November 21, 2000:  Sudbury, Ontario - Houston Lake Mining Inc. ("Houston Lake") is pleased to announce the commencement of a non-brokered $300,000 private placement for exploration including drilling on the Pakeagama Lake Rare Metals Project. Houston Lake is in the second option year of a three year agreement and is required to expend a further $40,000 in exploration, make $70,000 in cash payments, and issue 75,000 shares to complete the Company’s 100 percent option on the 632 hectare Pakeagama Lake property located in the Red Lake Mining District of Ontario. The 100 percent earn in is subject to a 2.5 percent Net Smelter Royalty.

The company will offer a maximum of 200,000 units at a price of $1.50 per unit for maximum gross proceeds of $300,000. Each unit will consist of two flow through common shares and one common share with a half purchase warrant attached to the non-flow through common share. Each full warrant is exercisable at a price of $0.60 for a period of one year. The private placement has a hold period of one year in Alberta and one and a half years in Ontario and is subject to regulatory approval. Proceeds will be used for working capital purposes to advance exploration to include drilling on the Pakeagama Rare Metals Property.

The Pakeagama Lake Property spans all known outcroppings of the Pakeagama Lake pegmatite which is the host to the rare metals (tantalum, rubidium, cesium, lithium, beryllium, tin, thallium, gallium and germanium) mineralization. The Pakeagama Lake pegmatite is a recent discovery by Dr. Denver Stone and Dr. Fred Breaks of the Ontario Geological Survey ("OGS", a provincial government agency). Since 1998, field-based and laboratory data amassed from the Pakeagama Lake pegmatite by the OGS and The Open University in the United Kingdom, include approximately 3700 electron microprobe analyses, 50 bulk chemical analyses, 350 analyses of potassium feldspar and 700 analyses of Ta-bearing minerals (columbite-tantalite group, wodginite, ferrotapiolite, stibiotantalite, stibiomicrolite, microlite, cassiterite). Additional analytical work by the Open University and the OGS is currently underway and is expected to be published in the coming months.

The Pakeagama pegmatite is characterized as a "Tanco-type" rare metals mineralizing system because of high concentrations of tantalum, rubidium, cesium, lithium and beryllium as well as high ratios of tantalum to niobium and rubidium to potassium. The Tanco mine is located in neighbouring Manitoba and is perhaps the richest rare metals deposit yet discovered. Pre-production reserves included 2.1 million tonnes grading 0.216 percent tantalum oxide, 7.3 million tonnes grading 2.76 percent lithium oxide, 0.3 million tonnes grading cesium oxide, 0.9 million tonnes grading 0.20 percent beryllium oxide and 0.1 million tonnes grading 2.50 percent rubidium oxide. The pre-production reserves at Tanco would have an in situ present day value of approximately 2 billion dollars (US) for the deposit’s tantalum and cesium content alone.

Channel sampling of the 13 metre wide Northern Wall Zone of the Pakeagama Lake pegmatite returned 344 g/t tantalum oxide, 0.90 percent rubidium oxide, 1776 g/t cesium oxide, 68.9 g/t tin, 131.9 g/t niobium oxide, 1.34 percent lithium oxide, 25.9 g/t thallium, and 42.2 g/t gallium over 11 metres. Germanium and beryllium results are pending. The Pakeagama Lake Wall Zone channel sample results compare favourably to Sons of Gwalia Limited’s Wodgina mine which is located in Western Australia. The Wodgina mine is a world-class tantalum-only producer containing 35 million tonnes averaging 402 g/t tantalum oxide.

The Pakeagama Lake pegmatite is already the second largest complex type, petalite sub-type pegmatite in Ontario with 260 metres in strike length and 30 to 70 metres in width exposed at surface. The pegmatite has considerable potential for expansion of its size as the pegmatite is open along strike in both directions and is flanked by a 120 metre wide lithium-cesium anomaly. The anomaly is interpreted to be due to more rare metal pegmatite buried underneath. Sampling of an outcrop on the shore of Pakeagama Lake (300 metres along strike to the southeast) returned 642 g/t tantalum oxide, 0.09 percent rubidium oxide, 408 g/t cesium oxide, 6.5 g/t tin, 64.1 g/t niobium oxide, 0.03 percent lithium oxide, 6.5 g/t thallium, and 44.9 g/t gallium and indicates that the rare metals mineralizing system may extend for over 560 metres. Houston Lake’s management believes that the combination of high rare metals concentration and large size are prerequisites for a potential economic rare metal deposit. The proposed $300,000 exploration program would involve line-cutting, geophysics, and diamond drilling of the outcrop area covered by detailed mapping and OGS studies.

Tantalum is the key commodity sought at Pakeagama Lake. Tantalum is used in a number of applications, including capacitors which are used extensively in the electronics industry for cell phones, computers, avionics, automotive and in communications technology. Tantalum bid prices for scrap have recently escalated by approximately 400 percent in the past year to $US290 to $US330 per pound (454 grams = 1 lb) due to high demand and shortages in supply.

Houston Lake is actively exploring for rare metals, platinum group metals and gold in northwestern Ontario. The common shares of Houston Lake Mining Inc. trade through the facilities of the Canadian Venture Exchange under the symbol HLM. Houston Lake Mining Inc. has a total of 12,972,432 common shares issued and outstanding. For further information on all of the Company’s projects, we invite you to visit us at www.houstonlakemining.com.

For more information, please contact:

E. Grayme Anthony   B.Sc., P. Geo., F.G.A.C., M. B. A.

Tel:  (705) 897-7622
Fax: (705) 897-7618
e-mail: houston@vianet.on.ca
Web Site: www.houstonlakemining.com

The Canadian Venture Exchange has neither approved nor disapproved of the information contained herein.

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