Australia Day 1 to 5

Day 1 July 28 Monday
My friend Lenny took me to the airport. Guess what? My flight to San Francisco was going to be two hours late so I would miss my flight to OZ. I heard over the loud speaker to go to the station and they put me on United flight 705 to Los Angeles. I sat in between two nice young ladies. One from Melbourne and one from Olympia. I got lots of good tips from Australian woman in her mid thirties. The Olympia woman ran a Christian bookstore on corner of Cooper Point road and Mud Bay Road. Then I took United 839 to Sydney

Day 2 (?) July 29
Lost at the International date line.

Day 3 July 30 Wednesday
I arrived and had no trouble at customs and took the train to Central Station. Three blocks north was the Nomads Maze hostel. The room has a bed and a table.. I took a half hour nap then headed off to look at cars, etc. I opened a bank account, and bought a phone, I saw several campervans at the car market and also at Traveler Auto barn which has a nice guarantee and reasonable buy back. I tentative can get a van on Monday since it will take several days to transfer money. I cooked a nice dinner of fried pots with onions, steak and tomatoes. Groceries are more expensive than a t home,. Gas I am told is about A$1.7 a liter which works out to $6.50 a gallon US. Whee, guess I will have to transfer more money.

Day 4 July 31 Thursday
Got up about 5:30, my normal time and went and made some coffee and oatmeal with apples. Yumm. Went to Vodaphone because I could not add minutes for some reason and had them help. Went to Commonwealth bank and had them fax the Credit Union to send money. They said it could take three business days and the bank will be closed on Monday. No car probably until Tues. More to see in Sydney. I spent about 4 hours touring the water front. Harbor Bridge, Opera House, Circular Quay, Macquaries Point and botanical garden. Saw the famous Wollemi pine which they found north of Sydney and it dates back to the dinosaurs.

Day 5 August 1 Friday
I had a very good nights sleep. After breakfast went to local travel association (like AAA) and got free maps for all over Australia. After an early lunch went to China town and Darling Harbor which is a very touristy area with lots of restraints. It was very windy and cloudy today. Lots of people walking around and eating out. Stopped at one of the harbor eateries and bought a six dollar beer. It has been in the low 40’s (10C) in the morning and in the high 60’s to low 70’s (20 C) during the day. Bought a Australian bird book since I already have seen an Australian white ibis. And lots of seagulls too. Went to a wine and cheese party here at the hostel which started at 8 which is close to me bed time. Met an older lady who gave me lots of hints about places to see. She is from Quebec, Canada and has been here six times for at least two months each.

Flying Foxes

Darling Harbor Woolemi Pine

Mason County Fair Exhibits

Well at the last minute I decided to add two exhibits to the Shelton's rock club's display at the fair. The one showed a few different samples of petrified wood from my property in St. Johns, Arizona and it won first premium (blue ribbon). I made a second case of quartz I collected mainly from my property but some from Luna, New Mexico and one from Montana. I got second premium (red ribbon) on that one. The judge thought I should have been more discriptive of what I wanted to show. I think I did well on my first try.

Rock hounding Eastern Washington

I picked up my friend Laura on Saturday 20 and we headed out to Eastern Washington for a little fun and hopefully some rockhounding. The weather was nice as we made our way over highway 20, the North Cascades highway. We hooked the trailer up in Margies RV park in Riverside which is just north of Omak.

The weather was nice, that is, it was not really hot. From the RV park there were three places I was interested in seeing. One near Lake Conconnully is now private property. So much for finding nice quartz crystals. Another one was East of Oroville, just South of Nighthawk. It too is not closed to the public. So much for copper ores. Maybe we were lucky it was closed because the area was just loaded with mosquitoes. The third one was East of Tonasket in the Aeneas valley up Frosty Creek Road. Looking for agates some of which were supposed to be blue. We found some but nothing special as far as I was concerned.

On the way up the narrow side road off of Frosty Creek road, a truck pulling a trailer was coming down. Whew. Had to back up a ways to find a spot so he could get buy.

We left Tuesday for Sedro Wooley taking highway 2 over Stevens Pass. Stayed at Riverside RV park. On Wednesday we went to Walker Valley to find some geodes. It is suppose to be a good spot. Well, I did not find any trace of previous diggings. No broken geodes, zippo. Found out later we were in the right spot. Fun looking.

