Northwest and Southwest Rockhounding

Tuesday, May 12, 2015

Drilling River Rocks

So, if you have been wondering what in the world we are up to now, check out our latest video below. We have been extremely busy drilling rocks, polishing rocks, cutting rocks, and the video shows how we do it.

Enjoy!

Thursday, April 23, 2015

Goodbye 2014, On To More Rocks!

Anyone who follows this blog may have noticed that 2014 posts are missing. Last year was an incredibly bad year for me. I started the year with a family of 5 and ended it with a family of 2. To top it off my 5 year old Granddaughter was diagnosed with Kidney cancer. Thank the Lord she is now in full remission.

Needless to say, I didn't get much rockhounding time in. I spent most of my time in hospital rooms and at funerals and memorial services. RIP Becky, Mom and Dad. See you in the future. Not too soon I hope. So now I am starting a fresh new year.

A Portion of the Foothills Trail

I have not had much time for rockhounding until recently, when my Sister-in-law and I have started walking local trails and we have really gotten the rockhounding bug. We have it so bad, we now have to pull a wagon. at least we are keeping up our bone density.

Near the Foothills Trail

We are also embarking on a brand new adventure. Because I had piles of rocks everywhere, we decided to put them to good use. We are now selling them on Etsy.

Beautiful Polished OR Dendritic Chalcedony Resting on a Nice Piece of Carbon River Marble

We are also making E-cigarette mod stands with the bigger specimens. Drilling big holes in rocks was a big learning curve. At least I now have my own Rock Saw and Drill Press. They are awesome! We even have giant petrified wood logs for sale for landscape use now.

Giant Petrified Log - It Would Make a Great Water Feature or Landscape Feature!

Where do we walk, you might ask? Well we mostly walk a trail near my home called the Foothills Trail. It goes for miles. Our favorite spot to start is in South Prairie, Washington. Thus the name of our new Etsy shop, SouthPrairieHandmade. At several points it comes near South Prairie Creek and the Carbon River. No earth shaking agates here, unless we get lucky and find one in the glacial till. There is some awesome sandstone and carbonized petrified wood though. we have also found some great granite and marble. Here are some examples of the E-cigarette stands, check out our shop for more examples.

NM Petrified Wood E-cigarette Mod Stand

WA Boulder Opal and Jasper

What some of you may not know, is that I am also an artist. Thus you will definitely see some of my art for sale on Etsy. One of my favorites is a torn paper collage of cattails which were surrounded by mist one morning when we were out near the river. You be the judge of my art. Let me know what you think.

Cattails in the Mist Torn Paper Collage

This is What We Saw That Morning

Anyway, stay tuned for many more rock hunting adventures and rock art. We are now working on jewelry. My husband actually want us to make some bolo ties out of our rocks. Who woulda thunk it?

Wednesday, November 20, 2013

Winter Rockhounding in Oceanside Oregon

Sorry I have been a bit remiss in my postings. I have been busy with a wedding, creating brooch bouquets for another wedding and making collages. More to follow on these topics on another blog. Stay tuned.

It's getting to be that time of year again here in Washington, where I've got to find places to go rockhounding that won't be buried under snow. It's a hard job, but someone has to do it... so here goes.

A Foggy Evening in Oceanside

We go to Oregon. Yep, the Oregon coast to be exact. The winter is the best time to go agate hunting on the beautiful beaches of Oregon. We usually try to pick a weekend in January or February, when the storms and waves have a had a good chance to wash away the sand and expose the rocky layers beneath.

Our favorite spot is a little town called Oceanside. It's hidden on a dead end, right on the coast with a beautiful lighthouse on the bluff up above. The neat thing about Oceanside is that it has a hidden beach you can only reach through a tunnel under the mountain, or during a very low tide. We like Oceanside because it isn't as well known as Newport, It's closer than Newport and Tillamook is only a few miles away.

Tunnel Entrance on South side of Mountain Near Oceanside

We usually rent one of the many beautiful beach houses there in Oceanside and the rates are lower during the late winter. My kids love to rent a boat and go crabbing in nearby Netarts Bay. Then we all have crab for dinner.

