Members wishing to go on a fossicking trip MUST put their names in the trips book.
All future fossicking trips are notified in the newsletter.
Field Trips to the great outdoors to search for that precious gemstone or the perfect mineral specimen are an important aspect of club activities often including morning tea and picnic lunches, along with comparisons of fossicking finds. Some are local day trips with the occasional weekender or longer trip thrown in. The club also arranges other educational visits to places such as museums and private mineral collections.
On a club trip to Tingha (Sept/Oct 2018), there was a clear sign stating that no fossicking is allowed in Tingha Sands anymore.
2021 Trips
March 2021
Tambar Springs
February 2021
Oallen Ford
2020 Trips
October 2020 (Finally!)
Muttama
2019 Trips
November 2019
Inverell
October 2019
Grabben Gullen
September 2019
Muttama – Private property
A group of eleven (11) club members made the trip out to private property in Muttama in the search of beautiful crystals. They certainly weren’t disappointed!
There was lots of wind and dust flying about. There were also plenty of clouds that threatened and later produced some rain, but that didn’t stop anyone from getting in and digging some large holes. The large holes paid off and some beautiful crystals were found!(see below – not yet cleaned). One of our club members was “lucky enough” to find a baby brown under a rock, thankfully it slithered off never to be seen again!! :O
We appreciate the property owner for allowing us to setup camp on the property!
August 2019
Hill End – Snowy one day, sunny the next…
The hunt for gold and crystals is what brought four (4) ILC club members to a well known private property in Hill End for a cold and wet weekend. There was rain, there was sleet, there was light hail…and there was plenty of snow! This however, did not deter the group from doing some looking around. Some souvenirs were found, but unfortunately, not in the form of gold nuggets 😀
We appreciate the property owners for allowing us to setup camp on their property!
April 2019
Tambar Springs
A group of six (6) of our club members travelled to private property in search of Drusy Quartz and Stellerite.
There was plenty of Drusy and Stellerite to be found, however, there weren’t many specimens of Stellerite worth collecting.
There were a few unfortunate cases of Ticks <<insert cringe here>>. A good deterrent for ticks is insect repellent containing DEET, however, it is not recommended for children. For those who are interested, the fossicking area had zero phone reception for both Optus and Telstra, UHF was the to go!
We had some really great weather, there were plenty of flies that also joined us on our fossicking trip thanks to the tremendous amount of cowpat-tites on the property.
We appreciate the property owner letting us fossick and look forward to going again next year!
March 2019
Tingha
A dozen ILC members made the journey to the old tin town of Tingha for a week of fossicking in the sun.
The week started off with a digging warm up trip to the blue box, where Crystals and Jellybeans were found.
Day two found the entire group at a mystery location with a local guide, this proved fruitful as we uncovered better quality jellybeans.
Day three, the crystals were put aside for a day for a trip to Wallangra, some lovely black tourmaline on quartz was found by everyone, there were variations on the thickness of the tourmaline and the whiteness of the quartz.
Day 4 found us all off to another mystery location with our very knowledgeable guide. This site proved to be a very good site as we all found even bigger jellybeans and terminated crystals than the other days. A double terminated crystal that was found by our trip leader, even had the guide very excited!
February 2019
Oallen Ford – Gold hunting
With gold pans, sieves and shovels in hand, a small handful of members tried their luck at Oallen Ford for the day looking for some colour. Most members searched for the yellow ‘golden’ variety, meanwhile one member searched for something a bit darker, more specifically – Blackberries. By the end of the day, colour was found by all, both equally as rewarding (I can only imagine how good that Blackberry pie was)!
Members also enjoyed a sausage sizzle and coleslaw for lunch.
Perfect weather made for a very enjoyable day with some great people!
2018 Trips
November 2018
Sept/October 2018 –
DIY Trip: Emmaville/Tingha/Inverell – A few club members made their way to the Emmaville show, held at the Emmaville caravan park, followed by a few days digging for jellybean crystals in Tingha . Congratulations goes to one of our club members who won first prize in the raffle at the Inverell show!! 🙂
Overall, it was a small group trip, but a great group trip!
September 2018 – 9 club members made the journey to Muttama in search of quartz crystals. Some members chose to rough camp on the site, while other members opted for the Caravan park or Motel in Cootamundra. It was a great weekend, with some beautiful finds. The weather was perfect for digging!
August 2018 -Minnamurra to Kiama walk – 6 adventurous club members met at Minnamurra train for an expedition from Kiama to Bombo Quarry. They walked for approximately 6km, admiring the lovely scenery and enjoying great company!
July 2018 – 15 members went to visit fellow club member, Peter’s beautiful mineral and crystal collection, afternoon tea was delightful.
April 2018 – 8 club members made the trip to Tambar Springs to fossick for some beautiful Drusy Quartz and Stellerite. It was a fantastic first time trip for a couple of the newer members of the Lapidary club and a return trip for the more experienced and extremely helpful fossickers of the club! Below is a photo of Stellerite, that was found by a club member and also a photo of the Royal Hotel where the club members stayed during the trip.
2013 Trips
September Trip to Tambar Springs. Nice specimens of drusy quartz found by all members but the dreaded rain got to the fossicking trip again and rained off the prehnite site.
23rd Feb trip to Kangaroo Valley fossicking for petrified wood and jasper. Rain stopped play on this trip. The property owner said that the creek where we fossick was only fit for white water kayaking.
29th to 31 March (Easter) Wee Jasper trip in conjunction with NSW Fossil club (David Hindmarsh trip leader) – Report of trip:- ILC, field trip, yass 2013
Other fossicking TBA
2012 Trips information
Rockarama trip was enjoyed by members and friends. The organisers of the Rockarama at Inverell put on a number of fossicking trips as well as the event in the Town Hall. From the Friday to the following Thursday there were between one and three trips out to local fossicking areas each day. Fossicking was for sapphires, quartz of various varieties, rhodonite, petrified wood and agate. On the Thursday a mystery trip to an old silver mine where a variety of specimens were to be found.
Following doc contains a few photographs from the trip:-
Part of the topaz and aquamarine found at Mt Surprise by a club member.
Quartz Drusy on Calcite found by a club member:-
