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NEFTA FLUORITE FANTASY WEEKEND VOLUME 2
WALWORTH, NY

This is the most hyped NEFTA field trip of the year and it should be.

The field trip is at the Dolomite Products Co. Inc. quarry a/k/a Walworth Quarry, (and hereinafter referred to as Walworth Quarry) famous for its perfect, crystal clear, up to 2 inch on edge fluorite crystals with a light blue shading.

Where is Walworth, NY you ask? From Central Massachusetts get on the Mass Pike, Interstate 90 (I90) and head west out of Massachusetts into New York, staying on I90 west, (the New York Thruway) go past Albany, past Herkimer, past Utica, past Syracuse and get off at Exit 45 the first Rochester, NY exit. That goes to I490 which you leave immediately for Rt 96 to Rt 250 north and finally to Rt 286 east. You end up about 10 miles east of Rochester. The total distance is about 375 miles and takes roughly 5 1/2 hours to drive with one stop. The distance from Exit 45 to the quarry is only about 14 miles or so.

There are many places to stay in that area of the Interstate; however, the official accommodation for the field trip was The Lodge @ Woodcliff. Sounds like a resort? It is. Definitely not your typical mineral collector's place to catch some sleep; that is if you can sleep before an exciting day of collecting. The Lodge boasts a swimming pool, exercise room and golf course; peculiar ways of pampering oneself when a stop at the local diner for breakfast is often considered an indulgence.

The field trip this year spent both days at the Walworth Quarry. It began with sign up on Saturday morning between 7:30 and 8:15. This included signing in, two safety meetings with additional instructions about parking, bathroom, first aid, what the quarry personnel would be doing to help us and the rules. These included keeping twenty feet away from the walls and overhangs and not being out of sight. Collecting began a few minutes before 8:30.

The Sunday collecting was from roughly 9:00 to 2:30 with nearly the same preliminaries. You had to have basically six things to be allowed to collect, i.e. membership in a NEFTA member club, your membership card showing same, steel toed boots, hard hat, safety glasses and pre registration [i.e. paid your fee(s)] or if you did not pre register your collecting fee(s). It was $10 if you pre registered or $12 the day of. That included collecting for both days.

You could also attend a chicken barbecue dinner Saturday evening with awards for fluorite specimens collected that day. There were two
categories, matrix and off matrix, with three awards each i.e. 1st, 2nd and 3rd with cash prizes. The dinner was held outside under a tent, at the Greystone Country Club, across the highway from the quarry, very convenient and also very much first class. The cost was $17 early registration, then $19 after a certain date and finally $24 at the door.

In conjunction with the barbecue there was a period of swapping and selling prior to the dinner, and also after dinner if anyone was interested. No one was. This turned out to be the most disappointing part of the whole weekend. At least a dozen people participated but many of the people brought their C grade material or material I already had or was not interested in i.e. fluorescents. This was a bit unexpected but ...oh well.

As for the awards, there were about a half dozen specimens submitted for each category. The three winners in each category were very good specimens, more than just representative material, especially the matrix pieces. One matrix piece had over 20 fluorites crystals on it and yet it did not win first prize. The one judged best was a single crystal on matrix with a light blue tint and very clear and lustrous. The best of the off matrix was a clean, clear thumbnail size specimen that had been found just laying loose on the ground.

Of course there were other fluorite specimens collected by those who did not attend the dinner and even by some who did but did not enter their specimens. You can only wonder about what those other specimens were like...?

The dinner was very enjoyable. Great barbecue chicken and the works to go with it. We had entertainment while we waited in addition to the swapping we could watch hapless golfers plunk their golf balls into the water hazard behind the dinner area. During and after dinner we shared very interesting conversation with fellow collectors from all over New England, the east coast and nearby Canada.

The weather cooperated, producing two nearly perfect days for collecting, although two very different kind of days. Saturday was mostly cloudy with gradual clearing in the afternoon, with a high temperature in the upper 60's and moderate humidity. Sunday was sunny and clear, very bright with a high temperature in the low 70's after a cool start and low humidity.

Neither my collecting buddy (Paul Young) nor I were lucky enough to find any phenomenal specimens but what we did find was more than just able to keep us interested. We both found fluorite crystals and sphalerite crystals worth keeping; although clearly not the best that were collected in terms of either size or color over the two days of collecting. The fluorites we found were either of good size, one inch or larger on edge but without good color or luster or had good color and luster but were only a quarter inch in size or smaller. The sphalerite crystals were very lustrous with some on a white dolomite crystal covered matrix or loose. There were singles and up to fourlings or fivelings. The largest group was not quite the size of a
dime. What they lacked in size they made up for in luster and brilliance.

