Hope Mines Limited (TSXV:GNH) announced assays from its Champagne deposit in the Appalachian Fold Belt of southeastern Quebec. Results include

• 1.23 g/t gold, 11.71 g/t silver and 1.6% zinc over 11.7 metres
  (including 1.79 g/t gold, 27.52 g/t silver and 2.77% zinc over 3.8 metres)
• 1.15 g/t gold, 17.24 g/t silver and 2.2% zinc over 8.2 metres
  (including 2.02 g/t gold, 30.14 g/t silver and 3.56% zinc over 4.7 metres)
• 1.28 g/t gold, 14.33 g/t silver and 1.73% zinc over 1.7 metres

President Frank Candido tells ResourceClips.com, “Bellechase-Timmins is a diorite quartz veining-hosted gold ore body, so it’s completely distinct from Champagne, which is a volcanic sulphide deposit. There was a report published by a gentleman by the name of Bergman in 1954, which was then updated in the 1990s by the Centre Geoscientifique de Quebec, which stated there was approximately a (non-NI 43-101) 300,000-tonne deposit — very shallow because all the drilling was very shallow — [grading] 2.4 g/t gold and approximately 20 g/t silver, with copper, lead and zinc credits.

“Champagne is within the same belt, so not completely distinct from Bellechase-Timmins. When we decided that we were going to prioritize Champagne as the next target, the first thing we wanted to do was make sure it existed and was there. There are no cores available from the time it was drilled, so we don’t have the core and don’t have the collar locations. We only know approximately where the drill holes were drilled. When we finally did drill Champagne — again, not really knowing where the zone was but guessing — we found we had intersected the furthest southwest part of the deposit. So it confirmed that, yes, the deposit is there, and we’re getting similar values. It’s provided us with a lot of encouragement obviously.”

“We’re about to publish the results from a VTEM survey [on Champagne],” Candido continues, “and I think it’s going to show that there is not only lots of room for growth on the Champagne zone itself but also lots of potential to repeat the Champagne zone over and over again because of the amount of anomalies. That information should come out in the next few days I think. We’re also expecting to put out the 43-101 resource estimate on Bellechase-Timmins very soon. [The VTEM] can put us in a situation where we can get into definition drilling at Champagne, which would give us basically two distinct projects simultaneously that we can develop quickly. That’s exciting for us.”

Regarding the resource estimate from Bellechase-Timmins, Candido says, “Holes 181 through 194 are still outstanding, so that’s 13 holes outstanding from our campaign which we stopped about three weeks ago. We’re expecting those holes back or most of those holes back within the next two weeks or so.

“The drilling at Champagne will be dependent on the VTEM, but as I said we’re expecting to publish that shortly. We’re putting the plan together for the drill campaign there now. The 43-101 will be published very shortly after most of those holes are in — not all the holes but some of those holes have been deemed very important. In the not too distant future, we’ll put a plan out to the market on how we will expand the resource that we have at Bellechase-Timmins and [which will] define the Champagne target. We expect to be drilling again certainly by the month of May.”

Infrastructure, Candido notes, “is excellent if you’re talking about access, hydro, workers and so forth. What there isn’t in southeastern Quebec is any gold mines, and so there’s no mining infrastructure. There are no mills and that sort of thing in the area. There is asbestos mining, and so there are miners in the area that we can get, but the one thing that’s lacking in the area is having a mill.