I started planning my trip to New Mexico back in December after making contact with a Guide out there in the Albuquerque area, that said he could take us to a few locations where we could find some pretty rocks. I let him know we were not new to rockhunting, that my crew had a lot of experience collecting rocks and even digging them from the ground and rock walls both. Every time I made contact with him again tho, it was like starting out new again, I dont think he was taking notes like I do when someone in charge of a group contacts me about going rockhounding with me here in Missouri. He did start to take me seriously the closer we got to the actual trip tho. He came highly recommended by a few friends of mine who have hounded with him, so I figured he knew what he was doing and would take care of us since we were going to pay him for his services, and so I didnt worry about it as I continued to put the trip together. 

During the few snows we had this winter, I was racking up alot of hours on my computer researching the trip…Michael, the NM Guide, sent me a photo of Dogtooth Calcites ringing a plate of blue Fluorite cubes one evening, said he might be able to take us up to this location, it was up pretty high and in the northern part of the state. I was pretty sure in my mind, that everyone in my group would be fine looking for something like this….

…but later on in the planning, he told me it was going to be impossible to get up that high due to all the snow they had received this winter, so we had to go with Plan B on the last day of collecting. 

Originally, I heard from Randy Gentry about a trip to the Red Cloud Wulfenite Mine, that had another mine nearby with Vanadinite plates, both would be tailings pile digs there. Another rockhound friend came back to Missouri from Arizona and New Mexico digs about a week later and I questioned him about the Red Cloud Mine. He and his wife camped out at the Mine one night, said the road going in there was really in bad shape in spots, due to off road vehicles driving it daily, creating deep ruts and there were sharp rocks in the road, too. He had a sharp rock flatten one of his new tires on the way in there, he told me they were only 4 ply sidewalls but he still had to replace it. He also told me that the tailings piles had been there since October and several groups had dug thru them already, so the pickins were pretty slim by February. I passed that on to Randy, who was in touch with the Mine Manager. We were looking at driving there first, staying 3 nights in the Yuma, Arizona area, hotel costs were running about $ 100 a night and gas prices there were not great either, then there were fees at the mines each day, both mines had a different fee….the temps there were also 80 to 90 per day, so we were going to have to keep a sharp eye out for rattlesnakes too.  We ultimately decided between the road in and the slim pickins, to skip it this year and maybe try for it next time around. This year we would start in Deming once again, as we had the last several trips down there. 

Early in February one evening, I was researching Desert Roses found in Southeast Arizona, near a little town called St David, which is south of Benson a few miles. The deeper I dug, the more information I came up with, but only a few sites were giving particulars on how to get to the areas where they are found…I was totally avoiding the You Tube page because there were several you tubers on there talking about going to St David and finding the Desert Roses, but they were not giving any info out on how to get there unless you paid them for the info…bad enough they are making money on their videos by their followers, but then they want even more money for the location info. Luckily there were some folks that did give out info on how to get there, and at no cost to anyone watching.

One evening I came across a guy named Rolf, who has a rock and art gallery in the St David area, and was a well known collector of Desert Roses, over a span of 40 years. I thought his name sounded familiar, and looked back at the notes and emails I had exchanged with John O, over the last ten years, and came across his notes to me about a friend of his named Rolf, who had a rock shop in the Bisbee area and knew every square inch of ground in southeast Arizona and what could be found there. I sent Rolf an email at three email addresses that were listed online, and to his wife through messenger on Facebook, but didnt hear back from him. I mentioned it to Anita Williams, who is a good friend and lives in the Silver City area…she offered to drive down there and check it out for me. 

Anita drove down there the next day and met Rolf at the Art and Rock Gallery, visited with him for a while and obtained a good email addy for me, as well as a good cell phone number for him. He showed her some of the Desert Roses he has found in that area over the last forty years….they are a Gypsum or Selenite Mineral….

He and I began talking that evening and made plans to meet up with him on Sunday morning, March 1st, which was our first day of collecting, at his Sunshine Art and Rock Gallery. Rolf wouldn`t be able to go with us to show us the way there,  but was able to describe to me where we could find some good roses and some other areas close by as well.

He told me that many of the good places, where he had collected even better roses, were now owned by corporations and fenced off, or inaccessible for other reasons. Carl and Valorie, in my personal group, stopped off in that area on their way home from the Tucson Show, and were able to find some and let me know, too.

If anyone would like to see Rolf`s photos of Desert Roses, go to this link on Mindat, he wrote many articles over the last 40 years for Mindat.   

https://www.mindat.org/gl/134557

I was also able to make contact with the new ” controlling interest ” owner of the Blanchard Mine and Mike was open to us going to the Blanchard one day while there to collect some more Fluorite and Barite, as well as some of the other beautiful minerals found there, such as Linnarite, Brochantite, and Chrysacolla. He told me that he would meet us at Bingham and lead us up to the mine, where he would have us sign a release form, and each of us would pay him $ 50 to collect there for the day. Initially he indicated that he would allow us to collect and fill one five gallon bucket during the whole day, but he relaxed that requirement when we got up there. All of us were willing to pay another fifty dollars to collect and fill another bucket, but as it was, didn`t have to do that.