The Hidden Beach Near Oceanside - The Tunnel Opening is in the Center of the Picture

We find plenty of agates too. All different colors, sizes and shapes. The trick is to go during a record low tide and follow the tide out. You can also find fossils and petrified wood there.

Tumbled Agates Found in Oceanside, Oregon

Here are some links to pictures of agates others have found here:

http://people.oregonstate.edu/~wilsolau/agates.html

http://blog.oregonlive.com/terryrichard/2007/06/seeking_out_secret_beaches_at.html

http://www.flickr.com/photos/65325541@N00/4076124779

Also, keep your eyes peeled for this green rock. It tends to blend in with all the black rocks along the beach. I'm not sure what it is, but it seems to polish pretty well.

Unknown Green Rock

For house rental information, I usually use VRBO. It's a great website to find exactly what you need, and renting a house means we don't have to spend money on restaurants.

Beautiful View from the Bedroom of one of the Homes we Rented in Oceanside

Oceanside, Oregon is a beautiful and fun rock hunting destination.

Oceanside Beach at Sunset

Thursday, September 26, 2013

Rockhounding Okanogan County Washington

Recently took a four day trip to eastern Washington and had a blast. It was like a trip through history. We found the most amazing mines, rocks and gold/silver/copper ores.

The area we concentrated on was the Ruby (City) area, but we started our quest at the Alder mine near Twisp. This gold, silver, copper, zinc mine was mined up to the 1950's and it is a huge mine.

Upper Level of the Alder Mine Near Twisp, WA

We checked out the ores at the top level of the mine in the "open stope" area where they "mined to daylight" and saw many colorful rocks and ore samples.

Alder Mine Ores Overlooking Stoped Area

We walked around and checked out the upper levels of the mine until some other adventure seekers showed up at the levels below. I didn't find any agates, so I was done anyway. :-)

Very Colorful Ores - Alder Mine, Twisp, WA

We decided to move on to our next planned stop which was near Loop Loop City towards Conconully, WA. We headed into Okanogan National Forest up Loup Loup Canyon Road to the Ruby Mining District.

We stopped to view the famous China Wall - the first attempt at a mill for the Arlington Mine in 1892. It is quite impressive, and still standing strong in the middle of the forest. I just wish that idiots had left their paint cans at home. Who drives into the middle of the forest to tag something anyway?

China Wall off of Loup Loup Canyon Road

Our next stop was the Last Chance Mine. My mine book had said that there were colorful rock specimens on the ore dumps here. Boy, were they right! Malachite and azurite and colorful quartz everywhere. It was amazing. The rocks were so plentiful and beautiful, that we didn't know what to pick up. What a wonderful find!

Lots of Pretty Rocks!

The mine was caved, just as well, we wouldn't have entered it anyway. Just outside the old entrance was a beautiful pond where someone has used a backhoe on it.

Pretty Man-Made Pond Below the Mine

This was such a great find we decided to move on up the road, and we headed for the Arlington Mine. It was mostly a silver, lead, gold mine. The road was horrible, but we made it without any problems. It is near the top of Ruby Hill and has some great views. The lower adit is completely caved and has become a gurgling fountain.

The Caved Arlington Mine Adit - Now a Fountain

Here we got our biggest surprise yet. Buried in the woods, below the mine is the ruins of the mill with most of the machinery still in place! It was amazing.

Arlington Mine Mill - With Ball Mill Still in Place

Even more amazing was the ore lying around the mill. They were just beautiful. They were VERY heavy. Must be something good in those rocks. I still didn't see any agates though :-)

Arlington Mine Ore

All in all it was a wonderful trip and I know we'll be going back next year especially since I have since read that one of the 100's of mines up there was known for pink garnets!

Wonderful View, Horrible Road!

Monday, September 2, 2013

Jade Hunting Deer Creek/Pilchuck Creek Washington

So, We had a long weekend and decided to take a trip to Okanogan County WA. I did a little research and found that there were lots of places to hunt for Jade in the Creeks below SR 20. So off we went.

