Nerdfest

Last Saturday (the 10th) Jeremy, Kristy, GK, Susanna and I took the kids to the Gem-O-Rama. This is a 68-year old nerdfest where people go out onto the Searles dry lake bed and dig around for crystals. We had wanted to go last year but the trip was preempted by Kristy's pregnancy with Cali. Where is Searles Dry Lake? I've heard of bad locations referred to as "the armpit of the world". Well, I can only think of one other anatomical location that might be considered worse, and that's where Searles Dry Lake is - Trona, CA, 30 miles NE of Ridgecrest and about 45 SW of Death Valley.

Looked a lot more like Death Valley to me. None of the houses had anything that looked like a yard, much less a lawn. About half the businesses were closed and boarded up. If it wasn't for the Searles Lake Mineral Company, I don't think any one would be there at all.

For those of you who have seen the cartoon movie "Cars", I found Tow-Mater's brother parked in one of the yards in town.

The lake bed is so saline that it's a kind of open pit mine for Borax and other salt minerals. The super saturated salt solution just under the crust in the lake form these really huge crystals and once a year you can go out onto the lake and dig them up. Jeremy told me that about 2 years ago Mike Rowe had done a "Dirty Jobs" feature showing them doing the "Blow Holes" for Gem-O-Rama - I'll explain later - and that last year the turnout was so unexpectedly high the locals weren't prepared for it - not enough food, bathrooms, etc., and apparently this years was no different for crowds, but they were ready for us.

We started out about 5:30 AM as it's a 2 1/2 hour drive there. Nyah and Sade wanted to go with me and after about 20 minutes there wasn't a lot left to talk about, so I put in a dramatized CD of "The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe" that Cherryl gave me a few years ago. The girls hadn't had much sleep so I thought this would put them out, but no, they listened to the whole thing - 2 hours long. Occasionally they would ask questions about the story, but after about an hour it was so quiet I thought they must have fallen asleep. I took out my camera and aimed it over my shoulder to get a picture of them sleeping, but they were wide awake, still listening.

GK and Susanna came later in the day, but the rest of us got there about 7:45 and I was surprised to see how many people were already there. They had us all line up in two staging areas. There were people from all over the state. We spoke with some from the Sacramento area all the way to San Diego. There were Boy Scout troops, families with little kids, teenagers, old people - it was a real mixed bag; not at all what I expected. We had some time before they took us out to the lake bed, so we went over to the General Store, which was more like an indoor swap meet. They had a number of gem and fossil dealers there with some amazing displays of minerals, semi-precious gems and fossils, all of which were a lot less money than you would expect to pay at retail stores.

Lined up for the trip to the Lake

Putting on the sunscreen

They took us out on a dirt road and to a huge parking area where they had dug up mud from the lake bed and piled it in a wide area where everyone could go through it. The mud yields some huge Hanksite crystals and clusters. It was also the stickiest thing I've ever seen this side of adobe clay. I was wearing knee-high rubber boots and it almost sucked them off my feet.

The white ground is salt or borax, much like the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah

A Panorama shot of all us mud grubbers. If you click on the picture it should open up to a bigger screen. That's the "town" of Trona in the background on the right.

I think there were about 3,000 of us. GK, Susanna and Van came about noon for the second half, which was the Blow Holes. This is where they basically drive a large diameter pipe partially into the lake bed with a compressed air line at the bottom, then run that air into the pipe. As the air rushes upwards it forces and sucks the materials up with it much like an aquarium filter and all kinds of material including large crystals are shot out onto the surface. As it goes deeper it pulls up different crystals and other minerals. The mud dig yields the dark, large crystals and clusters. The Blowholes yield smaller, semi-clear crystals and different minerals too.

This is a blow hole pump in action

The girls especially had a great time here as they could easily find all kinds of crystals without a lot of digging and no getting dirty.

Gk hard at work

Cali was such a good baby and seemed to enjoy herself.

Great mug for the camera Suzi!!

Here are some samples of the crystals we got. They are basically just salt, so they have to be cleaned in a heavy brine solution so they won't dissolve. It smelled and looked a lot like the stuff truckers collect in 2 liter bottles as they drive cross-country and throw out on the side of the road or in the truck stop bathrooms. ;)

The pen is there for size reference.

These are only a few, and not the biggest ones.

After the dig and on the way home we stopped at the Trona Pinnacles.

These are Tufa, or Calcium Carbonate spires that formed under water during the Pleistocene era between 10,000 and 100,000 years ago when the whole valley was a lake about 650 feet deep. If they look vaguely familiar it's because they've been used in numerous movies, including Planet of the Apes.

On the way home the girls wanted to ride with me again and listen to another Chronicles CD. I played "Voyage of the Dawn Treader", which will be the next movie out. Again they listened raptly and asked a lot of questions about the characters and story line. About half way home they had to get back in the car with mom and dad and Jeremy said Sade was telling them all about it. Being a huge C. S. Lewis fan I can't begin to tell you how happy that makes me (even happier than when they both watched "The Triplets of Belleville" with me one Saturday and then asked to watch it again). I just hope Disney doesn't try to "clean up" all the Christian references and allegory when they bring it out this Summer. Anyway, we had a great time.