St. Johnsville, NY

Sunday 7/13/08
We left our campground early this morning and stopped at a little restaurant for breakfast. We began the days driving at about 9. Almost as soon as we were on the road, we were driving in a pouring rain. It was a constant downpour for about three hours. Just before we reached our next camping site it stopped. We were staying at Crystal Grove Diamond Mine and Campground. Ed was going to dig for diamonds and get rich.
We were able to find the campground and got quickly set up so we could head out to the diamond mines. We were told the rain we had just come through was coming this way so we wanted to get started. We were given a hammer, shovel, and chisel to break the rocks. We also received a wire mesh tray to sift the dirt looking for the diamonds and a bucket to carry all our diamonds back to the campsite. Ed took to this mining thing, breaking apart rocks with his chisel and hammer. It didn’t take too long before he decided he would not become a miner. There were a few other people there who were kind enough to show us what we should be looking for. Meanwhile, Lynn is sifting dirt just expecting these diamonds to fall from the dirt. It didn’t take too long to realize the mesh was too big and she wasn’t going to find anything but rocks. She abandoned the tray and just looked through the dirt with her hands.
These “diamonds” we were looking for are Herkimer “Diamonds” or world famous quartz crystals found only in specific locations in New York State. They really are very pretty if you can find a complete diamond. Anyway, we are bringing home lots of rocks with crystal pieces in them. I don’t know if we can do anything with them when we get home except to use them as a door stop.
After working for a few hours and watching the sky and hearing the thunder, we decided we had better head back to camp. We were about 200 yards from our site when the heavens opened up. It was coming down so hard we were almost soaked in a few seconds. We had the awning up on the RV and it was like a waterfall coming off of it. We just stared at all the water coming down all around us. We knew we were staying put for the rest of the evening. That was a good thing because Ed was worn out from all his mining.