Gold Rush Fans Are Ecstatic To See Big Al Again In Season 13

The pursuit of gold is not only a great personal motivator to brave the wilds, but it also makes for some pretty interesting reality television. The original "Gold Rush" show started in 2010 on the Discovery Channel, and due to its overwhelming popularity, several spin-off series were created, like "Gold Rush: White Water," "Gold Rush: Winter's Fortune," and "Gold Rush: Parker's Trail," to name a few. Although the locations of these series can change depending on the format of the television show, all "Gold Rush" properties deal with placer mines, which according to NPS, involve extracting gold and other precious minerals from sand or gravel.

"Yukon Gold" is a Canadian reality television series that found itself a broadcast home on the National Geographic Channel in the United States. Similarly to "Gold Rush," this show also follows people as they utilize the placer mining technique, and it was even filmed in the same location as the original "Gold Rush" — Dawson City, Yukon. Big Al McGregor is one of the stars of "Yukon Gold," and as noted by IMDb, he appears in episodes during the show's entire run, which ended in 2017. Back when "Yukon Gold" first premiered in 2013, McGregor was asked by HuffPost how long he hopes to be mining, and he replied, "At least 10 years. This is my dream. So tell me, when do you tire of a dream? Probably never." Luckily for fans of the gold mining genre, Big Al popped up in an episode of "Gold Rush," and they certainly couldn't contain their emotions.

Over on Reddit, fans converged on r/GoldRush to express their shock at the surprise cameo of Big Al McGregor from "Yukon Gold." u/admiraltubby90 started the conversation by asking their fellow Reddit denizens to take a moment to appreciate that Big Al appeared on "Gold Rush," and that it was very nice to see him since "Yukon Gold" had ended. u/Canadasaver said that they enjoyed "Yukon Gold" and had always wondered what happened to Big Al on account of his issues with health and mobility. They added that since they are in Canada, they are a week behind in broadcasts but expressed excitement at seeing Big Al in the future.

u/Oldiewan hopes for much more Big Al in the future and added, "They need to get Big Al on gold rush full time. I couldn't believe it when I saw him on gold rush giving the two brothers a job. He and Hiro were fun to watch. Get Karl and his dad Marty Knudsen as well; it would save the show. Every other mining show failed after losing interesting people and just throwing in people no one cares about just to make an hour show."

Some users even hoped for Big Al to replace a current member of "Gold Rush," with u/cityofsinlvnv suggesting, "He needs to replace Former Army Ranger Medic Veteran Fred Lewis! Big Al is a class Act!" Judging by the comments, it seems that fans absolutely adored seeing Big Al from "Yukon Gold" pop up in Episode 5 of Season 13 of "Gold Rush," titled "Cheat Codes." Let's hope that he will continue to do so in the future.