Well its been a week since I returned from my fall Arkansas trip, so guess I better get this story in there or I`ll get behind again and I hate falling behind.  I think its this dreary weather that makes me do that…Missy and I always have a good time down there no matter what, and this year, Kyle, one of my gymnastic models, decided to join us cause he loves to go rock hunting too. Kyle hasnt had a vacation yet this year so this was a double bonus for him.  We got up early Wednesday morning and picked up my mom, she rides with me as far as Fort Smith, Arkansas, and I always drop her off at the home of my Uncle Harley and Aunt Dorcas, to visit with while we are down near Hot Springs doing our rockhunting and photo shoots….she goes shopping with the gals, some of my aunts and cousins, and then meets us at the family farm for a small reunion on Sunday before we drive back home.

We started down 44 and boy was it windy, a strong wind out of the northwest made driving to Joplin a real picnic….couldnt make over 18 miles to the gallon even, normally I can get from 23 to 25 miles to the gallon with my Colorado, but not today. When we finally turned south on Hwy 71 at Joplin, though, my mileage drastically improved with the tailwind behind us and we made better time as well, arriving in Fort Smith around noon.  After helping Mom with her bags inside and visiting with Uncle Harley and Aunt Dorcas a bit, Kyle and I headed on south on Hwy 71. We stopped in Y City for a few minutes to check out color along the Fouche LaFave River there…there are some little waterfalls there that I photographed Kyle in two years ago…doing his favorite pose…handstands.  There was a young couple there from Louisiana that had stopped to check out the color as well, they were northbound to the Springdale area and we talked with them a bit while I snapped a few photos of the color there…

…spotty color all the way down from Missouri is what we saw…even in Springfield on I-44, we saw maples still in bloom, and several places in Arkansas south of Fort Smith we were seeing maples half in color and the other half still green leaves.

I had several things on my agenda this trip, some photo work to do the first couple of days for a private client at Lake Ouachita where we stayed at Mountain Harbor Resort, before we could even do any rock collecting. Saturday morning, we got up early and by 7:45 we were pulling into Miller Mountain Mine west of Jessieville, on the northeast corner of Lake Ouachita.

For the first two hours we had the place to ourselves…a few people that had camped the night before pulled out as we were getting ready to dig…after talking with Faith for a few minutes and registering, we started a surface check to see what we could find.  I put on my old boots because the dark clay was very muddy and soupy looking, it was extra nasty looking today…Bill was turning piles from the day before, over and mixing things up a bit as we climbed around on the side of the dirt hill….

I didn`t know it at the time, but shortly after Bill turned the piles over, I came down from my surface hunt and looked at each pile til I found one with the peanut butter and then began digging into it…within a few minutes I spotted a few nice crystals poking out of the clay mud and pulled out a ball of clay with this one embedded in it…

…I say I didn`t know til later, like yesterday, when I cleaned off the mud and this is what emerged from the clay mud. Here is another beauty I cleaned up yesterday that I wasn`t sure what I had….

..found in the same peanut butter as the big cluster I found earlier.

Within twenty minutes, about twenty cub scouts descended upon the mine with a few adult scoutmasters….

…and pretty soon there were kids all over the place…Kyle had already stopped searching due to the cool wind chilling his fingers. After a few times of unsupervised kids nearly stepping on my pile of crystals next to my bags, which I had pointed out several times and asked them to be careful where they were walking, and a few that ventured over to chip and hack at anything nearby, I decided to call it quits as well….I told Kyle I was going to take a walk up to the far end and just see if I could find anything else surface collecting before leaving. I walked along the edge and found this little beauty just perched up on the dirt….

…..it was dirt up above and pure nasty mud down below…..and while up there, I also spotted a sandstone plate turned upside down…I reached over and turned it over and was greeted by a beautiful plate of smokey colored quartz crystals with just a little bit of damage…I was so happy by then, I decided to stop right then and there…another five carloads of cub scouts had shown up and there were more adults walking up to the far end where I was at as well. I had filled three bags by that time and Kyle had filled two bags as well, so we loaded up and headed toward Hot Springs.  We decided to drive down to Magnet Cove, south of Hot Springs, and see if we could find some pyrite in Cove Creek. I had been in touch with Mike Howard, a geologist with the State of Arkansas, and he gave me some good information on where to drive to, park at,  where to look and what I might be able to find there, pyrite cubes and feldspar, and possibly brookite crystals as well. 

We drove down to the creek and parked next to the creek, and as I was getting out of the truck, a local resident stopped at her mailbox to pick up her mail…I talked to her a few minutes and she told me the local folks didn`t mind rockhounds as long as they were respectful of the area and cleaned up after themselves and didn`t leave their trash laying around for others to pick up after them. I assured her that we were very respectful and well mannered rockhounds. Its amazing how some people who have no respect for others or their property,  can make a bad name for the rest of us.

Well I got my fire boots out and waded up and down the creek while Kyle searched along the creek bank in the gravels…I had read online while researching the creek and pyrite field trips and read where there might be some tailing areas along the bank…Kyle managed to find a few small pieces…he had greater success than I did, all I could find was the feldspar dike running across the creek. I figured we might be there at the wrong time of the year as well, since the leaves were covering the ground thick as could be. I left after an hour of searching with just a few small pyrite crystals in my hands and one small chunk of feldspar with a few pyrite crystals in it. I might return there next spring when I am back down there again.

I have a couple hundred pounds of quartz yet to clean up, so I will post more photos as I get that done. I plan to be down in Arkansas at least four more times next year, due to more work for the client down there, and plan to visit Miller Mountain again. I had planned to visit Bear Mountain Mine as well this trip, but they had just concluded visits by the Federal Government and were just getting back to digging when I was down there, so I didnt visit with them at all this trip. Maybe next year.