  A few days later, I texted Eddie, a mine owner of several claims in the Orogrande area, who we had visited with three years ago when out there last, took him some geodes for the children that he teaches about rocks and minerals at area schools near Alamogordo each year. I had reached out to him back in December, and he was very open to taking us to a couple of different mines than we went to 3 years before. When I texted him in February tho, he was having some serious PTSD issues, they were giving him severe migraine headaches and he asked me to remind him who I was and what we had set up or talked about before. Once I did that, he was good to go and remembered what we had talked about. He offered to take us to a couple of mines closer to town and also offered to take us to one of his mines in the Bingham area, so that took care of two collecting days for the trip.

By the end of the first week of February, I had the trip lined out and all I had to do was contact NM Guide Michael again and nail down where he could take us as well, which turned out to be Nacimiento Copper Mine north of Albuqerque, and I set that up for the last day of collecting. Here is the schedule that I set up for the trip this year….

Feb 27th  — Up Early and Drive to Tucumcari, NM

Feb 28th —  Drive to Deming and stop at Belen, along the way, to look for Jasper/Agate

Mar 1st  —   Lead Group to St David, Arizona to Rolf`s Sunshine Gallery With Morning                         Hunt for Desert Roses & Then Lordburg, NM for Copper Minerals

Mar 2nd —  Orogrande Mining District With Eddie at Two New Mines All Day

Mar 3rd —   Deming Area  Fluorite Ridge Possibly Hike Up To Old Tailing Piles

Mar 4th —   Deming Area  Fluorite Ridge Again, Then Drive to Socorro

Mar 5th —  Blanchard Lead & Barite Mine in Bingham Area

Mar 6th —  Bingham Area 2 of Eddie`s Mines, Then Drive to Albuquerque

Mar 7th —  Michael NM Guide Taking Us to Nacimiento Copper Mine

Mar 8th — Head for Home

It was a good plan and several signed up to go, we wound up with about a dozen going, including 4 rockhounds new to my personal group, 2 were experienced rockhounds and 2 were newbie rockhounds. A few of them didn`t join up with us til the 4th due to time constraints on their part. 

What I didn`t plan for or expect to happen, was the stomach bug that I came down with the 4th day…it started with me getting light headed soon after arriving at the meeting spot at Orogrande, sitting in my truck took care of it and I was fine to drive, then when I got back to the hotel at Deming, I had a fever that evening and broke it that night, which meant I was not contagious after that, but I was not able to eat solid food nor drink much water without the need to find a bathroom fast, and we all know how tough it is to find a bathroom out in the desert.

By Monday, I was on the computer talking to my Nurse Practitioner by messages, and she told me to get the new Immodium tablets for Multiple Symptoms…I had already picked some up and was taking them each morning at 5 am, to get things under control as quickly as possible. Then I would go meet the crew at breakfast at the restaurant…I was able to eat scrambled eggs and buttered toast without too many issues the first few days, for energy and protein daily, and my NP suggested banana`s as well for morning meals on Wednesday….that worked out for me better than the eggs and light toast did. She also suggested gatorade instead of my spiked water…I spike my grape propel bottled water with 2 tablespoons of Apple Cider Vinegar and she knows that…she said that the ACV would likely upset my stomach in my present condition and make things worse for me. Valorie had extra gatorade and gave me a couple of bottles of it, and it worked well for me at Orogrande…thanks again Valorie, much appreciated. It was tough, but I got thru the week doing that day after day, putting aside the discomfort that I felt to get my crew to each location each day…sometimes like the day at Blanchard Mine, I was able to collect and dig with them all day long, other days like at Orogrande, I stayed inside my truck with Onyx much of the day and catnapped. 

Onyx and I got up early on Friday Feb 27th and we were on the road by 4:45 am headed west to Tucumcari, New Mexico, having packed much of the truck the evening before.  Randy Gentry and Mike Mangrum let me know that they were going to drive to Tucumcari and spend the night there, too. In years past on the other trips out there, I had always driven to Tucumcari and spent the night at a renovated motel called Budget Inn in the downtown area on the main drag west side of the strip. The new owners had done a great job remodeling it and everything was cozy inside the rooms, lots of spacious parking area and quiet on that side of town, too. This year, I tried several times and was not able to contact anyone there, by phone or email, so I looked for another hotel and found one online called the Desert Inn, their rooms looked great and the prices were only like $ 60 a night, so I booked my room for the 27th there.

Randy and Mike decided to stay there too, and shortly after I arrived, I spotted David Hodge`s white pickup parked there too. Randy and Mike were an hour or two out yet and had stopped along the way for dinner, so David and I drove down to Del`s Diner, a very popular eating spot in Tucumcari, for dinner. This place had been owned by a well known local guy named Del, for many years but we found out after we arrived, that it was now under new ownership, and we discovered soon after, that the new owner knew how to cook food well, too. 

