Most of the claims i travel to are from 90 minutes to 4 hours, so far. I moved to Idaho in 2007 and love it. I don't like the seasons in the spots I can mine. The seasons are really short here and in my opinion not worth the drive from other states unless it's at least open for 90 days. I have one claim I can only work for 30 days and another the season is 45 ndays. I was used to the 5 months I had on my claim in California. The gold in the are I mine is real fine. I work more in the south western part of the state. The northern part gets bigger gold and in some area's a longer season.
As for Leonards short trip to his claim, don't be fooled, he travels all over this country and Alaska just to mine and be around friends. Gold is not Leonards objective, helping and being around friends is.