October - Returning South - Part 2

As we headed south, we stopped and visited our friends Jan and Vinny Gaglioni, owners of Crystal Bee Supply, Peabody, MA. We use to keep Honey Bees in our early days. Jan and Vinny were our teachers and mentors when we first started the Hobby.

Heading south, we decided to go back to Ogdensburg, NJ for another visit to Sterling Hill Mining Museum. Due to the power outage on our first visit, we weren’t able to take the tour of the mine or see the mineral museum. We took lots of great pictures and here is a little sampling of what you can see – we do recommend you go if you’re in the area.

The Oreck Family (Vacuum cleaner Oreck’s) has a mineral exhibit in the museum that’s amazingly cool and extremely large. It’s the best exhibit that we’ve ever seen. (Above)
The Sterling Hill Mine is famous for the flourescent minerals show above. Sterling Hill and the Franklin Mines are now both educational based museums and the the main sources for flouresecent mineral mines in the USA . The mine is extremely deep (I think it is about 8 levels deep), but since it’s not a working mine, the mine has filled with water to within 50 feet below the main level. The water is extremely clear and the flooded passages can be seen clearly for a long way down. It’s strange to see a row boat tied on the second level (especially in a tunnel). After we left New Jersey, we went west to New York City. Yes, we have friends everywhere. Fred and Sherry Sztul invited us over for a couple of night to visit. Fred and Sherry are fellow RMHYC members and they dock their boat near us in Marsh Harbour, Bahamas. They treated us like royalty. We had a huge lunch the day we arrived and then we all went out to China Town for dinner and then over to Little Italy for dessert. The next day we went to Boynton Beach for Russian lunch to be followed by dinner cooked by Sherry. Everything was great and we look forward to seeing them in Marsh Harbour. As we headed south again, we remembered the great time we had at Cotton Patch Gold Mine so we stopped for another visit with our niece Lee Ann and of course, she was very interested in going back to mine with us. Another great day – and highly recommended good fun.
Returning to Green Cove Springs, FL in time for a Jacksonville Gem & Minerals Club Picnic and Tailgate Swap. Wilma and Dianna know the true meaning of Tailgate Party.