The next morning, after breakfast at Del`s Diner and fueling up near the hotel, the four of us headed west on I-40 to Albuquerque, then south on I-25 to Belen. I had stopped off on my second trip to New Mexico, at this location, just southwest of the Belen Airport, pulling off the main road on to a four wheeler trail about a hundred yards, and started finding Agates and Jaspers all over the Desert Floor as soon as I got out of my truck. Within 30 minutes I had half a five gallon bucket of Agates and Jaspers. The washes out there were hot spots for them and the further west you drove down Marble Quarry Road, the more you could find…the area looking kind of like the Badlands…the locals called it a canyon…way down there is a river, Rio Puerco I believe it is called, and on the other side of the river, you are on Indian Reservation land and cannot collect there without a written permit.

After about 90 minutes of collecting, we headed on south on I-25 to Hatch, and then southwest on Hwy 26 over to Deming. Most of us were staying at the La Quinta Inn and Suites on the east side of Deming, and we drove down there to get checked in. After cleaning up and getting Onyx settled in, the four of us headed to La Fonda`s Mexican Restaurant for dinner. We discovered this place 3 years ago when last there, due to the Si` Senor Mexican Restaurant having problems with their cooks…I could relate to that problem, because at that same time, the Mexican Restaurant that I go to frequently here in Sullivan, was having problems with their cooks, they finally fired them once they located 3 new ones that could step in and take over operations in the kitchen. At any rate, we found out the cooks at La Fonda knew what they were doing food wise.

We met for breakfast the next morning at 7 am at Denny`s and then left from there at 8 am driving to St David, Arizona. Traffic was light and we drove through a unique rest area between Willcox and Benson Arizona on I-10, climbing up from the desert floor to a huge rock escarpment that made one think you were in Fred Flintstone country for a brief few minutes. The State of New Mexico had the forethought somewhere along the way, to install and build a rest area on both sides of the interstate there, too, called Texas Canyon Rest Area….

We arrived about 10:30 am, stopping off at Sunshine Art and Rock Gallery just a few miles south of Benson on Hwy 80 at milepost 296…about 50 yards off the road on the west side of the highway. I had let Rolf know what time we would be arriving and that we would have a few vehicles, he assured me that everyone would be able to park there. David Bruce and his friend Lawrence were already there when we arrived, having driven in from Red Cloud Mine. After introductions and a few minutes of small talk, we went inside his Gallery and spent a few minutes looking at his vast collection of minerals and crystals inside. He had some nice Elmwood Mine plates in one of the windows….

He then took us outside again to the west side and showed us many piles of native Arizona minerals and crystals, as well as some from New Mexico. Valorie and I purchased a few of the larger Desert Roses that he had inside the Gallery, just in case we didn’t find anything comparable at the collecting spot. Rolf provided us with specific directions to the main collecting spot and we took off soon after, turning right off Hwy 80 on to South Apache Powder Road, and driving a few miles down that road, passing by the Power Plant entrance, to West Desert Rose Lane. We turned right again, this road is a lot more narrow than it looks on the maps and rough, too, it passes by a few small farms and then comes to a ninety degree turn to the right…we proceeded straight at this intersection and stayed to the right at the Y, this trail took us to a Pipeline access road and we turned left. Rolf told us that the roses could be found anywhere in this area, but he advised one would need permission from property owners if we strayed to the right off the access road. Many of the places that he rockhounded at locally in the past forty years,  are now inaccessible due to private ownership, subdivisions, roads washed away, gates and fences installed, and permission revoked….likely revoked due to folks not respecting the property of others. We have encountered problems like that everywhere we go rockhounding at, in Missouri and out of state as well. 

From there, I drove per the instructions Rolf had provided me and we soon wound up at the parking spot…I had been told by a few others that once we arrived at that spot, that we would see sparkling selenite all around us…and they were right about that. We spread out and started looking for the Desert Roses, and within twenty minutes, a few of my rockhounds found some by digging down into the sand/dirt floor….

We started at the base of the hill and worked out way up…..

…and pretty soon after that, we were finding a lot of Desert Roses all over the place. David Hodge even managed to find a big plate of Selenite, pulling it right out of the ground….

…while Randy Gentry watched him dig it up and pull it out of the dirt…..

David Bruce dug into the hillside and got down to a green layer of dirt/sand, where he found several Desert Roses cuddled up together…this is what that layer looked like and you can see a red layer below the green layer….

….he turned it over to his friend Lawrence who worked it for a little while then. 

A few folks left early, headed to Lordsburg, as the plan for the day was to leave around noon or 1 pm and go collect copper secondaries there at the old copper mines. Most of us didn`t make the second part of the dig, we left about 3 pm and headed back to Deming instead. One of my rockhounds, Kirk, had driven to Lordsburg and was waiting for us about 1 pm, I texted him directions to the copper mines and let him know that he could find small pieces and plates of azurite and malachite laying all over the desert floor there above, and down inside these deep and wide trenches, that were part of the old copper mines there many years ago. On our very first trip there five to six years ago, we all filled at least one bucket full of them, if not two, and potentially, a person could fill many more than that…..these are photos from our first trip there….

(C) JW *

(C) JW *

(C) JW *

I dont recall him saying whether he drove on up there and looked around or not. It is a huge area and very productive, as long as rockhounds keep an open mind and are prepared to dig down to find better stuff than the average rocks on top. Down in the huge trench, one can dig and turn rocks over to find better stuff too.

