Field Trip Report:
3rd Annual Western North Carolina
Rockhound Roundup,
August 1st-6th, 2006photos by: Lee Fleming, Mark Gaskins, Jolene Falcone, Rick Jacquot, Ed Lytle and Phil Napier
Tuesday came and more members began to arrive. Ed Lytle and Kirk McFaddon arrived from Pa., they had made a trip to visit the Poovey for their first Roundup trip. They came away with a bucket full of garnets including one of the largest crystals I have seen from that site in years!
Ed and his big Poovey garnet.
Richard Holmes and Ken Sexton
Wednesday morning came and we packed Maggie and a few cars and headed to the Little Pine Mine for a day of fun.
Maggie with a load.
Once we arrived at the mine, the members went in all directions. I am not much for the social thing at the Little Pine, I headed into the back to do some digging, while I was there, I gave the few diggers who ventured into the mine with me a talk about the site and its history. Soon everyone was popping garnet crystals out of the wall, loose and in matrix. I dug about fifty decent size crystals "baseball size and smaller", and ended up giving them all away after the dig. The one specimen I kept was a large gemmy crystal in matrix, which I will be posting after I get the crystal polished and replaced in its matrix.
New member Gretchen Honsell searching for crystals, Gretchen comes from Iowa to join us on trips.
Gretchen and Ken in the mine.
Ron and Nancy working a vein.
Wade Perret, Lee Fleming, Richard Holmes, and John D.
