Garry, Jerry, Woody and I ended up in Central Oregon on a Rock hunting trip to 4 different locations: Maury Mountain, South Fork Crooked River, Bat Caves at Ochoco Reservoir, and Elkins Rock Shop.
Our trip started out early Monday morning with me picking up Jerry at his place and heading down I-5 toward Vancouver. Garry and Woody were in Woody’s truck pulling Garry’s trailer. We met up at the rest area near Vancouver and managed to follow each other the rest of the way.
Our original plan was to stop at Richardson’s Ranch and Rockhound for the evening, spend the night and head to Maury Mountain on Tuesday. However, we called Richardson’s Ranch and were informed that they were closed because of wet weather. So we headed to Maury Mountain. On the way we stopped at an out of the way spot and did a little prospecting.
Pulled up out of the way.
This spot turned out to have some interesting material and we decided that it would warrant further time in the future. The next two pictures are of Jerry and Garry diligently searching.
Jerry checking out the gravel.
Garry excited about a small find.
We left this spot and headed up to our camp site near Maury Mountain. It didn’t take long to set up camp, get dinner cooked, and plan our next days activities. We wanted to spend the day at a spot that Garry found the last time he was at Maury Mountain.
We got up early, had a great breakfast and headed out to Maury Mountain. Garry and I parked at the Chamber of Commerce parking site and hiked down the hill, while Woody and Jerry drove down a side road and hiked up the hill. We met in the middle and commenced to dig.
It looks like Garry is the worker bee today.
We spent most of the day at this spot and dug quite a bit of dense green moss agate, with a smattering of red and brown moss. Garry spent the whole day in his normal position, digging a large hole; while Jerry spent his first time at Maury Mountain moving top soil.
Jerry looks like a gopher.
Woody and I ended up doing a little prospecting(my normal state) during the day, and Woody ended up finding a spot with red and gold moss. So we all headed over to that spot on our way back to camp. There was quite a bit of nice moss agate there so we noted the location and planned to come back some day.
Camp, dinner and a nice soft bed sure felt good after this long day. Our Wednesday plan was to head over to the South Fork Crooked River pink limb cast area near Dendrite Butte, and spend the day trying to locate some decent sized limb casts.
We got up early, had another great breakfast and headed to Dendrite Butte.
Checking out someone else's leavings.
Garry and I had brought our Rokons, so we headed off one way while Woody and Jerry hiked off in a different direction. We planned on meeting up later in the day. Garry and I spent some time checking out a dry creek bed at the bottom of a long steep 4×4 road.
We weren’t having much luck so we headed back to the Agate Springs area where Woody and Jerry were. This is where I have found most of my limb casts, and it didn’t take long to find my first nice sized one laying on top of the ground.
I don't know how anyone missed this one.
Jerry spent quite a bit of time bent over looking for the ones laying on the surface. Woody hiked around and ended up finding quite a few nice sized limbs partially covered with dirt. Garry rode his Rokon around and finally ended up digging in a likely looking spot.
I decided to dig above the stream bank and was lucky enough to find a number of large limbs.
I am quite pleased with this haul.
We finally had to call it a day and headed back to the trucks where we loaded the Rokons and drove back to camp. Once more we had a wonderful day and after dinner we were grateful for a nice soft bed.
Thursday we broke camp and drove into Prineville where we spent some time at Elkins Rock Shop, before heading to the Ochoco Reservoir and the Bat Cave site.
This spot has some really nice jasper material that is quite hard and takes a brilliant polish. We set up camp and headed up to the parking spot.
Garry preparing to hike up the cliffs to the Bat Caves.
The Bat Caves are located in some cliffs, so it isn’t the best place to take small children. In fact anyone who has trouble with heights may want to skip this spot.
You don't want to slip at this spot.
Jerry and Woody found a nice sized seam of jasper in the cliff and spent most of their time “Hard Rock Mining”
"Hard Rock Mining" is not easy.
This seam turned out to be quite good and well worth the effort required to remove it from the surrounding basalt. Garry can relate to this:
Garry at the bottom of the seam.
Alas, the time to go had arrived so we all headed back to the truck with our back packs loaded and our muscles sore.
We once again had a great dinner and crawled into bed after a quick shower at the camp ground.
Friday we drove home and unloaded out material.
Thanks for joining us.
chasfire