Sure was a pretty sunset on the way back to Deming…started shooting it about ten miles west of Deming, 2nd photo via my side mirror as it was deepening in color, third photo from the LQ hotel….

 After a hearty breakfast the next morning at Denny`s, we drove over to Orogrande to meet up with Eddy, the Claim Mine owner, at a new spot of his choosing, which turned out to be a much shorter drive to the mines he decided to take us to. While standing at the back of his razor, I started feeling light headed, like I was going to pass out…I didn`t say anything to anyone, didn`t want to interrupt Eddie`s talk to my crew, so I just walked over and climbed back into my truck with Onyx, into the air conditioning, which seemed to help pretty fast. It wasn`t that hot outside yet, so I was a bit puzzled as to what was going on with me. A few wandered over to see if I was okay, and I let them know how I was feeling….Valorie brought me some gatorade and that seemed to help a bit too. Eddie led us over to the first mine, and the parking area was short and small, felt like we were perched up on the edge of a narrow shelf…

….great view across to the south tho, could even see the small mining town of Orogrande down there between the two hills…

…I stayed in my truck with Onyx much of the day, got out to stretch my legs occasionally and picked up some smalls of azurite and malachite that were laying all over the place at this first mining spot, there was an area below us that was loaded with all sorts of color and smalls, check out the color in the foreground below, as well as the great view….

and here is the area below where we parked that was loaded with color and more smalls too…I didn`t make it down to that spot, was afraid I might not make it back up to the truck….

…so I stayed in the area on top close to my truck, and picked up some fairly nice sized plates like this one….

…and worked this area of ground right here….

…with all that color in front of me, I didn`t really need to walk any further to find some good stuff. 🙂

Soon after that, Eddie sent Valorie up the hill behind us and she was soon finding some neat stuff, so the rest of the crew climbed up the hill as well….

…eventually I wore out again and climbed back into the air conditioning with Onyx, and we catnapped for a couple of hours. When I woke up, some of the guys were heading over to the 2nd mine, where Eddie said they could find some Orthoclase Crystals, he said they get up to five or six inches across and four inches wide…it was quite a drive over to the parking spot…. you can see where they parked in the photo below to the left middle of the photo, and then you can see Lawrence in a super bright green shirt on the right side of the photo, watching the guys hiking in front of him up the first hill on the way to the mine…

….I am glad I didn`t go to the second mine with them, that hike would have done me in for sure that day. Their drive over there was going to possibly require one really tight squeeze turn that might require a 9 point turn to make it, and then a short hike to the mine itself…the road doesn`t lead to the mine, just to a parking area close by. Later the guys told me that the short hike was up and over two of those hills, at least a mile hike to the mine from the parking spot, and the crystals they dug out of the hillside were no bigger than two inches across…..as it was, they didn`t get out of the area til darkness hit….I left about 4 pm, after checking with them to make sure they knew how to get back to Deming. Valorie and Carl were still collecting at Mine number one when I took off. I pretty much was drained despite several catnaps and went to bed as soon as I got Onyx taken care of on food and water back at the hotel. Ten hours of sleep really helped me for the next day.

Even with ten hours of solid rest and sleep, I was up early the next morning to take four Immodium tablets to bring the side effects under control before driving to Denny`s for breakfast. Then I led the group out north of Deming to an area that John O and David Hodge found one morning about 5 years ago, while they were hiking around the area of an old ore chute and making a big circle, they came upon several tailings piles on top of a huge hill a third of a mile from where we were parked at. They collected some nice plates at that pile and then brought them to the rest of us to look at and drool over…..

…and of course after seeing all those goodies, it was a ” heck yeah let`s go get some ” response from all of us that morning, but they prepared us for the hike over there, the first part was fairly flat and then it was a climb up a fairly steep hill, but there was a deer trail with switchbacks going up it from the direction we were come from the Ore Chute parking area. I remember we all took 2 buckets up there with us, and we all filled 2 buckets and carried them back down to our vehicles six years ago that day, then we returned to the tailing piles with another bucket and filled that as well. The main pile was huge, there were hundreds, if not thousands, of plates in it, from small to yard rock size and boulders ringing the edges of it. My last hike down with my third bucket, I hiked to the north after crossing the fence, instead of east to the parking area, and came out at an outcrop of huge rocks next to a road, that led to the Ore Chute to the east and going north the other way…later I found out the road going north led one to Fluorite Ridge.

This year, I decided to go back to that hill with the tailing piles and see what was left, so I led the group over to it that morning after breakfast…we had a little trouble getting there, when we got to the turn off on to the road just past the Ore Chute, and maybe a quarter of the way up that road, it didn`t look right to me, so I came to a stop and told everyone to hang tight while I drove on up to check it out. I seriously thought we were on the wrong road because it looked nothing like it did a few years ago when we drove out there again in 2023, so I turned around at a wide spot and returned to the group waiting on me, and after getting them all turned around, we headed on down the main road to the north. About a mile or so down the main road, tho, we came to a dirt road on the left that I knew led to a small campground next to a rock bluff, and I knew then that we had indeed been on the right road moments before, so I turned around and everyone followed me back to that road and up it we went again. It was in much rougher condition than it had been just three years ago, I guess the BLM doesn`t take good care of their roads like the USFS does, at least in Arkansas they do, maybe they don`t out west. At any rate, we reached the outcrop of huge rocks by the road and we parked there….three years ago you could have parked 20 vehicles there, this year there were maybe five good parking spaces and then you had to create your own parking space and still leave that road open for traffic driving thru.

