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Curiplaya Project

Location, Access, Physiography And Climate

The Curiplaya Project (the "Project") covers an area of 3,964 hectares or almost 40 square kilometres. The Project is located near the village of Bramaderos in the Paltas Municipality of Loja Province in south-western Ecuador. The Project is located approximately 220 kilometres to the south-east of the port town of Machala and approximately 140 kilometres to the west of the city of Loja, the capital of the province.

The Project is accessible by vehicle from the city of Loja, a 2.5 hour drive, along the well-paved Pan-American highway which actually passes through the western portion of the Project. Loja is well serviced by daily flights (45 minutes) from the capital city of Quito. Vehicle access within the Project, along un-maintained dirt or gravel roads, is quite extensive in the north central portion of the Project. Further access elsewhere on the concessions is feasible only by foot along paths, streambeds and open ground.

The 40 square kilometres of concessions comprise conical hills and steep-sided ridges separated by relatively wide alluvial plains. The elevation ranges between 800 metres and 1,100 metres. Agricultural production is minimal because of the arid, semi-desert, climate. Several permanent creeks and rivers, fed from surrounding highlands, cut the concession.

The climate of the Curiplaya region is hot and dry (semi-desert) with an average daily temperature of 25oC. Annual rainfall is 797 mm with a wet season from the end of December to April. Vegetation comprises open forest and scrub. Land use is mostly pastoral with some crops grown in isolated fields (e.g. maize). The concession is located within the catchment area of the Rio Playas; a tributary of the Rio Catamayo that becomes the Rio Chira in Peru and eventually drains into the Pacific Ocean.

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Previous History

UNDP & SPANISH AID MISSION (1970 - 1984): Mineralization at Curiplaya was first discovered in 1970 during a systematic regional-scale geochemistry survey completed by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP, 1972). Copper, lead, zinc, and molybdenum geochemical anomalies coinciding with zones of hydrothermal alteration were identified at Rio Playas. Between 1970 and 1984, the UNDP, in conjunction with the Spanish Aid Mission, followed up the regional survey with more detailed geochemistry and four diamond drill holes totalling 2,142 metres (drill cores location is unknown).

In 1999, Sr. Enrique Figeuroa of Loja applied for an Exploration Title for what is now the present Curiplaya Project, and in August 1999, he transferred the rights to this application to Mesaloma S.A., which was subsequently granted the Exploration Title by the government in February 2000. In January 2001, Mesaloma S.A. transferred its mining rights to Ecuanor S.A., an Ecuador-based "junior" Canadian mineral exploration company, whereby Ecuanor S.A. assumed the obligations and responsibilities of the original agreement between Mesaloma S.A. and Sr. Figueroa. In September 2001, the government replaced the Exploration Title at Curiplaya with the newly created General Concession Mining Title.

ECUANOR S.A. (2001 - 2002): Between 2001 and 2002, Ecuanor S.A. carried out extensive exploration of the Curiplaya Property including geological mapping, stream sediment and soil geochemistry (103 line kilometers at 100 x 400 metres and 100 x 100 metres sample spacings), rock chip geochemistry (700 samples), geophysics (magnetics: >40 line kilometers and induced polarization (IP): 17 line kilometers), and diamond drilling (3,243 metres of NQ2 in 13 inclined holes). Ecuanor S.A. samples were assayed by ALS-Chemex labs in Ecuador and/or possibly Canada, with thin sections prepared in Vancouver, Canada, and PIMA (Portable Infrared Mineral Analyzer) analyses carried out by the British Geological Survey mission in Ecuador. The results of Ecuanor S.A.'s exploration work are detailed in several reports including maps, drill logs and assays (Allen, 2000, Pratt and Allen, 2001, Val D'Or Geofisica Peru, 2000).

Ecuanor S.A. subsequently divided the stockwork zones into the (1) Porotillo Stockwork Zone, (2) Bramaderos Stockwork Zone, (3) Melonal Stockwork Zone, (4) Epithermal/Shear Zone, and (5) Limon Anomaly Zone, plus a number of un-named stockwork zones. Rock chip samples from these stockwork zones reportedly returned assay values of up to more than 2 g/t Au and 0.1-0.2% copper. "Anomalous" lead and zinc values were also found associated with skarn mineralization.

In January 2002, Ecuanor ceased exploration of the Curiplaya Property and transferred the rights to the Property to Sr. Figueroa.

