My youngest son recently has gotten into rock collecting. His collection so far is mostly made up of rocks he has found around the neighborhood and a few that we bought for him. He asked me if we could go try to find some "cool" rocks for his collection. I remembered a creek that I fish from time to time that might possibly hold some neat rocks.

We headed out to the spot in the early afternoon, I did bring a fly rod but decided to leave it in the truck once we got there. We spent the next couple of hours hiking and looking for rocks that he might add to his collection.

















We did find some interesting rocks for the collection but nothing spectacular. As we hiked out we decided to check out one more area. While looking my son yelled to me "Dad I found some crystals" and hands me this.














He was so excited finding his first crystal in the wild as he put it. On the way home he told me that this was the best day ever and that he couldn't wait to go home and show mom.


A week later Nick got lucky while searching a drainage area near our neighborhood. When he first spotted it there was just a bit of blue visible on the surface. After a good whack with a hammer, the inside revealed a good amount of blue opal. For size perspective the rocks in the first two shots are about the size of my palm.

Hi,

Good story, two great finds and an excellent start - sounds like you and your son can look forward to lots of quality time together creek crawling, surface hunting and digging for gems - plus it's all good for your health!

Good luck in your hunts.

cheers,
r

L82Play wrote on Apr 3^rd, 2015 at 12:49pm:



Yea, it should be fun for us. The nice thing is with all of the exploring I have done for my fishing adventures. I have become very familiar with a lot of the backcountry here. I try to go out hiking/fishing once every 7-10 days. Looking at mineral maps of my state, a lot of the deposits are in areas I know well. That really helps on the planning piece especially with a 7 year old in tow.

Great trip report Sasha!  Your son has officially been bit by the bug and I both commend and pity you!    For one, it's one of the most cheapest and healthiest hobbies one could have.  The downside is that your house will soon be full of rocks.

Looking forward to many more adventures you will no doubt be having.  Thanks for the great report!

Scott