We then climbed up and around the outcrop of huge rocks and started across the desert floor til we reached the barbed wire fence…yes someone does have cattle out there believe it or not…I still have no clue what it is they are finding to eat out there and water is pretty scarce too….maybe they like those thorn trees that are all over the place…..

(C) JW *

and cactus that are all over the place, too,  like these….

…we hiked over to the fence at the base of that steep hill, some of us climbing over and some going under it…strands were too tight to pull apart and climb thru the middle of the fence…and then we began the climb up the hill….

…and this below is the view looking down the hill from the top of the tailing pile and across to the outcrop of rocks where we parked, which would be where you see the road leading north from it across the way….

I would say it is steeper than 45 degrees, several of us took a few rest breaks on the climb up, as well as the climb down carrying one or two buckets filled with Fluorite plates, which there were still hundreds in that pile for sure….here is David standing at the very top of the pile…

…and Mike and others down below the pile picking up pretty rocks as well…they were clearly in abundance on that hill. We actually made it back to the parking area in good time, with alot of time left to go for the afternoon. After resting up some at the parking lot……

….they asked if there were any rock shops around and we discussed those, one in Deming that was mainly Lapidary centered, and one south of town near Rockhound State Park that was mainly Thunderegg centered, but no one was sure it was even open. I asked them if they had been to the Luna County Mimbres Museum and they said no, so we headed there to see the Mineral Collection back in  the Western area and the Geode Kid`s Huge Thunderegg Collection there. If you have never been there, it is well worth the free admission to go and see it….

…and they all enjoyed it as well…we asked the ladies in the shop if they knew anything about the rock shop and Thunderegg Museum near Rockhound State Park but they didn`t have much info on it. We stepped outside and Randy made a call to what we thought was the Thundergg Museum and Rock Shop to see if they were open, and a lady answered and said they were there this week and open. About that time tho, someone found something online on their phone that said that place closed at 2 pm daily and it was after 2 pm right then, so we stopped for the day. When I returned to the hotel, I had a message waiting on me from Lori at Spanish Stirrup Rock Shop, she told me that she and Bruce were at their old Rock Shop on the hill just north of the entrance to Rockhound State Park and said we should come visit them while we were there. I told her we would come out in the morning after breakfast around 8 am and she said that would be just fine. 

As it turned out, Lori was the one that answered the phone and talked to Randy that afternoon outside the County Museum, we found that out the next morning, when we drove out to visit with her after breakfast. We just missed Bruce, he left right before we arrived, headed to Truth or Consequences to pick up half a dozen flat lap machines that a guy there had for sale. In the meantime, Lori gave us the nickel tour of the property including the many piles of pretty rocks and thundereggs….here is the front of the Rock Shop…..

Just as a disclaimer, for anyone thinking they can go by there and check things out without anyone around, be aware, she has cameras all over the place, they are connected to law enforcement who can respond and arrive pretty darn  quickly, plus there are watchful neighbors, too, and most of them out there are likely well armed, too. Several years ago Lori dealt with some claim jumpers, there was a guy down there that was leading clubs and groups to one of her thunderegg claims out on the slopes of the Little Floridas Mountain range there…Lori had her kids with her and they watched the caravan go by the Rock Shop, she had a good idea where they were headed, so she put the kids in her truck and she drove to her claim. Sure enough, as they started up the slope , she spotted a guy on a four wheeler up on top of the hill who signaled to the leader and both of them sped off, leaving everyone in the group to fend for themselves. When she came up on the group, many of them had an attitude toward her, and she was in no mood to deal with attitudes from trespassers on her claim. She told them they were trespassing on her claim and gave them a chance to clear out…they refused to budge, so she took out her handgun and started shooting out a front tire on every vehicle there…called the Sheriff and told him to bring a lot of wreckers with him…and he did just that, as well as a whole lotta deputies. 

Moral of the story is, don`t trespass on private property and steal from the mine claim owner…actions have consequences and she doesn`t mess around, she means business !! 

She also gave us a tour of the house attached to the Rock Shop, used to be an old Army barracks and there is a large Great Room with a beautiful fireplace….

…and she had transformed her shower in the bathroom very nicely as well….

…most of us purchased some polished cut Thunderegg halves from her and some purchased material in the piles outside. Here is the link to her FB page, Spanish Stirrup Rock Shop…..https://www.facebook.com/SpanishStirrupRockShop

We left about 11 am headed to the area north of Deming near Greenleaf Mine at a pin location provided by Guide Michael…about the only thing we found there were some new claim markers and massive Fluorite. Soon after, we loaded up and drove up to Socorro, arriving around 3 pm and were able to check in to our motels. I wasn`t too impressed with the Baymont Motel this time around…had a major safety issue with the heater / fan in my room, and they had several Utiiity crews staying there…those guys got up at 4 am and left at 5:30 am with a lot of fanfare and noise each morning. The least the new owners could have done was put some separation between them and us normal folks. We had dinner and breakfast each day at El Camino Restaurant…Randy had quite a dinner that evening, I have never seen a Mexican dish like the one he had…he called it Dos Burritos….

