Nope, seriously though if you want to come down and check out the area send me a PM and who knows what we'll find? I'd wait until fall when it cools off a bit. I'm not in any way claiming that Richmond County will even come close to some other areas for variety and quantity but I do know for a fact that minerals can and have been found here that warrant further exploration. I'm hoping that some major road work or excavation will be done to expose things better. I plan to go out this fall and winter and explore the hot spots in the county hard and anyone interested in tagging along let me know.

Laurie,

That's fine, you had expressed interest before in coming down. I have to work for the next two weekends but hopefully after that, things will slow down a bit and the weather will cool off. I think going to look for the tourmalinated smokies would be a good idea and also the area where the large schrol occurs in the quartz, there is a large pegmatite nearby that holds promise and needs further digging. My friend who showed it to me found a small pocket in it with small but glass clear light smokies perched upright all over a plate of feldspar, looked like a pin cushion with all the crystals sticking up, pretty neat. The biggest crystals were around 1/2" but were like glass clear.  I dug the vein a few times and found large well formed mica and feldspar xls and massive smoky but no crystals. The creek below the vein is full of colorful rocks and I've never looked it good. So there are several places to look for sure. Can't promise what will find but the potential is certainly there. Of coarse there is the limonite spot, I always find cubes there no problem and there is a quartz vein that has produced some small clear xls on top of the hill but the digging is in a very hard slate matrix. Anyway, just let me know.

Mike

Collin,

Your more than welcome to come down anytime. I've been busier than a one legged man in a sack race lately and haven't been able to get out to dig at all. But with this heat, I couldn't stand it anyway. Hopefully in a few weeks it will cool down a bit. If I didn't feel that there were possible opportunities in the area I wouldn't even try it myself but I've seen some really good indications that warrant some looking, I just don't have the time to get out and devote to it unfortunately right now but would be glad to point someone in the right direction. That schrol include smoky that was found over by Millstone was as good as it gets I kid you not. I've been trying to get the man who found it (when he was a kid) some years ago to sell it to me. He has it sitting on his living room mantle and he isn't a rock hound so I'm hoping he'll get back with me about it. I found a few small ones but nothing like his. He just got lucky and literally stumbled over while hunting! Anyway, Laurie has my number or you can PM me if you decide to venture down here some day.               Best Regards - Rockytop

Here's a few more pictures I took of a few more specimens we found along the way.  Definitely nothing shelf worthy, but  it's still fun finding crystals nevertheless.

Tim4d wrote on Aug 21^st, 2015 at 4:51pm:

Hahaha 

You're right!

Pretty looking pieces of purple, anyway, as usual.
It's going to take the "perfect storm" for this place to pop!

Tim4d wrote on Aug 27^th, 2015 at 3:56pm:


Yes, something we're all hoping for -- so many dusty construction sites that need a good drenching.