International Gold Hunter - Joey Freeze, P.Geo. Candente Resource Corp.

By Ellsworth Dickson    February 27, 2003 www.resourceworldmag.com

Some people have all the fun. Joey Freeze explores for gold in Peru, gets into bidding wars with Barrick and packs a 44-Magnum to fend off banditos. She also hunts for the yellow metal in the Botwood Basin of Newfoundland.andente Resource Corp.

The office windows of Joey Freeze, president of Candente Resource Corp. [DNT-TSX Venture], look out into the heart of Vancouver, BC’s financial district where she is literally surrounded by hundreds of other junior exploration companies. An intelligent and personable woman of 45, Joey seems totally at home in the high risk/high reward game of mineral exploration.

A love of geology runs in the family - her Dad was in the oil business and husband, Art, also a geologist, is currently working in Peru. Born in Calgary, Alberta, she moved to Tulsa, Oklahoma when she was 14, then to Chicago for the last two years of high school. After graduation, her parents moved to Europe while Joey attended the University of Western Ontario where she earned a B.A. in geography. By her third year, however, she was hooked on geology. Her first field job was coal exploration in northeast BC that convinced her mineral exploration was going to be a career. Following two years in coal, Joey worked for Art Troup at the Hughes-Lang Group exploring for gold for four years in BC, Yukon and northern U.S. After a stint with Glen White Geophysics, she consulted for various companies, including some majors such as Placer Dome.

Peru

From 1994 to 1997, Joey lived in Peru where her husband was working. By then they had two young children, Dylan and Samantha. Working for a junior company she got to know Peru’s geology and mineral belts quite well. During these years Canadian companies were beginning to explore Peru, which enabled Joey and Art to receive geological contracts. Because she had written many geological reports that were filed with the stock exchange (VSE), Joey was in demand as a consultant. In her early years in Peru, she became aware of the dangers of banditos, not only to foreigners, but to the locals as well. That’s why she carried a 44 Magnum pistol when working in that country.

"We had to watch out for the Sendero group of terrorists," explains Joey. "When we first arrived in Peru, things were considered dangerous as it was believed it was the Sendero that had killed a geologist. Sometimes they would invade a farm and kill the family living there.

This led to many people giving up their rural lifestyle out of fear and moving to Lima where many currently live in poverty. Fortunately, things have improved considerably; but we often alter our plans to throw off any possible ambushes. I think it helps to have a Peruvian crew."

While she was wary of terrorists, it was a small spider bite that caused Joey the most grief. "My face swelled up badly and it was difficult to get proper medical help. The first doctor told me I was not used to the climate, but then I got worse. People were beginning to look at me oddly as I became very ugly from the facial swelling. Soon my entire body was turning red and purple.

Finally I got decent medical help, but it was pretty scary for a while. It took about a week to recover. "It was a providential day when Vancouver entrepreneur Catherine McLeod-Seltzer, president of Arequipa Resources, hired Joey to explore their Paron property where drilling was underway.

Arequipa was also getting ready to drill their California Quattro property. On her second day in the field, Peruvian geologist Fredy Huanqui (Candente’s current vice president of exploration) mentioned that if she liked the California Quattro property, she would really like the Pierina property. Fredy had staked the Pierina ground on behalf of Arequipa and named the claims after his daughter.

Unlike other gold properties in Peru, the Incas or Spaniards had never mined the Pierina property. "Because the gold is contained in vuggy silica and invisible to the naked eye, you would never know there is gold at Pierina since there were no old workings," says Joey."

Fredy, however, was familiar with a similar type of gold mineralization in Peru and recognized the potential. Even though many geologists had walked over the Pierina ground, no one bothered to take any samples since the rock appeared barren. In November 1995, based on Fredy’s attraction to the Pierina property, Joey asked Catherine if she would spend three days on the claims. Catherine gave her the go-ahead. By this time, Pierina samples were grading 8 grams gold/tonne on surface. On January 1, 1996 Joey again called Catherine to inquire if she needed a report on Pierina. Catherine said no thanks. Then, surprisingly, four days later Catherine called and said, "How fast can you write the Pierina report?" No wonder.

Arequipa discovered that anywhere there was 0.5 grams gold/tonne in soils, the bedrock below would run ore-grade gold. While Joey’s family skied at Whistler, BC she wrote up the report on Pierina. Meanwhile, Arequipa completed a $5 million financing at about $5 per share. Joey returned to Peru and continued to assist with exploration as a due diligence consultant at Pierina throughout the summer and complete the report. Prior to drilling, two adits were driven.