Needless to say, since I had some of those Utility workers next door to me, I was up at 5:30 am, whether I wanted to sleep another 30 minutes or not…hard to sleep thru loud music, loud talking, and loud door slamming, not to mention their loud diesel pickups running outside the window for at least 30 minutes. Why the new hotel owners can`t figure out that moving the rest of their customers away from that noise would be much better, is way beyond me. Will definitely have to rethink another hotel to stay at in Socorro on the next trip to New Mexico, cause it sure won`t be the Baymont Inn next time around. We made it to breakfast, had some scrambled eggs and light toast again, and then just before our departure at 8 am to Bingham, one of our newbies showed up with his family dropping him off to us. David Hodge volunteered to give him a ride today and back, due to my condition at the time. I had talked to Jake online a few times, all I knew was that he liked to collect pretty rocks, has some musical talent, lives in Tennessee, and has bright red hair. 🙂  He did turn out to be a pretty nice young man and a pretty good rockhound.

We left shortly after getting him settled into David`s pickup, and headed to Bingham about 8 am. I had been in contact with the new majority controlling interest owner of the Blanchard Mine and Mike said he would meet us at the foot of the hill. As it turned out, he was just ahead of us and made his turn on to the County Road leading out to the Mining area about fifty yards ahead of us. I had made contact with my contact at White Sands Missile Testing Range a week before, and he had let me know that we would be able to go anytime that week without any hitches…he said they had been quite busy the month of February testing rockets and missiles but were ” resting up ” in March. Three years ago when we were last out there, he said much the same thing, but added that we might hear some automatic cannon fire to the south, that they would be shooting some sporadically 30 miles south of us. Told him I didn`t know we had automatic cannons and he said there were prob a lot of things I didn`t know about our military weaponry these days, but he couldn`t go into specifics on that and i was completely fine with it, cause I sure didn`t want him to get into any trouble over it. He is a former dispatcher like me, and I have a lot of respect for dispatchers, law enforcement, fire service, and our military men and women, as well. As it was three years ago, we did hear that automatic cannon fire and it sounded alot closer than 30 miles from us that day. This year it was much more quiet out there, except for the wind, which was quite gusty out there at times. We stopped at the foot of the hill, as Mike calls it, got out and shook hands with him, he gave us a little bit of history on the area there, and then we drove on up the hill. The elevation at the foot of the hill is 5400 feet and we were going up to the parking lot for the Blanchard Mine, which is 6200 feet, where we would be digging and collecting at, was prob another 50 feet higher. I think I am the only one that went up in four high, everyone else was in four low or all wheel drive. We wound up at the parking lot about 20 minutes later….

…..the view up there is something else…the valley floor below is part of White Sands Missile Testing Range, the mines out there are part of the north boundary of the Range. The line of hills way across on the far side of the valley floor in the photo above are ten to twelve miles from us, so you can see that far across there.  I am taking the photo from the west edge of the Barite Bench just outside one of the entrances to the mine…they are all heavily gated and padlocked for security and safety reasons. We did not go inside the mine, Mike has decided not to take anymore groups inside, due to liability reasons, same reason that Ray decided not to take groups inside as well. Not everyone that promises to follow the safety rules, actually does…some people play stupid games and win stupid prizes…and those stupid prizes they win, can cost the rest of us who do follow the rules and safety policies, the opportunity to go inside a famous and well known mine to collect extraordinary specimens. This happened about five or six years ago, before we were there for our first time. However, as Ray told us six years ago, and Mike stated as well, there is a lot of great material in the Barite Bench outside the mine, too. Fluorite from here comes in six colors at least, including the Blanchard Blue, which it is mostly well known for, and then there are green, pink, yellow, clear, purple, and a wine color that is kind of a reddish brown hue. I have seen all of these colors in the Fluorite there. It is also known for the beautiful honeycomb formation of white Bladed Barite, the bright Blue Linnarite, bright Green Brochanite, vivid Teal Chrysacolla, and sometimes a mix of all the above. After more talk about the history of the mines up there at that level, we signed the liability release form and paid Mike our entry fees, and then made our way up to the Barite Bench and began collecting. I was feeling pretty good today, as the Blanchard Mine is one of my top favorite places to collect at, so I started off surface collecting, which was made easy by the amount of gorgeous material laying all over the place that folks who had been there before us, had high graded and left behind…and believe me, I was shocked at some of the stuff left behind…felt like those people must have lost their minds leaving it behind. Carl and Valorie decided to work the small canyon right off the parking lot and they were down there the better part of the day….

…after I filled half a bucket of smalls left behind by others, I moved over to the north edge of the Barite Bench and dug in near David Hodge….the wind really picked up soon after we began collecting and digging….this video will show you how windy cause you can`t hear what I am saying til the wind stops or subsides a bit….

