Fieldtrip report:
Walker Creek Kyanite
Buncombe County, North Carolina
August, 2003We had a great fieldtrip today to the best site in North Carolina to collect kyanite. It was my first time meeting some members of Dirtyrockhounds and new M.A.G.M.A. members. We met at the Silver Armadillo rockshop and proceeded to the forest area, we parked at the bottom of the mountain and began the one and a half mile hike to the collecting site, on the way I was able to get pics of some nice wildflowers:
We got to the top and began the hunt, there is not much digging taking place here since the kyanite is laying all over the ground, if you want large pieces in matrix, you need to dig a little deeper and break the large boulders to expose the larger kyanite crystals like these:
We collected pounds and pounds of beautiful kyanite crystals.
Dave and Laura take a lunch break.
Rare sighting of a wild rockhound in the woods!
The end of the day, stopping by the creek for a break.
There are several excellent locations in Western North Carolina to collect kyanite. A few kyanite bearing pegmatites are in the area of this Walker Creek site, the Thomas Mine and a couple of others are on Parkway property and are off limits to collecting, these mines are considered "magmatic occurrences" where other occurrences of kyanite such as the Montreat site, Old Fort, and Lookout Mountain are metamorphic. The kyanite produced at the Walker Creek, Thomas Mine and other sites in this pegmatite system are considered to produce the best quality specimens.
See you on the next trip!