Thursday I took Laura home again to Bellingham and Friday headed home to Shelton. I had a fun time even though I did not find and rocks. Laura said she had a good time too.

Fort Ancient

Friday, Daniel, Than Tu and I went to visit Fort Ancient. It is a Hopewell indian settlement built about 2000 year ago and was lived in forabout 400 years. This area is a hill top above the Miami river and the mounds surrounding it are 18,000 feet long. Some of the mounds these natives built in the mid-west were for burial, some cerimonial and some unknown. In this case the mounds do not seem to be for defense since there are about 67 gaps in them. The mounds were about 20 feet tall. Three of the gaps line up with movements of the moon and sun which they probably used to determine when to plant, etc.

Here are some pictures of the mound and Thanh Tu having fun on one of the trails.

There was a nice museum there with artifacts showing the inhabitants traded with others thousands of miles away. They alsonhad a kids area and Thanh Tu had a fun time there too. Here is with his dad playing on a drum.

Fossils in Cincinnati

Well I returned some movies to the library which is close to my son's house. On the way home I noticed some rocks that looked like they had fossils in them. They did.

Today I went and found some specimens. There is coral and clams and crinnoids which look like little tires. Apparantely the whole area around southern Ohio and northern Kentucky is loaded with them.

Here are a few representative pictures with a penny for reference.

Heading to Cincinnati

Day 1

I left St Johns, AZ on Easter Sunday and headed east on I-40. SpentMonday night at Santa Rosa, NM.

Day 2

I went Monday the 24 to see if I could find some copper ores at Guadalupe Mt which is about 15 miles south of Santa Rosa on hwy 54. Unfortunately, the road was fenced off and it appears that the area is now a cattle ranch. Rats. So I drove to Santa Rosa state park, which is just north of the city. very pretty place. Pic below

I then went to Sumner Lake, which is about 37 miles south of Santa Rosa on Hwy 84, about ten miles north of Ft. Sumner, burial spot of Billy the Kid. It to was a pretty reservoir. I did some rockhounding in the area and found some nice agate material. It was a fun day. Both reservoirs are on the Pecos river.

Day 3

Left Santa Rosa and continued east on I 40. Just past Amarillo,TX took hwy 287 east to Goodett where I spent the night at the Old Cotton Gin RV park space 20. very nice place.

Day 4

Left the RV park and continued east on 287 to just past Wichita Fall, TX to hwy 82. I followed 82 east to Sherman,TX. Along the way was a ranch with a bunch of one hump camels. Saw about 20. Funny to see them. At Sherman took 75 north into Oklahoma to US 70 east all the way to De Queen, Ak. Just past there took 71 south to hwy 371 to Nashville. AK then took27 north to Murfreesboro. Just outside of town is Crater of the Diamonds State Park. I am spending the night outside the park because this is spring break and almost every camp area is full around here. Tomorrow I may strike it rich. today was a long driving day so I am ready for a big strike tomorrow.

Day 5

Spent three hours dry sieving and one and one half hours wet sieving at Craters of Diamonds State Park along with three or four hundred other folks on the 30 acres of ground. No diamonds were found while I was there. Two were reported found the day before. 22 were reported for the month of February. It turns out to be spring break and so the place was loaded with lots of families. Well getting tired of not finding anything I headed to Little Rock, Ak and spent the night just south of the big city. No sign of Bill or Hillary.

Day 6

I drove through Little Rock and caught I-40 east again. There was lots of flooding on the Arkansas, White and Mississippi Rivers as reported on the news. Saw where a tornado went through one area. I made it into Tennessee, going thrugh Memphis (no sign of Elvis either) where I spent the night just south of Nashville.

Day 7 Saturday

Last day of the drive. At Nashville, took I-65 north through Bowling Green to Louisville, Kentucky. I took I-71 from there to I-75 to I-275 and exit 69. It was then just a short distance to my sons house. Whew. Long drive. Traffic was really heavy from Memphis all the way to Cincinnati and the freeways had lots of potholes. Here is a pic of my grandson and son which made the trip so worth while.

Walking Zipper on my property

Today, St. Patrick's Day, Helen and I took her new smooth fox terrier Zipper to my property here is St. Johns, AZ for a walk. He did very well on the leash and enjoyed all the new smells. He got back into the truck and fell asleep right away. We all had a fun day.