AVI 118 Blanchard Mine on Wednesday All Day March 5th, 2026

David was standing on the outside edge of the Barite Bench we were collecting on, behind him the bench sloped down at about a 35 degree angle and then there was about an eighty foot drop to solid rock below, which would have been the bottom floor of an adit that approached the mountain at a 45 degree angle from the road. That adit was blown open by the original mining company years ago, Mike told us. I had to rephotograph my cellphone as a video was rolling to show you what David looked like on that ledge that he dug out level so he could stand there for hours to collect those huge plates…

He was wrestling that thing out of the dirt and rock, while the wind was blowing around and gusting pretty good too, he had to take a few short breaks to avoid the rock dust blowing into his face, too. He and I were able to lift it up on to the bench where I was at, and then it took 2 other guys to help him carry it up to his truck. If he sends me a photo of it cleaned up, I will post it on my FB page and here as well. 

Here are some more photos of what he and I found while digging into the Bench at that spot….

I actually had two like this one above, the other one didnt have as many cubes, but sure had a lot of the pretty colors it it, think that is the one I gave to Mary, who has Marys Lake Site, one of the places I take groups of people to collect pretty rocks at here in SE Missouri. She really liked it. Here are some more that I found and took home too….

…and then I walked around to stretch my legs and see how everyone else was doing there….Randy and Mike were digging near the top of the Bench on the southwest side and they got into a mess of honeycomb white Barite and Blanchard Blue Fluorite cubes….

They also had a commanding view of the valley below where they were digging at…..

These below were some of the ones David and I were pulling out of the Bench….with the pretty green Brochantite mixed in here and there….

I then walked up to the east end to see how David Bruce, Lawrence, and Jake were doing on that end of the Bench, found Lawrence doing some high grading in the southern end of the trench they were working in….

…and Jake, he has the BRIGHT Red hair, was over to the left of the trench, talking to Mine Owner Mike Sanders….Jake was likely looking for some more Galena cubes, he had shown me some that he had found over there that morning and they were very nice looking cubes….

…for his very first trip to the Blanchard Mine, I would say Jake had great success and did quite welll with his finds there. I remember him telling me that he had a great time and that is really all you can ask for on a rock and mineral collecting location like this. Pretty soon it was quitting time per Mike, so some had some high grading choices to make and some had some ” where am I gonna put this in my truck ” choices to make….

I got tickled at David Bruce for a few minutes here…he did have a dilemma tho, cause he had pulled some nice, pretty, and BIG pieces out and was truly wondering where they were going to go. 🙂

We left about 4 pm, drove down to the foot of the mountain, and Mike had some goodies from other places as well as other areas of the Blanchard Mine, like the Portales Entrance that has been closed off for years for safety reasons. He offered them to us at good prices, and several of us purchased some from him. We thanked him for allowing us to collect at the Blanchard once again and headed back to Soccoro for the night, as we would be coming back the next morning to go to yet another mine in the same area.

Kirk Price sent me a photo or two of his best pieces he found at the Blanchard Mine that day, after he got them all cleaned up….

and they look pretty nice for sure. 

We met at the El Camino again the next morning, I was running a little later getting there, opting to run to Walmart and get a cluster of banana`s after Mike had given me one the day before at the Blanchard to snack on, and it hit the spot for me. I researched it online after we got back to the motel and found out banana`s were good for stomach related illnesses, providing good fiber and of course potassium sources too. That was the morning I stopped eating the scrambled eggs and buttered toast and switched to banana`s instead, and that was probably the start of my stomach getting better and stronger…thanks again, Mike. 🙂 

We drove back over to Bingham about 8 am…Jake had decided not to go back with us that morning, opting to spend some time with his family instead, but said he would meet us Saturday morning at Cuba, for the day trip there. We arrived in Bingham thirty minutes later, we were supposed to meet Eddie at the foot of the mountain, but instead, as we approached our turn off, found him on the shoulder of Highway 380 in front of the rock shop, so we all pulled over and waited til he was done talking to someone in a motor home…turned out to be some folks that he knew, that were going with us that morning to his fluorite mine, and these folks knew of me through my group FB page, MO Rock Collecting & Digs. They had been on a trip or two with me Guiding here in Southeast Missouri, and not long ago, because as soon as they mentioned their names, I remembered them. They followed us over to the foot of the mountain, which is the base of Eddie`s Mine Claim there, and he gave a brief safety talk on the hazards there…..

Eddie took off shortly after, had some other obligations he said…..he had suggested that the guys bring some big sledge hammers with them, like in the ten to twenty pound variety / size, to bust open some boulders to find vugs of pretty fluorites. Some in my crew went and purchased big sledge hammers and then after busting a few boulders open and not finding much of anything inside them, gave up in frustration…well grounded frustration I might add. Turns out there was very little there to be found in terms of pretty fluorites unless you were fine with really small stuff. This one is about the only big one I found and it was buried deep in the ground there…

Needless to say, we didn`t stick around long after that, opting instead to drive north to Albuquerque and get settled into our hotels, rest up a bit before the next day of rockhounding north a bit into the mountains at an old copper mine. Most of us stayed at the La Quinta Inn on San Antonio Drive just east of I-25, it was in an older neighborhood, nice and quiet. We had dinner at the Denny`s Restaurant next door as well as breakfast the next morning. Fuel was a little cheaper up there opposed to the prices in Deming. We drove north up I-25 after breakfast, and then turned west on Hwy 550, which was a four lane and took us through some colorful landscapes….

