Saturday, March 15, 2014
The Tar Heel Gem and Mineral Club held a fieldtrip to the Harnett County Hanson
gravel quarry in Bunn Level, NC south of Lillington on Hwy 210.
We really didn't know what to expect.
Actually we were kind of surprised to hear it was a "gravel" quarry.
There are sand quarries all over this area, so a granite quarry,
here, where the Coastal Plain meets the Piedmont had our curiosities up.

There are atleast three different terrains coming together in Harnett County.
The Coastal Plain, the Piedmont, and the Sandhills.
Another Terrestrial Region is described as the Middle Coastal Plain.
"The Middle Coastal Plain was inundated and exposed numerous times
during the last 40 million years, it was not until about 1.7 million years ago
that the ocean finally retreated."

The quarry is bordered by the Upper Little River on the north and east sides,
which puts at the eastern edge of the Sandhills.
The light gray to white fine-grained highly silicated granite
looks a lot like the Garner, NC Hwy 70 quarry granite.
I'm not sure if it would be considered a southern portion of the Raleigh Belt?

Here are a few pics of morning at the bottom level.

Same with the Molly.
It's hard to see the color, but there was plenty of it to be seen.

So all in all it was a great first time trip!
Our list of identified minerals is;
Pyrite, Molybdenum, Quartz,Calcite, Fluorite, Goethite, and Chalcedony.
Just a couple more pics of the quarry.

nice report joe, wish i had taken the opportunity to hit the quarry fluorite from NC is rare and i want it...

I have really been looking forward to another opportunity to get into this quarry
and I almost missed it.
The Fayettville Rock Club had a field trip scheduled for this past Saturday
and were cordial enough to invite members of the Tar Heel Club to join them.
I didn't get the e-mail until the night before, but no matter what
I was going to be there.

I want to thank President Mary Francis Bunny and the rest of the
Fayetteville Club for inviting us. And Nick and Hanson Aggregates for having us!

Meeting in the parking lot.

I had planned to spend the first couple of hours looking for the fluorite,
and then switch to looking for nice plates of the pyrite,
but being somewhat of a fluoriteaholic I never made it to the pyrite plates.
There were seams/veins of fluorite everywhere!
Here are a few examples of common fluorite sightings.

I am going to start a thread in the North Carolina section,
"Harnett County, Gardner Quarry" for more and better pics
of the specimens coming from this quarry. The "GQ" quarry.
But here are a few more shots of a very pretty vein of green and purple fluorite
in a very big boulder in the quarry. You know these veins have
got to open up somewhere!