I was out in Nevada visiting my dad who lives in Pahrump, which is about an hour west of Las Vegas.
I had bought a few books about rockhunting in Nevada before the trip. I searched to see what was close to Pahrump that would have stones that my wife could use for making jewelry. Since I was travelling, I really didn’t have any equiptment either. So the stones need to be easily accessable. The closest place seemed to be a place near Scotty’s Junction which had quantites of Apache Tears. Apache Tears are small stones of black obsidion. They ae black, but are translucent.
The weather was cold and rainy on many days while I was in Nevada. I picked a day with a decent weather forecast. I was planning to go out by myself, but my dad said he would come. The spot where the apache tears are located along the road (highway 95) about 8-9 miles south of Scotty’s Junction. So it was about a 100 mile drive with my complaining about my music.
I parked the car on the side of the road, and we got out. I brought a couple 5 gallon buckets. We walked around looking at the ground. The best way is to keep the sun at your back. I did best by walking near the fence. I even crawled under the fence. We just walked around loking for the small black rocks and picking them up. It was very easy. After collecting a bunch of them, we packed up, and drove back to Pahrump. I weighed them when we got back. We had collected about 25 pounds of them. I boxed them up in a Flat Rate box from the post office, and shipped them home to New York.
My wife is going to polish them. I am thinking we can drill small holes in them, and string them like a necklace.
If she needs more, I can always get more on my next trip.

Posted by Rob in Rockhounding on January 10th, 2010 | No Comments