…to Cuba, New Mexico…we stopped at the McDonald`s there, to meet our Guide Michael there….he was running a little late, came in behind us and spotted us lined up over on the south side of the building…we weren`t able to line up where he asked us to, due to a bus taking up about ten spaces there. Soon he was telling us what we could expect to find at the Nacimiento Copper Mine….

…and soon we were on our way, following him over to the mine entrance, where we parked outside the gate, between the gate and the highway. We then hiked up the driveway, up a fairly steep hill, having to stop and catch our breath for a few minutes…we were at 8, 400 foot elevation there, so the air was a little thinner up there compared to where we had been rockhounding for the past week.

Soon after we topped the hill and started downhill a bit, Michael led us down a road that led to a big lake at the bottom….but we only walked a little bit down the road, and then off to the right to a big wash where he had found some different things, some weird shaped geodes and occasionally some selenite. While we were there, some guy in a Ford Explorer pulled down near us, got out and approached a few of us that were below the rest of the group, and asked us what we were doing. We told him we were rockhounds and we were looking for pretty rocks. He asked who the bossman was and we pointed out Michael to him…this guy seemed to be a bit ticked off, but Michael was soon able to calm him down and explain things to him. Turns out the guy had a claim down by the lake, and for some reason, thought we were going to soon be claim jumpers. Michael assured him that was not the case tho, and told him we had no intentions of going down to the lake, or anywhere near it for that matter. Turns out the lake water was not normal type water, possibly had some acid in it, and why on earth that guy would think someone would want to be down near a pool of acid water, is beyond me. Once Michael had him calmed down tho, he actually wound up giving us some good tips and info on some pretty rocks up on the hill off to one side of the lake. We had no intention of going up there to look tho, as that was going to be quite a steep climb and up over huge rocks to get there. Michael said he would check it out later on.

After checking out that section, where we didn`t find much, we went back up the hill and turned to the right and headed through some light brush…small pines and juniper scrub bushes, to a gravel looking area where Azurite berries could be found…in that particular area tho, they are quite tiny and Michael brought some sifting screens for others to use to find them. By that time tho, after hiking all the way up there, my energy levels were falling fast, and I told my crew I was going to walk back down to my truck and rest up, thankfully it was all down hill for me, but Onyx and I still had to take a few breaks along the way. The last break we took was at this junction where I sat down on one of these big rocks…the road in front starts down the hill slightly curving to the right toward the white colored area to the right of the deep orange area of the far mountain side…toward the first collecting area Michael took us to…the lake cannot be seen from here but is at the bottom of that mountainside below the orange colored area….

the wash we started collecting in is to the right and at the base of the reddish brown area on the right side of the next photo….

..in the next photo you see the road to the right…that was the main road we hiked in on, the road that Onyx and I were taking back to my truck…at the top of the hill to the right, from there to the left across the red colored ridge, the owner of the land, possibly government, were building a trail across there and you can see some of it, looks like a dirt road, on the left side of the photo, leading up the hill into the pine trees….

…and behind us to the west and up on top of the 3rd ridge, way up there, were a few people rockhounding, possibly some of my group, possibly a few that came with Michael, but they were finding some stuff up there too…it was quite a climb up there and I am glad we didn`t try to make that climb earlier….

I had let my crew and Michael know before I took off….Michael later told me that he gathered up some of the azurite berries, gave them to one of my people and asked him give them to me, but I don`t know who it was that he gave them to, and he isn`t able to remember either. 

Onyx and I got back to the truck and napped for a couple of hours in the ac til Randy, Mike, and David Hodge made it back to the trucks too. Said they had had enough as well…Mike and Randy headed home from there, and David and I headed north on I-25, drove past Santa Fe and then turned south down Highway 285…that took us to Clines Corner, New Mexico, where we turned east on I-40, and drove to Tucumcari, stopping for the night at the Desert Inn once again. We drove down to Del`s Diner and discovered it closed early due to a water leak, so then came back nearly to the motel and discovered a hamburger joint open to a thriving business…a basketball team from a local school was there having dinner too, and so we had hamburgers and fries…have to say, it was very good, and my first solid meal in a week.

Next morning, Onyx and I were up early and on the road headed home by 5 am…I ate banana`s all day long til I got to Springfield, Missouri, then fueled up and got some Long John Silver`s food to go, and boy, did it taste just fine. 🙂  We got home about 7 pm, safe and sound, and heard from the others later that evening that they made it home safe and sound, too. Had a few hiccups along the way, but all in all, think it was still a good trip.

Despite getting sick, I still had a great time with good friends and finding pretty rocks. Hope everyone else had a great time, too. David Avery told me a few days later, that he made it home with 1600 lbs of rocks in his pickup and boy was he going to be busy cleaning and unloading for awhile. 🙂  Here he is with one of his two large yard rocks at the Blanchard Mine….

To Be Continued….Still Working On Photos, nearly done….