Welcome to the 2001 Sainte-Marie aux Mines Show!
 
 

 
June 20th

This was our third day here in eastern France.  Many more dealers were open for business today than yesterday and more will be open for business tomorrow which is the first official day of the show.

Most of the day for me was spent running from tent to tent in an effort to track down interesting new items here at the show.  Overall, after the first two days of activity, there does not appear to be a great deal of new material.   As I said in yesterday's report there is a sea of red vanadinite here.  Today there was even more - make it an OCEAN!!  Everyone seems to have some specimens of this material on display.

At the beginning of the morning I went over to Laaroussi's tent and found a few more interesting items.  This time some malachite partially pseudomorphing azurite on siliceous matrix - rather attractive stuff.  I found about a half dozen problem free specimens and moved on to the Theatre where the lights were on!  What a difference 24 hours makes!

Compare and contrast these shots with the pictures below taken just 24 hours before!

This is a pan of the interior of the Theatre.

Out in the tents I found Clavel Minerals selling the Carre-Agen Fluorite Collection.  This collection was centered principally around French localities but there were many specimens from Spain also.   I found 3 beautiful blue beauties including one from the famous La Bieux locality and three from le Burg in Tarn, France.   Further on I found another Moroccan dealer who had some very nice azurite specimens and some more of the large blocky crystallized vanadinite.  He also insisted that these were pyromorphites and not endlichites or vanadinites.   One thing I have come to appreciate - maybe not appreciate, probably understand about Moroccan dealers is that they will say almost anything to get you to reach into your wallet and pull money out.  Trust your eyes and knowledge and don't expect to get 100% accurate information.    Also nearby was French dealer Alain Grosse with some nice roselite specimens from Morocco.  There are a fair number of roselites here at the show this year.  The quality is generally low but I did find one rather attractive TN sized specimen then moved on.

As the day wore on I was getting anxious about my quest for pink fluorite specimens from Chamonix.  Colleen and I had just been there for 4 days and I spent a fair amount of time enquiring around the small towns there asking if anyone had any pinks for sale.  I was quite frustrated at the overwhelmingly negative response to my enquiries.  Anyway, today I found Alan Martaud of Paris, France who had a small hoard of about a dozen specimens of pink fluorite from Chamonix.  That is Alan in the picture on the left.  I bought the entire lot and gleefully moved on.  He had one large specimen pictured above that filled my left hand (11 cm across).  If you're interested in it let me know and I will put you in touch with this rock!  Warning: it ain't cheap...

I then spent a few minutes walking about the show snapping pictures of the show and tracking down random items for future updates.   The following pictures will convey the degree to which today was a bit of a "cluster" event with cars and people vying for the same space....

Still, there were periods of open roadway as the next pictures indicate...

Yes, that is Sandor Fuss of The Collector's Edge talking with Jean Claude - the curator of the Sorbonne Museum.  Sandor's the guy in the shades.  We had a beer and snack together down the street where he showed me some of the new stibnites that they have brought out of China.  They have spent a lot of time working the turf over there to find only the best pieces available that are free of damage which seems to plague much of the Chinese material.  There are some world class pieces that they will be making available in quantity at the Denver Show this coming September.

After lunch with Colleen I wandered over to one of the large tents set up and found a Chinese dealer by the name of Jinshi Liu from Chengdu, China. 

I was very impressed with the quality of much of his material including one very interesting specimen which had orange scheelite, blue aquamarine and white fluorite crystals on it.  Of course I bagged it along with a few other scheelite/beryl combination specimens and a rather odd quartz floater specimen.

Afterwards, I went back into the Theatre as it is always important to keep moving during set up day and found Chris and Brice Gobin with what has to be some of the best carrollite specimens EVER found in quantity!  The specimens come from the Kamoya Mine near Kabove City in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.  I took a number of pictures and also found time to pick up 15 specimens from the new lot.  Again, I was very fortunate to be in the right place at the right time as within minutes there was no room to stand while everyone gawked at these marvels.  No one has ever seen this many great specimens of Carrollite at one place at one time.  The following shots are just a sample.  Prices were not cheap as everyone knows that this recent pocket, which was carefully collected, is now worked out.

Here are Brice (on the left) and Chris Gobin saying Hello from France.

 

In these four pictures all of the crystals of carrollite are over 2.5 cm or 1 full inch.
The one in the upper left is 5.5 cm across and absolutely mirrorlike.

Also in the Theatre French Dealer Francois Lietard had some new specimens from two new finds in the Afghanistan and Pakistan.  Rich deep blue spinels from Pakistan and light blue topaz crystals with tourmaline and lepidolite from Afghanistan.  I will be meeting with Francois tomorrow to bag some more of these for the show page when I get back home.

More from Sainte Marie aux-Mines as the show officially opens tomorrow!
 

Click here to see the 2000 Saint-Marie aux Mines show report The Official Sainte-Marie aux Mines Show Website