Adventures at Emerald Creek Garnet Area

One of the fun things to do in north Idaho is prospecting for garnets. There are only two places in the world where Star Garnets can be found: India, and right here in north Idaho. As explained on the USDA Forest Service website, "the Forest Service provides a stockpile of garnet bearing gravels from which people can gather material to run through one of two sluice boxes in search of garnets."

Yesterday @jacobtothe, @generikat, her husband, "T", and I made the 2 hour drive to this spot so the two members of the group with garnet fever could prospect for garnets. T and I opted to sit in the shade and read books; the temperature rose to at least 95 degrees, and I was plenty warm just sitting under the trees! The more-ambitious two kept busy for about six hours of prospecting. @jacobtothe has explained in detail the prospecting process, so I will omit that in my post and let you read about it there. Below are some photos of the area.

This little hut is where the Forest Service employees collect the $10/adult or $5/ child fee for the day. After you are all done prospecting, the garnets are brought here to be weighed.

In the photo above, you can see the beautiful forest and also the very necessary porta-potties.

Not only are there picnic tables in the shade of the trees, but also in the shade of umbrellas. Here you can see the stacks of buckets used by prospectors to hold garnet-bearing gravel.

The garnet-bearing gravel is dumped here by the Forest Service for convenient transfer into buckets by the prospectors.

This area is for sifting out the dirt and debris and larger gravel.

The sluicing station is where you wash your gravel and search for the garnets. It takes some instruction and practice to spot them!

Later today I plan to create another post with pictures of the wild flowers in the area. Thanks for stopping by!