Logging Road Bridge over Pilchuck Creek

Our first stop was along Pilchuck Creek off of a logging road below Lake Cavanaugh Road. We didn't spend much time here because there was an open gate on the road and we almost got locked in once on Tree Company Forest Land. There was a beautiful camping spot on the Creek and we did find a few pieces of Jade but as I said, we didn't spend much time
here.

Looking down Pilchuck Creek from the Bridge

Next, we headed down Lake Cavanaugh Road and pulled off at a good spot along Pilchuck Creek and started looking. We found quite a few good pieces.

Beautiful Spot to Look for Jade

We spent about an hour here picking and choosing what we thought might be jade, and I found a couple pretty yard rocks that may be what they call grossular garnet around here.

Lots of Rocks to Sort Through

The jade is rather elusive. It can weather to have a red or white rind around the pretty stuff inside. You usually can't break it because it's so hard and then if you do, it shatters. We just tried to carefully look at the rocks and determine if there was anything worth lugging back to the car.

From here, we headed up to Deer Creek at Oso. This is supposedly one of the favorite hunting spots for rockhounds. We discovered that the railroad trestle bridge that Gem Trails of Washington recommends to access the opposite side of the creek is closed. We drove down SR 530 over Deer Creek and discovered access from the parking lot of the closed down Oso General Store right past the bridge. It was an easy walk down to Deer creek next to the bridge.

Oso General Store Parking Lot

We found a few interesting rocks here, but not a lot of jade. The hunting was better on Pilchuck Creek. We didn't have time to check out Finney Creek, but it's supposed to be good also.

Deer Creek below the Bridge

When we got home, I'm still not sure what is what, and even apparently die hard jade collectors have a hard time positively identifying their finds, so I will just say that I'm sure there must be some jade here somewhere.

A few of our Finds

I know that we found enough for me to want to go back again and hunt for some more. Meanwhile, I definitely need to get a rock saw. Just so I can see what is inside these beauties.

Jade or Garnet?

Monday, July 29, 2013

Copper City Washington Ghost Town and Mill Site

Last week, I had a spare day to get out and about. My Grandson Darien and I took a trip over Chinook Pass to find the ghost town of Copper City. The U.S. Forest Service is talking about bulldozing the mill site, so I wanted to see the site and ore piles before that happened.

FS Road 1808 has been closed at the Mt. Aix trailhead since 2006 flooding and bridge washouts by Deep Creek until just recently. The trip to this site was a long 4.8 mile hike one way. Now it's only 1.5 miles because one of the bridges has been repaired. There is still road damage along the last 1.5 miles of roadway to the town site.

The directions to the site are as follows:

Coming from the west on Highway 410, travel approximately 35.6 miles from Chinook Pass to Bumping River Road/National Forest Road 1800. Turn right (south) onto this road. Drive 13.5 miles past Goose Prairie and Bumping Lake and keep left at the intersection, turning onto Forest Service road 1808 following Deep Creek. Continue on this road for approximately 4 miles until you reach the road closed sign and a quarry site on the right. Park at the quarry. The hike begins from here.

Coming from the east, drive approximately 27.9 miles from Naches on Highway 410 to Bumping River Road/National Forest Road 1800. Turn left (south) onto this road. Drive 13.5 miles past Goose Prairie and Bumping Lake and keep left at the intersection, turning onto Forest Service road 1808 following Deep Creek. Continue on this road for approximately 4 miles until you reach the road closed sign and a quarry site on the right. Park at the quarry. The hike begins from here.

Road Closed Sign at Quarry on FS 1808

The hike is a fairly easy hike on the level road with the crossing of one washout from a Deep Creek feeder stream and a few spots where the roadway has become a seasonal runoff. It could be fairly muddy during the wetter times of the year. It is 1.4 miles to the Copper City sign and turn off onto the Copper City Trail #654 which is an old mining road to the mines above Copper City. The townsite is only .1 mile beyond this turn off. The trail continues on above the townsite to the top of Miners Ridge.

Copper City Sign

The first thing you will see is the old bunkhouse ruins, now mostly fallen over on the east side of the roadway. A few cabins were once scattered throughout the area but have gradually been vandalized or taken over by the forest. As recently as 1960, a cabin was located directly across the road from the bunkhouse, but no sign of this building remains.

