Pleasant Surprise Found at MFQ Saturday…

Missy and I arrived at MFQ mid morning Saturday, driving down to check out the clearing activity that was going on per my buddy Jim, who I called Thursday evening on my way to work. The forecast was for a very nice warm and sunny day, temps in the 70`s, but by the time we arrived at 9:30, it was still cool enough to require my blue sweatjacket. As we pulled into the upper parking area from the highway, I spotted the clearing activity on top of the hill….

01 Clearing Off for Expansion

…I then looked toward the back center wall, however I was unable to see the back wall due to a very high pile of rock crushed into chunks suitable for support and driveways….as we drove around this huge pile of crushed rock, I came upon a nicely sloped pile of untouched goodies blasted down from the upper bench…needless to say I was estatic because my buddy Jim was unaware of any recent activity, most likely due to his view from the roadway being blocked as mine was, by that huge pile of crushed rock. The pile was wide enough that it required four photos to show it….

02 New Blast Pile

03 Middle of New Blast Pile

04 East End of Blast Pile

05 Front Side of Blast Pile

 …after quickly letting Missy out, I changed into my boots, grabbed my mini mattox, and made a fast walk around the front edge…it was obvious the only thing workers had done since bringing the wall down, was to clean up the front edges with the dozer. I didn`t find anything pretty out on the front edges, so I grabbed a bag and headed for the back wall, as I was able to spot some pockets from the truck. Within moments, I had spotted several nice druse pockets like this one….

08 First Pocket Found

…and from this one pocket came some very nice druse pieces like these two guys….

06 Nice Druse Pieces Found at Start of Search

…after filling one bag full of wrapped druse plates, I moved on down the wall to the next several pockets, many of them similar but a few had some nice poker chips attached as well…as you can see from the next images, this wall was full of pockets…..look below the green line….

13 Wall Pockets

15 Wall Pockets

…and at one spot along the wall, I looked up, as I normally do, and spotted some beautiful black druse pockets way up there…about fifteen feet higher than I could possibly begin to reach….

10 Blk Druse Pocket Up High

11 Blk Druse Pocket Up High

…the next pockets I had to climb up to the top of the stepladder to access….right under that green/blue line….

14 Wall Pockets

…the material in front facing me, was loose, so after pulling it back with my mini mattox, it looked like this…

18 Druse and Poker Chip Pocket

…I was cleaning away the loose stuff, looking for an opening to a pocket and oila !! one appeared….

20 Druse and Poker Chip Pocket

…pulling a few nice plates of druse and poker chips out of this opening, resulted in finding yet another pocket right behind it….

21 Third Pocket

…and pretty soon, I had yet another bag full of very pretty druse and poker chip plates. I went back to the truck to get yet another bag and to check on Missy. I no sooner returned and was down in the dip along the back wall….

17 Wall Pockets

….searching for yet another pocket that could possibly turn into four pockets like this one did, when my buddy Jim showed up to visit….I walked down the pile toward my truck to meet him about halfway….

12 From Top of Blast Pile

…and where we both came to a stop to talk, I looked down and spotted some beautiful pieces of black druse and some black dogtooth crystals just laying all over…

24 Blk & Brown Druse & Chips Piece

22 Hit The Jackpot

23 Hit The Jackpot

25 Brown Druse Piece

…what a great meeting spot Jim selected to talk to me at…I owe him big time I would say. After we talked abit, he left to go work on cutting some more wood, and I looked around a bit more, picked up several more black and brown dogtooth crystals, and druse pieces, filling at least two bags full. I then looked to my left and spotted these two huge boulders with vugs of poker chip crystals inside each one….

27 Poker Chip Vug

28 Poker Chip Vugs

 …I decided to take a water break, and then returned with more wraps and another bag, as well as my hammer and chisel, and proceeded to get a good workout in, removing some nice clusters of big gray colored poker chip crystals from these vugs….

29 Poker Chip Vugs

31 Poker Chip Vugs

…and then I returned to the wall, where I found a few more pockets that contained those nice gemmy plates of druse and poker chips. I filled two more bags, my last ones even, of these plates. I then walked around the back side of the pile where I located some nice gemmy green poker chips, some with dogtooths, and some were small and some large yard rocks style….and set them up on a nice flat boulder….I ran out of steam about this time, and loaded them up last before heading for home….sure was a nice day. 

Feb 23rd…..Due to two winter storms the last two weeks, I was unable to get out and hunt, so as promised, here are some of the dogtooths and druse pieces all cleaned up…..

32 Dogtooths Found

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34 Blk & Bro Druse Pieces

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