Trip Report - Amethyst Cove June 2001

Its been a while since the Amethyst Cove trip and my memory is poor at the best of times, but I will try to recall some of the events of the day.

It started early in the morning, as Terry and I arrived at the parking lot at the bottom of Cape Blomidon. We looked over some aerial photos of Cape Split to familiarize ourselves with the shoreline of the area. We then began the task of moving equipment down to the shoreline.

Others began arriving as it drew closer to departure time. As we waited for the boats, the tide kept falling. At Blomidon, the beach is nearly perfectly flat, so when the tide drops even a small amount, the water’s edge moves out considerably. This meant having to continuously move the equipment further out on the beach to keep up with the water.

As the fog started to burn off the boats finally arrived. They could not come too close to the beach because of the shallow water, so a deflated dingy was brought ashore to transport people and equipment. Inflating the dingy was a bit time consuming due to the small foot pump, and the fact that the sand beneath the pump kept turning to soft mud. When about half the air chambers were filled, Terry, who was wearing hip waders, decided it was filled enough (despite the pleas of the people who would be inside the dingy), and we began to fill up the boats.

Eventually the first boatload departed for the collecting areas. We scanned the shoreline for rockfalls and checked out interesting spots with binoculars. Riding in the boats is really enjoyable with the wind and sea spray. Arriving at a point of land quite near Amethyst Cove Terry hopped out and helped get people ashore. A while later, the second boatload of would arrive.

Terry, Andrew, and I decided to try our luck on a rockfall about halfway between Amethyst Cove and Blomidon. The area is difficult to reach by land and had not been explored in several years. It was fun, but good specimens were in short supply. Andrew and I reduced a small boulder to rubble and found some pockets with some nice thumbnail sized natrolite balls associated with heulandite and analcime. Terry found a vein of stilbite which we also opened up. Alas, it had been out in the weather too long, having been beaten up in places.

Near the end of the day, the wind picked up and it began to rain. I ended up getting quite wet, not only from the rain but also from holding the boat off the rocks as we were getting picked up. I heard similar stories from the other group of people. Back at Blomidon beach the tide was nearly high and we carried soggy boxes of specimens back to the car. The Amiraults had to go all the way to Kentville/Wolfville to get additional gas for the boats, and returned as were packing the car. We said goodbye and headed into Wolfville for a well earned supper.

As usual a great day spent outside collecting.

Ronnie Van Dommelen

These great photos were provided by the Judy and Mark Amirault. Click on each one to enlarge.

© 2001, Nova Scotia Mineral and Gem Society

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