ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on Jul 23, 2017 21:04:01 GMT -5
Hubby and I did our Upper Peninsula rock hounding trip. As all of our UP trips start out, our first pic is of course the Mackinaw bridge. Here we go heading north. Our destination......McLain State Park campground. We reserved a campsite for three nights and drove straight through with total road time of around ten hours from our home in Whitehall Mi. We wasted about an hour searching in vain for Jasper knob in Ishpeming. Hubby forgot to get a screenshot map ahead of time and we drove around aimlessly until we gave up. Below is a shot of our campsite. And a selfie of us in front of the campfire. First day we started off by visiting the Wolverine #2 mine and checked the poor rock pile for copper included agate but came up empty handed. It looked to me like the main #2 poor Rock pile has been removed and the old shaft that used to be surrounded by poor rock is now sitting there next to what is left of the pile. Below is the wolverine #2 shaft. Below is one of the old mine building remains Next we went to the Objibway mine off highway 41 where we found some decent Prehnite. Next we went to Delaware mines poor Rock pile where we were hoping to find some datolite, but all we came away with was some nice gemmy Prehnite. Next we went to the Clark mine. The old smokestack looks out over the poor Rock piles that have seen better days when it comes to finding the highly sought after Clark mine datolite. The place is heavily dug through and actually the most disgusting minesite I've ever been to. After seeing the mess left by previous diggers, I saw little chance of finding my dream datolite. Below are some pics of the mess. Some one should be ashamed. Stuff was everywhere.... That ended our first day. It's getting late and I still have three more days to write about. Check back tomorrow for details on day two.
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Post by coloradocliff on Jul 23, 2017 23:21:00 GMT -5
Thanks for the pictures and great descriptions. You guys are too cool. Liking the commentary. Maybe the people before weren't rockhounds. I don't know a single hound that treats and area like that. The ones I know including myself, and probably you guys pickup trash and not make it. Sorry dear. Hope the next days are ore productive and more fun. Still very interesting to see the area and hear your views. Thank You. Cliff
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Post by Toad on Jul 24, 2017 3:57:45 GMT -5
Jasper Knob is very hard to find. It took me 15 minutes to find the very overgrown stairs to the top. But once found it was an easy climb to the top
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ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on Jul 24, 2017 11:14:00 GMT -5
Jasper Knob is very hard to find. It took me 15 minutes to find the very overgrown stairs to the top. But once found it was an easy climb to the top We actually ended up finding it on the way home. Both me and hubby have COPD. I waited in the car and let hubby go up. He didn't find the climb easy. You must be in great shape😉
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ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on Jul 24, 2017 11:58:15 GMT -5
We started off day two by heading directly to the Cliff mine. We got out our pick mattock and rock hammers and sat down to dig. Hubby pulled out a rock with a mess of native copper attached. Then I found an old miners copper chisel tip. After digging a while the mosquitos started attacking and we gave up to surface search for Prehnite. We found quite a bit. Below is a pick of some of the almost 100 lbs. collected in three days at various mine piles. While at Cliff mine we also searched for amygdaloid basalt holding greenstone. We found a mess. We spent most of the day at Cliff mine but when we left we went to a mine pile out behind the highway patrol station off route 41. After not finding much there, we went to Calumet Waterworks park where the beach is full of nice looking rocks. Kept a few. We neglected to take photos there, sorry. By then it was getting dark and we headed back to camp for the night. That was it for day two in Houghton/ Keweenaw.
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Deleted
Deleted Member
Member since January 1970
Posts: 0
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Post by Deleted on Jul 24, 2017 13:47:34 GMT -5
Lots of greenstone nodules in that matrix! Now, how to get them out?
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Post by fantastic5 on Jul 24, 2017 15:17:57 GMT -5
Great pictures and trip report. Looking forward to the next installment!
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Post by Pat on Jul 24, 2017 15:29:47 GMT -5
Beautiful scenery and good report. Thanks for taking us along. Hope you brought marshmallows!
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ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on Jul 24, 2017 18:57:14 GMT -5
Lots of greenstone nodules in that matrix! Now, how to get them out? We have reached that bridge and crossed it. Greenstone removal pics coming.
