My Kentucky Central trip over Labor Day Weekend this year, turned out to be a hard lesson learned for me, situation I hope to never encounter again.
In a nutshell, a few weeks out from the trip, a friend of mine called and told me that he had lost his job and would like to go rockhounding with me and my group…at the very least, I probably should have asked more questions because he had never expressed an interest in rock collecting before, and I have known him for five years now, had visited with him on a couple of my quartz collecting trips in Arkansas a few years back even, not a peep out of him then about it. I also knew that he had some type of medical condition, recently diagnosed, and I did not ask about it, because in some cases, such as a disability, it is against federal law to do so. They can voluntarily give you that information, but you cannot ask them for it, or worse yet, try to force them to give you that information. I knew he was taking medication and thought it was pain relief or similar. I made the mistake of picking him up and taking him along, and it went south Saturday evening…. he didnt take his medication Friday evening, and I saw a side of him that I never want to see again, think along the lines of Dr. Jekyl and Mr. Hyde. It involved an ambulance trip to the hospital with police assistance, and after a lot of advice, I made the decision to leave him behind on the basis of safety for everyone in my group as well as Onyx.
On Friday morning, we drove over to visit with my good friends Gary and Walter, who operate a fluorite mine in southern Illinois…they had recently got into some good specimens…one of my rockhunting friends, Ryan Shaffer, drove down that morning from Rolla, Missouri, and met us at the gas station where Gary was eating breakfast at and visiting with some of his local buddies there. When Gary left to go home, we followed him and picked out some fluorites to purchase from him. Walter joined us a little later that morning after he woke up…he works night shift and sleeps til about mid morning. We had a good visit, and Ryan and I were able to get some pretty stuff in purple and yellow colors, before heading southeast to Danville, Kentucky.
We arrived at the hotel in Danville about 4 pm, checked in, and just had time to get cleaned up before heading to dinner at the Bright Leaf Golf Resort Restaurant for their seafood buffet. After an hour of great fellowship and dinner, we drove back to the hotel in Danville to set up for the swap and sell tailgate event.
Onyx and I were up early, about 6 am after a good night`s rest, and after a good breakfast, we headed to the front of the line to lead everyone over to Caldwell Quarry. We met Clay at the Office and taking a group photo in front of the big rock outside the office, Clay gave a brief history of the quarry operations and then led us down to the ground floor where we all parked. He pointed out the collecting areas, changed alot from last year, and set us loose. His safety guy Jeff, stayed with us as he has in the last couple of years we were there…we always appreciate his watchfulness and assistance, and tip him well before we leave. Several rockhounds found some nice vugs in the boulders there and harvested some beautiful brown calcite crystals…
I came across Don Lapham working on a boulder that had a few vugs of beautiful honey yellow calcite dogtooths inside…he had them marked with a few of his colorful handkerchiefs….
…this one had an exceptionally gorgeous calcite flower in the middle of the dogtooth vug….
…absolutely stunning….and Don was able to remove it completely intact !! He found another one at Caldwell that morning that was nice as well….
Can`t remember who found this one….
…and here is another one of Don`s finds…he left another marker there with it….
…and a few more that I am not sure who found….but they are spectacular as well….
…and I believe it contains calcites, pink dolomites, and fluorite cubes in the bottom and left side of the vug….
After four hours of collecting there, we drove down to Junction City to look for geodes.
Larry Huffman and Harry Polly always led the group on this part of the trip in years past, but sadly, we lost Larry to a heart attack back in April, and Harry didn`t feel like making the trip this year…they were both very close friends and I know all of us regulars, understood exactly how Harry felt about it. I can safely say, without a doubt, that their presence was seriously missed by all of us there.
We arrived to find a mostly dry creek bed at the private landowner`s farm near Junction City, they were locked into the same drought as we in Missouri, suffered through all last year. Clay had mentioned that as well, and the quarry did seem awful dusty this year, compared to years past. We were still able to find some nice geodes, had to go upstream and downstream to find the bigger ones, but everyone managed to find some nice ones to take home.
…that is Ryan Shaffer working on some geodes at the creek in the photo above.
Onyx and I returned to the hotel to get a nap in, however, we were going to dinner at a local steakhouse…. which I figured might fill up early…. so while Onyx and I were getting cleaned up, Slade and Dean, two of my North Carolina buddies, called and made a reservation for the group of us, and that helped us get in the door quicker, and out of that heat, soon after we arrived. We had a good dinner, food was cooked well and delicious.
We all returned to the hotel…some stayed in their rooms due to the heat outside, and some of us were out in the parking lot visiting. Normally in years past, the swap and sell tailgate event would be held Friday and Saturday in the hotel parking lot after dinner, but this year we only had it Friday evening. Slade, Ryan, Dean, and I were out in the parking lot for a while talking and think it was around 10 pm before we retired for the night to our rooms.
We had a pretty good day at the next quarry on Sunday…
…that is Carl and Valorie`s truck in front of mine above…and they were both checking out the boulder field behind their truck, looking for goodies…later in the day, Onyx and I drove up to the top of the hill and took this panoramic photo below….
…and alot of pretty vugs were found here and harvested by several….this one found on the underside of a boulder….
…and check out these yellow fluorite cubes on calcite that David Bruce found, in photo above and a couple of photos below….
…the next one is one of Don`s finds at the Sunday quarry….he told me it had a bees nest inside it, so I didn`t stick around long after taking a few photos of it. 🙂
…and here is Don sawing off some matrix as Valorie walks by with a crystal find in her right hand….
Most of us stayed til about 3 pm, think most were fairly happy with their finds, and then headed to Elizabethtown to our hotels. We had to make another dinner reservation to be able to get into the Texas Roadhouse, but the wait was definitely worth it as they always have good food there, too. The next morning, some of us headed back to the quarry and some headed home. Onyx and I drove up to the quarry again, and stayed til about mid morning before heading home.
I snapped a few photos of Slade making some cuts to free up some beauties before we took off for home…
I know I second guessed myself all the way home regarding the ordeal with my friend…Ryan and Dean and other friends with professional medical experience, helped me finally realize I had done the right thing, the only thing actually, that I could safely do that would not jeopardize my group, Onyx, and I, in dealing with that type of situation