Rock clubs offer many benefits to rock hounds. They have many friendly people who are willing to help in many ways. If you are looking for places to find rocks they have field trips where they take you to the areas where you can find gem quality rocks and they will show you what to look for. If you need advice on what equipment is needed to work the rocks you have, they are a great source of information. They can also provide advice on how to work with the rocks.

My first experience with a rock club was with a group from Hood River, Oregon. This group went on a field trip, lead by Tim Fisher, to the Idaho-Oregon border area. I emailed Tim asking if I could meet up with his group; it wasn’t long before he emailed back with information on where I could meet up with them. I met them early on a Saturday morning at a campground in Homedale, Idaho. That day we went to two locations one to collect jasper and another to collect plume agate. I had a great time and returned home with more material that I had ever collected by myself. I knew then that I wanted to join a rock club.

Joining the Hood River club was not realistic due to the fact that I did not live anywhere near Hood River. I knew that there were a couple of clubs in my area so I look online to see what I could find. I found that Boise, Idaho had a club, Idaho Gem Club, and Caldwell, Idaho had a club, Owyhee Gem and Mineral Society. I went to a couple of meetings at each of these clubs and found that both of them would be good clubs to join. I ended up joining the Owyhee Gem and Mineral club because it was more convenient for me than the Boise club.

The first field trip I went on with this club was to a pink plume agate claim. At first I was not that impressed with the site because two weeks prior I had been at Grave Yard point and found some wonderful pieces of agate there. Then I was told to go to the bottom of the hill. When I got to the bottom of the hill I was surprised to find very large chunks of agate that were much nicer than what I had from Grave Yard Point. I found one piece of green agate that I still think is the best agate I have ever found.

After the trip to the pink plume agate claim I joined a couple, Richard and LouAnn, who were going to Succor Creek Park to look for thunder eggs. About an hour after arriving at the park they had taught me what to look for and shown me a couple of places to dig for the eggs. I also had two 3 gallon buckets full of eggs.

I have since participated in three more official club field trips and one unofficial field trip with members of the club. On every trip I met more people who were willing to share their knowledge. Joining a gem club was the best thing I have done to develop lapidary knowledge and skills. If you are just starting or have been doing lapidary for many years but still want to learn more I strongly suggest joining a club.

Friday I started on my Journey to Hampton Butte early in the morning. I took the back roads from Caldwell thru Adrian, Oregon to Vale, Oregon hoping to find some places to stop and look for rocks. I didn’t find any new places on the way to Vale. Once in vale I stopped just long enough to photograph a few of the many murals that decorate the buildings of the town. These murals are very nice and I would suggest stopping to view them if you are passing thru town.

After leaving Vale the first stop I made was around Drinking Water Pass. This spot was great. About ten feet of the car I found my first rock. Within an hour I had a full five gallon bucket of opalite, petrified wood and agate. The GPS coordinates for this location are (N 43*46′17.1″ W 118*13′11.6″). I never made it to these exact coordinates. The spot I went to was a gravel road just to the West of them. I tried working my way back to these coordinates but had my bucket full before I came anywhere close to them.

The next stop was the bridge at Stinking Water Pass. I have been told by many rock hounds about Stinking Water and was looking forward to collecting petrified wood. I was disappointed to find nothing at the bridge; I have been told the actual collecting area is quite a ways to the south of the bridge. I quickly left and headed towards my next stop of Buchannan to look for thunder eggs.

Buchannan was another elusive location. My GPS coordinates lead me to a gravel road but as approached the site my GPS pointed two mile East of where I was located. The only way from the gravel road to the collecting site would have been a two mile hike across private property. Later at my next stop I was told that there was a paved road called Buchannan that would have taken me to the collecting site.

