And then, there were the mud puppies! Everett and I chose to dig down on one side of a mud filled pit that Mr. Frazer had dug earlier in the year, but since had been inundated with muck and debris caused by regional spring flooding.

The mud was so sticky that it clung like snot to everything, including our shovels as we tried to throw it from the pit. Most of the time, we found it easier to throw out big balls of mud with our hands, so needless to say we were soon covered in brown goo. The thick mud did a good job masking all the rocks that we pulled out of the hole and Everett put Celia to work dunking potential fluorite specimens in a bucket of water to see what was hiding beneath the muck. My help was on strike and doing her own thing, so, while I was digging, I put all rocks that showed any hint of purple aside to clean and check later.

While I was digging, I put aside many rocks for later inspection, but about mid-morning I pulled one out that required only a couple swipes with my glove to reveal large dark purple fluorite cubes. "Eureka!!!" Excited by this find but unsure of how good the specimen really was, I unstuck my boots from the muck and made my way over to the creek to clean it off. Yep, it did appear to be a good one alright, but how good it really was would have to wait until we got home and I could wash it completely. Lucky me - this one turned out to be a real beauty with not a hint of damage on any of its many cubes, as you can see in the following couple pictures.

From what I could see and hear, not a single person in the group was unhappy with what they had found. By late-afternoon, we were all pretty much worn out from digging, so we called it a day. All but a few met up that evening at the Great Southwest Grill at I-24 exit 40 in Kuttawa where we kept the good times rolling and celebrated Kathy's birthday. Enjoying a nice meal with the crew was a nice way to end a great day of rockhounding.

Everyone met again at the Clement on Sunday and we headed back out to the Columbia and Eureka to do some more collecting. Joining the group that day was Dona and James Dick who had heard about the trip on the NET, but not until Saturday. As is her way, Chrissy took time to show Dona and James what and where to collect - she even hit me up for a couple specimens to give to Dona but had to pry them from my fingers - I would have chased Chrissy to get the specimens back, but I was stuck in the muck - again. ;~)

The very pleasant sunny Saturday weather turned to rain overnight and then windy and much cooler on Sunday. By early afternoon, everyone, except Chrissy and me, left to head back to their respective homes. Mr. Frazer stopped by to check on us around 3:00 PM while we were packing up our stuff. It took a while for me to remove all the caked-on mud from my skin and change into clean clothes, but we managed to be on the road by around 4:00 PM. We endured a 7-hour drive through extreme wind and rain, but made it home OK and finally passed out around midnight. What a FULL weekend!!!!!

I used our power washer followed by a hot super iron out bath to clean our lot of specimens and was pleased with all that we brought home.

More field and specimen pictures may be seen on Everett Harrington's Image Event page: Click Here for Everett's Pictures

Chrissy and I want to thank James for all his hard work setting up the trip. However, with all his recent dam building in Hurricane Creek, we have reason to believe that he may be morphing into . . . well, you be the judge . . .