On Thursday we decided to take a crack at the Richardson Fission Mine. This mine is perhaps best known for a rock containing highly fluorescent pink calcite and dark purple fluorite. Some of this material even contains green apatite making for very striking specimens. Collecting at this locations requires about a 2/3-mile hike in. We parked at the head of the two-track road, grabbed our gear and tools and started hiking. At about 1/3 of the way, I remembered that I had forgotten to bring two five-gallon buckets for carrying specimens back to the truck. Realizing that there was no believable way to blame my blunder on Chrissy or Opal, I dropped my stuff and ran back to the truck to fetch the buckets while the two waited patiently for me. At least I would have a chance to shake some of the many mosquitoes that had been buzzing around my ears. We passed a beaver pond along the way, one obvious source of those rotten mosquitoes. I guess those silly beavers don't care much about mosquitoes since they are directly contributing to their proliferation. Bad beavers . . bad beavers . . .

We came to a well-worn side trail leading upward from the road. Not much doubt that this trail led up to the collecting area so we followed it up. We spent much of the day collecting in the extensive spoil piles above an adit. I also spent a bit of time recovering the best fluorite/calcite and apatite specimens from a boulder in the hard-rock digging area. Between the two us, we did quite well at the Richardson Fission . . . almost too well as we had to carry everything back to the truck. The two 3/4 full buckets proved to be quite a challenge but I finally managed, with 342 stops along the way, to get them back to the truck.