The Next stop on my trip was the Highland Rock and Gem Shop in Burns, Oregon. I was not planning on this stop but stumbled upon it while looking for a place to get gas and lunch. The shop was dark and dingy but had quite a bit of things to look at. The real treat was the huge selection of rocks in the back and side of the shop. I found some small thunder eggs that looked promising and went inside to pay for them. I paid $2.75 for seven eggs that were almost 3 pounds totals; I felt that this was an excellent price. I then asked the owner of the shop about the Buchannan Site and he showed me some maps that he had and told me about the paved road. I spent another $1.50 for the maps and left to get gas and lunch before finishing the final leg of my trip for the day.

At around 4:00 I finally arrived at Hampton Butte. Within minutes I found my friends, John, Kathy, Doug, Rose and Jack, all members of the Owyhee Gem and Mineral Society. They had come up the day before and had many examples of what they had found and told about going to Glass Butte earlier that day. There is nothing better than stories and examples to get a rock hound excited about hunting for rocks but before I could start my search I had to get my camp setup. It wasn’t long before I was setup and ready to start the hunt. Actually I was finding stuff right in camp as I was setting up.

Saturday Morning started nice and early. By 8:30 breakfast was eaten, camp was cleaned and the group was on the way to Dendrite Butte, hoping to find some nice limb casts. Finding the right road to Dendrite Butte was challenging and once we found it we still had to navigate many forks in the road until we the found the right route. Having the GPS coordinates helped us navigate.

Upon arriving at Dendrite Butte the group scattered in all direction in search of limb cast. Small fragments of agate were quickly found but they were not that impressive or useful. After a short while a few members of the group found some small cast that were better but full of holes. I found the only larger cast, about 3.5 inches diameter. When I returned home from this trip I immediately started to clean this limb cast. Four days later I am still soaking this limb cast and it is not cleaning up well. In fact it pretty nasty, full of holes, dirty and just plain ugly. Even thou we found a few rocks at this site it was unanimous, nobody wanted to go there again.

By the time we returned to camp I was not feeling well. Being out in the desert the wind can quickly chap your lips. My lips felt like they were on fire. I mention this because I now know how important it is to carry Chap Stick, Carmex or some type of lip protection when spending lots of time in dry windy conditions. Despite my painful lips I still managed to spend a little time Saturday evening finding more petrified wood around camp.

Sunday started with hot chocolate and packing up camp. I was planning on rushing home except for the possibility of stopping at the Buchannan site to search for thunder eggs. As I was packing up camp John invited me to his camp for breakfast with the group. As we ate pancakes, eggs and bacon Kathy and Doug asked if I wanted to join them on a quick detour to Glass Butte before heading home. I had heard so many stories about Glass Butte and could not refuse the offer.

The road in to Glass Butte started as just an ordinary gravel road but it sparkled in the sunlight more and more the further we traveled toward the collecting sites. I was real excited about starting my search for obsidian. Kathy led us to a location that the rest of the group had visited Friday (N 43*33′17.7″ W 120*00′13.2″). This hill top was covered with piles of mahogany, rainbow and black obsidian. It did not take long to find enough obsidian to fill a five gallon bucket. After filling our buckets the group was eager to head home.

On the way I home I made only two stops. The first for Chap Stick and a soda at the first opened store I could find and the second for gas and lunch in Burns. I did slow down to find the road to the Buchannan thunder eggs but I was too tired to stop. The road to the Buchannan thunder eggs is at mile post 155; look for the store on the corner. The eggs are reported to be 3 miles down Buchannan Road on the left.

As with any rock collecting trip I had to select a few rocks to clean right away. The limb cast was the first rock I started with. Next I moved on to a few pieces of petrified wood from Hampton Butte. The funny thing about this wood is the pieces I thought were going to be great were really boring and one that I thought was kind of mediocre turned out to be great. Monday I continued to clean rocks and cut a few of them. The thunder eggs I bought Friday were nice and the Hampton Butte petrified wood surprised me again. I cut a couple of rocks and found one that I thought was plain to have incredible green patterns inside and one that was nice outside that was just a solid muddy color inside.