THURSDAY 18 MAY     RUBYVALE

I took advantage of the good weather to do the washing.

Then we set out, taking our solo traveller R with us, to sieve a barrow of wash at the Miners Cottage. But the man was away in Rockhampton. So we went to the Heritage instead and sieved a bucket each. We did alright, getting four cutters.

Took all our findings from the time here, to J at Old Micks. She found we had, overall, ten cutters, all small, which we left with her to be cut. We were to phone her at the end of the month, to arrange COD delivery.

John washed Truck. We packed up as much as we could. It was a good thing that we did, because it rained during the night, and the mud came back!

Tea was fries, with flathead for John and ray (Qld flake!) for me.

We were finding it hard to leave Rubyvale – it is a good-feeling place.

FRIDAY 18 DECEMBER     RUBYVALE

We were off out to Mt Leura again, at 6.30am. It was quite pleasant driving out there at this time of day. If one lived here, there would have to be a regimen of utilizing the cooler mornings, retreating in the heat of the day, and having early nights.

JJ and L told us we could go out to Katie’s Gully alone, as L had a bad night with a sore back and they would not be going out. I suspect the bad night – and morning – had more to do with the box of beer we gave them yesterday!

Anyway, it was good to be out there on our own, and we explored our hunches, digging up and bringing back four large and one small buckets of gravel for washing. Even though it was early, it was still hot work.

Sapphire fossicker at work in Katie’s Gully – digging out a gravel layer

Rough, dry, sieving the gravel to get rid of the dirt and large chunks of rock

Is that an interesting bit?

Thirsty work – pretty grotty too

Washed the gravel, back at JJ’s place. We got some small pieces of sapphire and one very big yellow and blue piece, bigger than my thumb nail. This generated much envy and disbelief from JJ, who confidently predicted it would cut beautifully and be worth thousands. Maybe $50,000! John was very pleased!

We said our farewells to the men – who we suspected might be heading out to Katie’s Gully in a hurry, to see where we had dug. Drove back to town and straight to J the cutter. She did not take long to pronounce that our big yellow chunk was too fractured to cut, or even polish. Well, it had given us lovely thoughts and feelings for an hour or so. We will certainly keep it as a little “treasure” – a piece of might-have-been.

The chunk of parti-coloured sapphire we found

From the bits that we have found here, we did arrange for her to cut two stones for earrings, and set them, and one ring stone – a pale greeny one that she thinks will cut to nearly a carat, and set that too. So I will end up with some new jewellery from this stay – special pieces because of having found the stones ourselves. It will cost $270 for the cutting and setting. Good value, we think. When the work is done, she will mail them COD to a designated Post Office – and we will pay at the Post Office before collecting the goods.

We had a counter lunch at the pub, to console ourselves for the “loss”. We both had the seafood basket. It is a long way from the sea, here, but it was very nice.

Then we went and again admired the jewellery at the Rubyvale Gallery.

Back to the van and cool air and a nap for a couple of hours. All that temporary excitement was too much!

After that, although it was still hot, we packed up what we could. Sat outside watching the clouds build up and a most impressive lightning display.

John had sausages and bread for tea; I had some biscuits with tomato and cheese. Neither of us was very hungry, after the big lunch. The leftover cooked sausages will make a nice sandwich filling for tomorrow’s lunch.

THURSDAY 17 DECEMBER     RUBYVALE

We left to go out to Mt Leura at 6.30am. Another early start to beat the heat.

The property is named for the nearby volcanic cone. It was the volcanic activity in the area that accounts for the formation of sapphire. It is pretty country out there.

JJ and L took us out to an area on the property called Katie’s Gully. We dug in a dry creek bed there and filled a half 44 gallon drum with rough screened gravel, and then took that back to the home area to wash and sieve. This saved having to cart water and more gear out there.

We were introduced to the Willoughby washing apparatus, which holds the sieve of gravel suspended in a half 44 gallon drum of water, and allows you to jiggle the sieve around to concentrate the heavier stones (hopefully with some of value) in the centre of the bottom of the sieve. That’s the theory anyway. It is much easier on the back than bending over and manhandling the sieve oneself.

JTJ washing gravel – doing the final sieve

John using the Willoughby to wash the gravel

We found a few little bits of sapphire and zircon.

Picking over the sieved gravel looking for something of value

We were done by 10am and drove back to town.

John realized that he had forgotten my birthday, and got cross – with me, because it was somehow my fault!

The day grew very hot and we stayed in the air conditioned van for much of the afternoon.

However, I did do the washing when we got back from Mt Leura. It did not take long to dry.

We did venture out to go buy a box of beer to give to JJ, in appreciation of the effort he has gone to. He collected this from us, when he was in town, later in the day. He seemed very happy to receive the gift.

Walked the short distance to the Post Office at the front of the park. Our mail was in, containing bills, Xmas cards and some letters. I wrote cheques for the bills and got them ready to send. Read the cards and letters – it is great to start hearing from people.

Tea was chicken, bean shoots and cashew stir fry. It was very nice. We had a bottle of champagne that John bought at the same time as JJ’s beer. It was a belated birthday celebration.

It was a very hot, heavy, oppressive night and we kept the air con on all night, despite its noise. We have no neighbours to disturb and we were tired enough to sleep through it.