"The tunnels were driven into the heart of the gold deposit which gave us valuable geological information." In August 1996 Barrick Gold acquired Arequipa and the Pierina property for about Cdn $1 billion. After the Arequipa takeover, a colleague suggested Joey get together with Fredy and launch their own resource company. "We thought about it for five months, during which time Fredy had been working for Barrick," says Joey, "We finally took the plunge and raised seed money for our new company, Candente Resource Corp."

Initial funds were to be used for regional exploration and acquiring properties of merit. The first property Candente acquired was the Pamel, located in west-central Peru. "It has a high sulphidation gold target that needs drilling," says Joey. "We have completed rock geochemistry and mapping but we are not quite ready to drill it yet – it needs more systematic sampling. Other nearby gold discoveries have made the property more attractive and now there are majors taking a look at it."

Candente has over a dozen properties in Peru, mostly gold, but some copper. "Just on the cusp of going public we acquired from another Vancouver junior a 50% interest in the El Tigre, Las Sorpresas and Lunahuana properties on favourable terms, considering that over $500,000 had been spent on the properties – plus an option on the remaining interests. Las Sorpresas is adjacent to the Yanacocha mine. We staked the Picota ourselves and found the Las Brujas ground on our own."

Then Hecla Mining Company [HL-NY] told Candente they didn’t want to work in Peru any longer. "We optioned a 100% interest in Hecla’s Alta Dorado property from them subject to a 2.5% royalty," notes Joey. "Hecla had dropped some contiguous ground. We liked it because it was a high sulphidation target with many favourable geological characteristics such as the vuggy silica with good gold numbers."

"We won the adjacent claims in an auction," explains Joey. "In Peru, a previously held claim does not come open the moment it expires – it takes about a year. The government publishes a notice in the newspaper, sets a date and lets everyone know that on a certain date the land can be staked via paper staking. If more than one person ‘paper stakes’ the ground, the stakers are considered to be equal bidders. In this case, only Barrick Gold and Candente staked the ground. This led to a bidding war with Barrick."

Now the intrigue began. "We spoke to Barrick regarding a possible joint venture; however, we couldn’t come to an agreement. To make a long story short, at the auction we bid up to $50,133 and won the ground. Barrick lost because they stopped bidding at $50,000 – a close call. Basically, the auction was a game of high stakes poker. We viewed the acquisition as a bargain because Hecla has spent several hundred thousand dollars on exploration. In addition, two majors were visiting the property and were interested in some kind of deal. I think Barrick eventually acquired a small property nearby. Under the Peruvian regulations, one has 48 hours to pay or it goes to auction. Since Hecla had spent a great deal of money exploring Alto Dorado and Fredy understood high sulphidation systems, we had enough geological information to accurately gauge the value of the property."

Currently, Joey and her team continue to explore their various properties in Peru.

"I first became aware of mineral opportunities in Newfoundland from Larry Kornze, a former exploration manager at Barrick and now a Candente director, who told me that the Botwood Basin could have Carlin-style gold mineralization," says Joey. Larry showed her some samples pointing out that, "This could be another Carlin, we have got to be there!"

As readers know, the Carlin Belt in north-central Nevada hosts vast gold reserves. Since Larry had been involved in the discovery of more than 40 million ounces of gold in the Carlin Belt he was able to recognize the similarity between mineralization at the Botwood Basin and the Carlin Belt. Joey’s plan was to option properties that had known gold showings. The first one was the Linear property, which returned a high-grade sample grading 54 oz. gold/ton. "The more we looked the more excited we became. By the end of July 2002 we had as much land in Newfoundland as we have in Peru – over a dozen properties. We are currently drilling Island Pond. In 1989 and 1990 Noranda discovered quite few gold showings on the Linear, but never followed it up. Since then, prospectors working for us have found 10 surface showings with visible gold. We are presently trenching on the Linear claim group."

Interestingly, although there are producing and past-producing mines in Newfoundland, there are none in the Botwood Basin, in spite of some surface gold showings.

"We have found that a valuable exploration technique has been to followup lake bottom sediments," explains Joey, "This has been very helpful in finding gold targets. Up in the Virgin Arm area we have received very encouraging gold values where we developed targets by geochemistry. We are suffi ciently funded to continue our exploration programs." (See Lawrence Roulston’s story on p.29 for more Newfoundland exploration details).

Joey encourages girls to choose a career in the mining industry – whether it is in geology, management or the securities side. She notes that while the resource industry is still dominated by men, she has not experienced any negative side effects to speak of."I think that because women are in the minority their mistakes get noticed more, but so do their successes. Women must keep in mind that the exploration lifestyle is sometimes difficult. One needs an adventurous streak as it can involve traveling to remote parts of the world. This can mean being away from your husband and children which may not be suitable for everyone; however, it can also be exciting and rewarding."

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