First smokey

[Fullerton]

I thought I'd share the background to the first gemstone I found ... 

I was on a university field tour in the Tingha area of NW NSW in 1987.  We toured an old abandoned mine site which had never been rehabilitated (probably good for fossickers but perhaps bad for the environment!).  Anyway, as I was getting back on the mini-bus I noticed an odd shaped and coloured stone.  It turned out to be a solid piece of smokey quartz of about 200g. 

I wasn't an avid fossicker at the time but kept the 'odd stone' for the next 20 years.  A couple of years ago when I got serious about fossicking, I decided to get some of it cut. 

The result was eight stones ranging from 35 to 15 carats.  I was, and still am, really impressed by the golden dark brown colour.  I made two into pendants for gifts and the rest are specimen stones I'll never part with.

Attached is an image of three of the stones ... I keep them wrapped in tissue paper so sorry about the tissue fibre on the stones.

PS. ... and no, unfortunately, I can't remember the name of the old mine site. 

Cheers,
Fullerton
 

[Wwoofa]

Hi Fullerton,
Nice looking stones   The place you went might have been "Chathams" ??  They used to allow fossickers into their property.  They had quite a large area of land with lots of large sandy mine dumps from the old tin mining days.  I followed an old mud map to their property a few years ago and to my surprise it turned out to be the same property where Tingha Sands is now located.  Unfortunately, all of those dumps have now been processed.  Luckily there are so many similar places around Tingha that we're never likely to run out.
Regards, Paul

[mehoose]

How'd I miss this
Mighty fine stones Fullerton, nice deep colour and they look wonderfully clear from here.
Merryn

[Barrett]

Nice looking stones!  Hard to tell from the pic but doesn't look like to much color zoning