Copper City Bunkhouse Ruins

Heading past the bunkhouse toward the meadow, is the foundation and ruins of the mill. The only remains here are scattered timbers, cable, pipes and ore tailings from the ore processing. Presently the U.S. Forest Service is considering removing the tailings due to contamination of the stream running through the ore tailings. At the present time however, the ore tailings are still there.

According to a preliminary assessment report by the U.S. Forest Service, "In June and October, 1997, Washington Department of Ecology personnel collected water quality samples along an un-named tributary of Deep Creek, above and below the Copper City Millsite, and one sample was collected from Deep Creek just above the confluence with Bumping Lake (Rayforth and others, 2000). The samples along the un-named tributary were taken both above and below the old Copper City mill which has collapsed into the drainage. Water sampling revealed substantial increases in iron, zinc, arsenic, copper, and lead below the collapsed mill. Copper concentrations below the collapsed mill exceeded the state’s acute aquatic standard for surface waters. However, metals concentrations in Deep Creek just above Bumping Lake were similar to those above the mill."

..."The Site was extensively explored and developed by the Copper Mining Company which located 42 claims in the area in 1906. Development and production in the area focused around five mineralized shear zones within quartz monzonite/granodiorite cut by rhyodacite dikes. The most significant mineralized zone is explored at the Clara-Red Bird Mine by adits at three different levels and several surface workings. Total development in the area is estimated at over 1,000 ft. of underground workings (Huntting, 1956). The primary mineralization in the area occurs in mineralized shear zones cutting quartz monzonite and granidiorite host rock. Primary ore minerals were chalcopyrite, scheelite, molybdenite; gangue minerals include pyrite, arsenopyrite, quartz, calcite, and tourmaline (Derkey and others, 1990). Commodities produced included gold, silver, copper and tungsten (Derkey and others, 1990).

Copper City Mill Ruins

U.S. Bureau of Mines data indicate that 5 tons containing 34 ounces per ton (opt) silver and 1,486 lbs. of copper were shipped in 1917; 150 tons containing 1 opt gold, 99 opt. silver, and 4, 347 lbs copper were shipped in 1938; 650 lbs of concentrate containing 62.4% tungsten trioxide were shipped in 1940; and 5 tons containing 48 opt silver and 2,000 lbs copper were shipped in 1942 (Van Noy and others, 1983)."

Close-up View of Some of the Tailings

The tailings at the top of the mill site consist mostly of unprocessed ore. At the base of the mill, gravel sized tailings that have been processed through the mill appear to be contaminated with tron, zinc, arsenic, copper and lead. Maybe by processing, maybe just from leaching of the minerals from the ore itself. Whatever the cause, the tailings below appear uninteresting, while the ore above is scattered with visible samples of chalcopyrite, pyrite, azurite, and malachite.

It turned out to be a beautiful day, we came home with a few good ore samples and had a wonderful time.

Some of My Better Finds

Tuesday, July 16, 2013

Salmon Creek Again

Well, we enjoyed our last trip to Salmon Creek so much, that we just had to go back. We really want to find some of the bigger agates I keep seeing people find. Anyway, the day was gorgeous and we headed out again with a late start (as usual).

I decided we should check a different, less well known area of Salmon Creek, so we headed towards Merchant Road from highway 505. After we crossed the Salmon Creek bridge I noticed that the areas on the south side of the bridge had been clearcut very recently. We decided to stop and check it out, since so much ground was visible.

View Down Logging Road from Highway

We got out and headed down the road and right away discovered small chips of carnelian. I decided to check out all the tree stumps we passed, and sure enough I found this interesting little bit of river polished petrified wood.

Petrified Wood Hiding Near Tree Stumps

As we moved down the road towards the river, we started finding more and more pieces of carnelian in the road, where the rain had worn gullies in the road. I even found some really nice jasper.

View of Road Towards River and Highway

When we noticed how late it was getting, we decided to turn around and head back. Of course I had to check out one more spot where the loggers had made a clearing above the road. This was where I found my 10lb piece of petrified wood. I don't know how I knew to dig it up, but I'm glad I did. It almost looks like a big piece of a tree root. Wish I had a rock saw!