Monday, June 08, 2009

Can you say Bling...bling...I think Fergus Og and Connor Macleod can. They both got to go on a treasure hunt today with Celtic and Gary today.
We visited Herkimer Diamond Mine today. What fun!!! What work!!! boy is Celtic's arms burned...stupid person...she forgot the sunblock and here she has red naturally under her hair dye. And she wore a black tee shirt... even if it had the word tatting with a tatted heart on front of it...it was too hot to be out in the sun wearing black. Celtic almost swooned from the heat. For shame...but we are now home showered,(boy were we filty and Celtic kept saying she couldn't stand to even touch her hair doo). But we did find some treasures there. In these pictures you can see Celtic,Fergus Og and Connor Macleod and Gary having a dirty fun time working.















You can see in some of the pictures the people working on the mine...chiseling way, or sleg hammering away ...any way to get the diamond out that was all that mattered. The guy wearing the black tee shirt is Gary my husband.



















In one of the pictures you can see the street named like Diamond Drive for instance. You can also see Fergus and Connor watching Celtic smashing the rocks...and guess what ...any diamonds you find...you get to bring home...and we did and here is a picture of us showing off the bling. In the first picture you see Fergus sitting on a rock...but guess what is inside of that rock> A crystal. We can see it but we haven't figured out how to remove it yet without breaking the crystal. So for now it is a crystal in the rough.

Now Celtic needs to find someway to make some kinds of jewerly out of the stones where they will be nice and secured and won't be easily lost. Celtic is thinking of some kind of cage setting. There are two crystals that are amost perfectly matched for a pair of earrings. Those are the two big crystals you see at the bottom of the picture. We had all our crystal appraised and I believe our treasure is worth $80.00.

Anyhow...have fun enjoying the pictures.

We are thinking of going back again. Herkimer Diamond Mine is a couple hours drive from us in the Adirondack Mountains. Here is a link that you can read about Herkimer Diamond Mine. There is also a place called The Ace of Diamonds. It is located on the same road and is close to Herkimer Diamond Mine. We might go there next.

Herkimer Diamonds are not really diamonds but crystal. Their hardness as far as a gem goes is 7 whereas I believe real diamonds are a 10 on the hardness scale. The thing about Herkimer Diamonds is when you find them...they are already faceted. How cool is that.
This was something we wanted to do last year but it didn't happen. Have you all ever seen the show "Digging for Treasure" on the Travel Channel? This place was on the show once. It was also a topic among some serious minners.
Anyhow...I thought I would share with you all the adventure Celtic, Gary, Fergus Og, and Connor had today.

2 comments:

Tatman said...

both you and Gary wore black on a hot day. Two dummies LOL! Don't suppose Gary's shirt said "I HEART TATTING" as well? HAHA
You got some really nice crystals. I would assume that since they are already faceted, that they would be quartz crystals. Is the quarry set in limestone? That is the usual place to find quartz. I love gem hunting. We did that several years in my life as a kid going out west and southwest. And also going to rock shops. AHHH...the memories!

battatter said...

oooh diamonds... I bet Conor will guard them very well for you!I bet that would be fun to do, digging for diamonds, even if it was toooo hot!