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ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on Jul 24, 2017 19:06:59 GMT -5
Beautiful scenery and good report. Thanks for taking us along. Hope you brought marshmallows! We went looking to buy some up there but, strangely, they were sold out at every place we looked😉
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ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on Jul 24, 2017 20:17:04 GMT -5
By day three we had so much rock that we needed to save some room for the jaspillite we planned on getting the next day on the trip home. Time for some tourism. First we followed route 26 to Lake Linden looking for old smelting Mills. Below is pics of the ruins of one of them. Next we went to prospectors paradise and almost bought some puddingstone (the price, at five dollars, was right, but we couldn't find one with enough jasper.) Inside they have an awesome variety of high quality specimen pieces. We left and headed north on 41 to go and see Mandan, which is basically a ghost town. We found the nearby Medora mine posted with no trespassing. Typical of lots of the formerly accessable mine piles now privately owned and closed to collecting. Below are some photos of the three houses still left in Mandan. Some are still used today. Below: One of the abandoned ones. Next we headed for the road to High Rock Bay. The road turned into a four wheel track before we ever got to our destination and we were forced to turn around or risk damaging out front wheel drive Ford Fusion. There were beautiful wildflowers along the road. Next we drove to the top of Brockway Mtn. Down on Lake Superior a Great Lakes freighter sails past. The view off the east bluff is no less spectacular. After leaving Brockway Mountain we headed south on route 41 and ended up at the Quincy mine. There was an old miners house which we walked through. There was old mining equipment and locomotives. We found this huge piece of float native copper laying outside one of the buildings. With a little sleuthing we found probably the last remaining poor Rock pile at the Quincy mine. Upon examination hubby found no usable material. We left and headed south on 41 until we crossed the Portage River then headed south on route 26 to check out the South Range and Painsdale mines. The poor Rock piles were less than spectacular and we left with nothing from either of them. We left Painsdale and headed south to Toivola where we followed the road to agate beach. While it didn't live up to it's name, I did find one agatey looking rock. Too bad we forgot to take pics on this beautiful beach. This was how day three ended.
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ziggy
spending too much on rocks
Member since June 2016
Posts: 483
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Post by ziggy on Jul 24, 2017 20:57:41 GMT -5
Day four we broke camp and headed back towards home with stops at Jasper Knob in Ishpeming and a side trip to Grand Marais. We finally found Jasper Knob and I stayed in the car while hubby went up the hill to get a couple of photos and hopefully some jaspillite. Below is a pic looking out over Ishpeming from the top. Below: A pic of the mass of jaspillite at the top ( a small portion of it) This stuff is super hard and was almost impossible to break some off. He finally got a small portion to take with him. We failed to take photos at Grand Marais but hubby did manage to find one low quality agate. It is about quarter size. After that it was back across the bridge. Then a stop at Weinerlicious for a foot long and our trip was done. Today we broke a bunch of greenstone out of the matrix. All we did was hit the basalt with the rock hammer. Lots of hits when the rock broke four or five nodules of varying sizes would literally fall out intact. When a big one got exposed, we simply held on to the nodule with one hand while breaking the matrix away with the hammer until it could be popped free. We got some really big ones but they don't all polish up right. Below is a pic of some of the bigger ones. We will post pics of the ones that shine up well. We started slabbing some of the Prehnite today. It is some nice looking material. It looks like there is datolite included in some of the Prehnite slabs as well. We will be posting pics of the finished greenstones when they get done.
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Post by wigglinrocks on Jul 24, 2017 21:49:01 GMT -5
Now there's a trip report I can relate to , been to most of those places many times . We've made some great friends up there and have learned some very good info about where to go or where is a waste of time . Truly a rockhounds paradise up in the Keweenaw . Thanks for the report and the photos . Don't think we will get up there this year but next year I hope to do the same location report .
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Gem'n I
freely admits to licking rocks
Member since March 2008
Posts: 980
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Post by Gem'n I on Jul 25, 2017 21:42:57 GMT -5
Thanks for sharing your trips with us. This was a place I always wanted to visit but never got the chance...now you made it possible!!!
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Post by coloradocliff on Jul 26, 2017 0:24:37 GMT -5
Wonderful trip and scored some great rock. Need to do that every week all summer.
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Post by rockjunquie on Jul 26, 2017 15:42:06 GMT -5
Thank you so much for such a great trip report! I'll probably never make it to your area, so it was nice to see your trip. I didn't realize there was so much mining history there. I have never heard of greestone or seen it, so I am looking forward to the pictures. The prehnite looks awesome!!! I wish DH was into rocks. It's cool y'all could share your adventure with each other. Sounds like a wonderful trip!
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