Sierra Gold relates the adventures of a young eastern couple looking for a change. They head west to the mountains of the Sierra Nevada in California.
Commercial airlines have begun using jet planes, but on the ground, roads are still sketchy in many parts, and paper maps are the only option for orienteering. If the lines over the mountains are severed by a fierce Sierra storm, wanderers in the hills could be at peril. Word of their fate must then be passed by radio.
The story evolves during a time more closely aligned with the old west and the far west. There were roads and cars, of course, but not on the scale of today. The information age was yet to come. As in all societies, there were good guys and bad guys, and it was harder back then for the good guys to keep track of the bad guys. The young couple's lives become intertwined with people with nefarious histories. The young couple, Frank and Sally, travel to the Sierra Nevada to find an amenable co-existence in the mountains, but Frank gets lured into gold fever by an old miner who spins yarns for drinks. The bandits who harass the couple, mistakenly believing they know of a stash of gold, are claim jumpers. The bandits believe that the couple has a map to a gold strike.
The couple ventures into the wilderness, and the bandits follow them.
On the other side of the ledger, the couple finds allies in several hearty individuals during their travels. The couple is aided by friends they have made, storekeepers, a lady wrangler, the miner himself, and an unseen ally. The wilderness of the Sierra Nevada was the stage where their opera would play.