Ecuanor S.A. drill data and gold and copper assay highlights:
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BRAMADEROS ZONE
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Drill  Bearing /  Total  Gold  Copper
Hole  Inclination Depth   g/t    %                Notes
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CURI_01 102/-45   193 m  0.52  0.07  None
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CURI_02 330/-45   100 m  0.29  0.055 None
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CURI_03 236/-44   257 m  0.57  0.14  From 67 m to 121 m, 54 m @ 1.07 g/t Au
                                     From 231 m to 251.7 m, 26 m @ 0.80 g/t Au
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CURI_07 204/-70    90 m  0.35  0.08  Hole abandoned due to fracturing.
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CURI_08 204/-45    40 m  0.23  0.04  Hole abandoned due to fracturing.
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CURI_09 230/-55   452 m  0.23  0.07  None
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CURI_10 288/-59   194 m  0.08  trace Drilled down an acid-leached
                                     zone?  No quartz veining.
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CURI_11 015/-57   458 m  0.20  0.065 Sample of 2.5 g/t Au cut to 0.5 g/t
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CURI_13 216/-59   428 m  0.40  0.10  From 216 m to 318 m, 102 m @ 0.567 g/t Au
                                     Max Au value 0.925 g/t Au.
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         total  2,212 m
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MELONAL ZONE
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CURI_04   ?       147 m  0.168  0.045 None
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CURI_06   ?       153 m   0.28   0.07 None
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         total    300 m
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POROTILLO ZONE
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CURI_05 180/-70   263 m  0.30   0.09 From 6.0 m to 30 m, 24 m @ 12 g/t Au
                                      From 230 m to 263 m not sampled, 
                                      post-mineralization intrusive.
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CURI_12 240/-57   468 m  0.07   0.05 None
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          total   731 m 
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                                             Taken from Jemielita, 2005
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Some core from the Ecuanor S.A. drill program (holes Curi_10 and 11 from Bramaderos) still exists and is in storage in Loja at a property onwed by Sr. Figueroa. However, the whereabouts of the bulk of the core is not known.

ASCENDANT EXPLORATION S.A - ECUADOR GOLD S.A. (2004 - 2006): In March 2004, Ascendant Exploration S.A. entered into a purchase option agreement (the "Option") with Sr. Figueroa on the Curiplaya Property. In March 2006, Ecuador Gold S.A., a subsidiary of AndeanGold Ltd., acquired the rights to the Option from Ascendant Exploration, which had completed some work at Curiplaya beyond the collection of 17 surface grab samples across the Bramaderos, Melonal, and Porotillo zones. The results of Ascendant Exploration's sampling are: 
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Sample No.  UTM Coordinates     Gold    Copper
              X          Y       g/t      %
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ACB-01     631207     9548181   0.134   0.014
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ACB-02     631385     9548066   0.623   0.123
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ACB-03     631408     9548045   0.556   0.145
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ACB-04     631487     9547951   0.503   0.124
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ACB-05     631650     9547851   0.563   0.113
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ACB-06     631523     9547892   0.713   0.183
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ACB-07     631443     9547884   0.269   0.112
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ACB-08     631341     9547891   0.049   0.007
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ACB-09     631262     9548016   0.401   0.100
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ACB-10     632685     9549290   0.383   0.086
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ACB-11     632746     9549242   0.515   0.113
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ACB-12     632641     9549237   0.522   0.094
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ACB-13     632435     9549295   0.478   0.169
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ACB-14     632435     9549295   0.441   0.145
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ACB-15     632416     9549435   0.320   0.117
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ACB-16     632425     9549396   0.465   0.130
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ACB-17     632442     9549306   0.498   0.111
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Ascendant grab sample numbers, location, and assay results

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Regional Geology

Ecuador consists of several oceanic, continental, and island-arc terranes accreted to the Guyana Shield during the Andean Orogeny that occurred between the Early Cretaceous and Early Tertiary. As a result, Ecuador is conventionally described as being divided into three distinct north-northeast trending geologic and physiographic regions: (1) the coastal plains (La Costa) to the west, (2) the central mountainous area- the Andes (La Sierra), and (3) the eastern lowlands (El Oriente).
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Local Geology

The Curiplaya area is underlain by the Cretaceous-aged calc-alkaline volcanics-porphyritic andesites, tuffs, and breccias, and intercalated sediments of the Pinon and Celica formations. These rocks are intruded by the Tangula Batholith (Cretaceous) as well as younger quartz-diorite porphyries emplaced along north-east bearing by sinistral faults. Gypsum/anhydrite veins are common and widespread across the surrounding district.

Both the Pinon and Celica formations are considered to be predominantly of marine origin and consist of a thick succession of massive, homogeneous, grayish-green andesitic lavas and tufts, with sporadic dacitic volcanics. The formations are considered to be remnants of a volcanic-arc developed along an active continental margin or aborted marginal basin. Both formations are affected by very low-grade (sub-greenschist facies) metamorphism.

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Deposit Type

The Lithologies of the La Sierra region extend into Peru and Chile to the south and Colombia to the north. In these countries, there are a significant number of Mesozoic porphyry copper and porphyry-related copper deposits similar to that which is believed to exist at Curiplaya. Mineralization within the Curiplaya Project is characterized by quartz diorite (alkalic) porphyry related copper-gold mineralization. Skarn and epithermal styles of mineralization have been reported to exist (Pratt and Allen, 2001) but have not been observed on the property by subsequent workers.

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This page was created on Mon Sep 6, 2010 at 10:50:42 AM Pacific Time.