In addition to the fluorite and sphalerite we also found the following:
lots of dolomite crystals, mostly small crystals (micros) and but some
larger, up to almost a quarter inch, nearly all were white or a shade of
white, a very few calcite crystals mostly small as well, up to one half
inch, as either schalahedrons or dog tooth forms. Also found was massive selenite up to a couple of inches, celestite crystals were often embedded in the selenite, up to an inch and half and some black gooey petroleum material in daubs of up to an inch or more in diameter. There were also fossils. I did not try to identify them but it appeared that they were both marine and vegetation types. Many of the fossils had been replaced with both attractive and interesting mineralization, micro dolomites in most cases. If there were enough time it might be well worth cutting some of these out with the cut-off saw.

The Walworth Quarry is located in an area with the typical NY dolomite rock. All of the mineralization was to be found in pockets of a couple of different generalized descriptions. There was the open pocket lined with dolomite crystals which would sometimes have fluorites or sphalerite crystals in them either singles or multiples. The second kind of pocket was the dolomite crystal studded lattice work of multiple chambers with an occasional fluorite or sphalerite crystal. The third kind of pocket were those completely filled with selenite sometimes with embedded celestite crystals. Finally there was what I refer to as the onion layer pocket which most of time did not seem to have any crystals other than a druze of micro dolomites on each of the layers. This by the way was the case with all of the different types of pockets if there was not some other mineral present there were the micro dolomite druzes showing in the spaces between the other
crystals all very sparking and lustrous. Until you really looked closely it appeared to be a lining of micro sugar quartz crystals. As for the daubs of black petroleum they were also found in the pockets here and there covering whatever was there without any apparent rhyme or reason. The pockets ranged in size from pea to almost football size; not very round in the larger sizes but more tube like in shape.

Saturday began with us taking a look at the rock in the blast pile and a few tentative hammering sessions. After getting our bearings so to speak we began working a large block of rock, roughly 6' x 6' x 5'. Out of this block we found a number of fluorites of various sizes, mostly from a sixteenth to an eight of an inch or so. They were usually in pockets of a couple to a few crystals per pocket. The biggest crystal was an inch plus with good color but unfortunately it was broken in two pieces which had cleaved off of the matrix.

The cut-off saw was of tremendous use in getting the matrix with the
crystal pockets down to a size small enough to bring home. Too much
hammering, i.e. trimming near the pockets tended to result in the crystals readily popping off of the matrix.

Sunday the collecting was in another portion of the quarry (northwest
corner) at least initially working a 40 or 50 ton blast. Saturday's area
(south west corner) had been two 50 ton blasts.

It did not take nearly as long on Sunday to start finding a productive area to work. It just happened to be in the middle of the blast pile. This time in addition to finding fluorite crystals there were also sphalerite crystal groups which shown brilliantly in the sun. After a couple of hours you could also go back to Saturday's work area as they had turned it over and spread it out some more. We never made it back to Saturday's area.

We finished up the collecting day on Sunday working another large boulder and got a few more fluorites out.

The Second Edition of Fluorite Fantasy Weekend was history as we went back to the quarry building area to sign out and say our good-byes and thank yous.

The only problem with the setup of the entire weekend from our perspective was the difficulty in finding The Lodge. The map was a little off with regard to the location, putting it on the right side of the wrong street. One unnamed person paid dearly in terms of ribbing for that little error.Even that would not have been as big a problem if the sign for The Lodge had not been covered over with heavy vegetation.

There was also one equipment problem Paul and I faced, the cut-off saw. There was some mix up with the information regarding the appropriate fuel mixture, gas to oil ratio for the two cycle engine. At least we will never make that mistake again.

There were many humorous moments in the weekend, one in particular that I recall. Saturday morning the loader operator announced that he would be giving rides to the children and asked for a show of hands from those children who wanted a ride. People were chuckling before the hands even went up and you just knew what was going to happen. At least twenty adult hands went up in addition to the kids who raised their hands. This was a huge loader. It could have easily held a full size car.

There was one particularly picturesque moment of the weekend that sticks in my memory. This occurred when I stopped to look around the quarry and saw and heard the numerous cut-off saws singing away with their accompanying clouds of dust and smoke rising up into the air. It made me think of smoke signals rising from the rocks.

I guess the best endorsement for the collecting experience would be my definite willingness to go back. Now especially with the knowledge and experience gained and a good, well running cut-off saw (either a 12" or 14") I feel certain it would be even better the next time around.

As with most successful group collecting adventures (especially when there lots of people involved, about 100 on Saturday and 80 on Sunday) there are a number of people to be heartily thanked for their efforts. To be included in that number is first and foremost Ed Murphy, as well as a couple of people form the Wayne County Mineral Club, the quarry personnel, my fellow mineral collecting enthusiasts (for abiding by the rules) and finally the quarry owners. Thank you all.

-Larry Bull