Swimming trough the Thousand Needles

Ore fest

My brave young Paladin Daytonaa was in desperate need for some ores, as one of her professions is jewelcrafting. A traveling merchant had told her that the bottom of the submerges Thousand Needles, before the Great Sundering a beautiful river canyon, holds a wealth of mithril and iron ores, and also some truesilver and gold ores. Although The Thousand Needles were not exactly on Daytonaa’s  route – far from it – explorer as she is, she decided to go check out the region and see for herself what treasures it holds. It turned out to be a long - as much dusty as wet - journey. And yet very rewarding. 

From Stormwind she took a flightpath to Menethil Harbor in the Wetlands and from there a boat to Theramore Isle, in Daytonaa’s days still a proud city, ruled by the lady Jaina Proudmoore. On the back of her ever loyal and strong horse Paloma, Daytonaa rode through Dustwallow Marsh, via Witch Hill, all the way up to an Alliance / Horde crossroad. From there she went to the right and traveled into the Barrens. She followed the long winding road into the Southern Barrens up to the Razorfen Downs, the ancestral burial grounds of the quilboar. 

As she entered the site, she had to fight off some fearsome Razorfen battleguards en cultists. No match for our sturdy and yet ever charming paladin, but still. Enemies to reckon with. Battling her way through she almost missed the left turn, which led her to a gloomy hidden spot inhabited by Razorfen cultists and battleguards.  

Keeping to the right, Daytonaa discovered the quarters of a Death’s Head Cultist, whom started hurling bolts of dark magic at her the moment he spotted the brave paladin. After slaying him, she climbed the rocks to the right of his dwelling, to discover the Darkcloud Pinnacle, and a bridge over the submerged canyon. To the right of the bridge, she stumbled across a little camp, home to Arnak Grimtotem, proudly announced as the ‘Chief of all Darkcloud Grimtotem chiefs’. Smiling upon this, Daytonaa left him in piece and crossed the bridge. Fighting her way along some Grimtotem Stompers, she reached  Arikara’s Needle, a place where the Grimtotem tribe at Darkcloud Pinnacle honor their dead. 

As she found nothing but hostile creatures on the hanging bridges and the pinnacles, Daytonaa decided to take the dazzling jump into the waters of the Thousand Needles basin. Swimming around, on an easy course to the east, she found ore after ore, diving to the bottom of what once had been a land of golden red sandstone spires. Making her way to a seemingly floating village in the distance, Daytonaa discovered all kinds of interesting and weird stuff, like a huge floating statue, that made her float in the air a bit as she climbed it. 

Finally she reached the Shimmering Deep (a lake that was once the Shimmering Flats), and Fizzle & Pozzik's Speedbarge. Tired of the long swim, awfully hungry and loaded with ores, the paladin decided to heartstone back to Stormwind, for a nice meal of Mightfish stew and a long ore smelting session.

Note: the described area can be entered at level 40. Hostile mobs range in level from 40 to 42, but upon the shores south of the basin, evil creatures of level 45+ reside. The Shimmering Deep no longer offers quests to Alliance players, but it's mining heaven. Truesilver ores are mainly found in the nothwestern part of the basin, near Feralas.