Mining in Jerome

Another artist at the Co-op told me about a public azurite claim in Jerome. Yesterday, Doug and I went to check it out. Doug enjoys going on adventures :-) I posted the pictures in the reverse order from which i intended, but oh well. After we drove around a little and then asked a woman walking her dog how to get down into the big gulch, we found blue stuff all over the palce. A few different minerals containg copper have formed around here. Azurite, Chrysocolla, and Malachite are the three most colorful. I think we found mostly Chrysocolla, which is often mistaken for turquoise, but is much softer. The above hunk of rock broke really easily with a couple whacks of my pick.

This is what it looked like after the whacking :-) I'm trying to get jewelry worthy pieces, so I was looking for smaller, flattish pieces of rock. I do not cut the stones. I like to use them as they come out of the ground. Ok, I guess whacking counts as altering...As I was whacking, I actually realized that I prefer to find the rocks already out of the ground. Doug enjoys the whacking :-)

This little pile was all soft and crumbly. I could use it in inlay work...

Cool big rock! It was too hard for us to get anything off of it with our little picks. We were in a little wash here, and found lots of cool stuff.

From the road, we could see where we needed to go, but getting there was a bit of a challenge. The only trail we saw was chained off with a sign that said "Stay out and Live" The dog walker said go ahead and use the trail, nobody minds. Gotta love Jerome :-)

I think that must be an old mine entrance. We stayed away from that....

Here's the trail we took down to the lower right side of that big gray wall under the Douglas Mansion. Must have been a little blasting going on at one time. We had a fun day, and got some cool rocks. I'm gonna double check with Brice to see if we were actually in the right spot :-) Doug thought our adventure made a good beginning to a horror movie...Going down a trail that said stay out and live, then in the movie, the people would have gone into the old mine to find some old miner zombies with picks..... Hard to swallow for me in the bright sunshine :-)

Douglas Mansion

Sunday, Doug and I took a little field trip up to Jerome and the Douglas Mansion. It was the residence for Mr.(I forgot his first name already) Douglas, founder of the Daisy mine, back in Jerome's heyday. I'm not good at retaining details, but we learned a lot about Jerome's history and some of the mining that went on there. I had the macro lens on, so I couldn't get panoramic views. Doug is standing next to a bunch of different little mining carts that brought the ore up from the mines. Gold, silver, and copper were all found under Jerome, which was once the third largest town in AZ. Doug was hoping to get in for free, since he shared the name :-) We had to pay the dollar anyway, and were happy to do so.

Unfortunately, the State of AZ is cutting their budget, and the Jerome State Park, of which the Douglas mansion is now part of, closed as of yesterday. We went on the last day it was to stay open. Hopefully, it will reopen when the state is in better financial condition.

This is the view towards Flagstaff and Sedona.

Old mine shafts run all over the place under Jerome. Jerome is a National Historic Landmark now, so the buildings that haven't fallen down the hill are all historic, and have been, or are being restored. Way cool town with a colorful past. You can visit www.azjerome.com for more details.

The Buttes

Yesterday I was picking the boys up from the skate park, and the lighting was looking vey cool. Luckily, I had the D70 with me! The following pics were taken along Montezuma Castle Highway, the road that takes us to school. Past school is Montezuma's Castle, an old Sinaguan Indian cliff dwelling, then the Casino ;-) We go bowling there. It was cloudy for most of the day, but the sun peeked through just long enough to click a few pics. It was about 5:30 in the afternoon, so the sun was about to go behind mingus Mountain. These pictures are looking to the eastish.

This is our view every morning on the way to school. It's 3.5 miles from the house, and an eight minute drive, but who's counting...

Beaver Creek runs along the road, and is very high right now, with all the snow up north melting. Sometimes it's completely dry at this spot. Tried to get a shot, but it didn't work in the car :-)

This morning, there was actually SNOW on the ground in CV!!! That was a first here for us. While it was just a dusting, it was exciting nontheless :-) I planted collard greens the other day-hope they survive!

The wall around the pool...

I love the Mesquite tree out in front. Endless photo ops! I'm 'collecting' bark on film-more later...

Looking towrds Jerome. I'm on my way home after taking the kids to school. I think that's a goose flying by.

One of the three stop lights in CV. I'm about to turn left heading home.

Snow on the car!!

For some reason, we brought our snow shovel with us when we moved. It's good for shoveling Mesquite mess. i don't think we'll ever have to use it on snow :-)

Arizona got dumped on yesterday, with huge storms all over the state. Flagstaff broke a record for snowfall in one day, with over a foot falling in town. There was even hail in Scottsdale. OOO, I made a rhyme :-)

A few weeks ago, I was on my way to the Enchantment Resort in Sedona, to drop off some jewelry. I could see it was raining in Sedona from a good ten miles out. I've been on the run so much lately, that I've taken to aiming the D70 out the window while I'm driving. Don't worry, i don't look through the lens, just point and click. This is on Highway 89A, just coming into town. Coffee Pot Rock is on the right end of the formation.

On the way to Enchantment. It started snowing right here, while i was still in the sun...Very cool!

I was still in the sun here too, but headed into the clouds.

SNOW!!!!

In the snow here too. It only snowed for a few minutes, but it was cool anyway.