Hello from Derbyshire. Looking for crystals and minerals!

[Midnightstar]

I'm a crystal collector and I'd love to get my hands on some local "gems". Any recommendations for any old quarries, mines, caverns etc would be most welcome. I'm not a caver, so only places a mere mortal (with a fear of falling down holes ) can get to please. Nothing that involves extremely tight spaces either! Cheers

 

[Roderick]

Um, those of us who go caving and exploring like to see the "gems" where they are. People chipping them out of the rock often damaging them in the process so they can either sell them or selfishly keep them just for them selves are spoiling it for the rest of us and are understandably not popular. There is no problem with people picking up the odd lump of spar from an old waste rock heap or the bottom of a quarry but not many collectors leave it at that.

 

[Midnightstar]

Um, those of us who go caving and exploring like to see the "gems" where they are. People chipping them out of the rock often damaging them in the process so they can either sell them or selfishly keep them just for them selves are spoiling it for the rest of us and are understandably not popular. There is no problem with people picking up the odd lump of spar from an old waste rock heap or the bottom of a quarry but not many collectors leave it at that.

Don't worry, I'd only picking up what's already on the ground. I'm not into damaging nature. Already had a good rummage around the scree Black Rocks but would love to find a little piece of something.

 

[Hayman]

Don't worry, I'd only picking up what's already on the ground. I'm not into damaging nature. Already had a good rummage around the scree Black Rocks but would love to find a little piece of something.

On my mantelshelf I've a couple of pieces of ilmenite I picked up from the deck of the bulk carrier I worked on as ship's cook's boy from Dakar to Grimsby. That was in 1974. And I've a lump of rock from the grounds of Bossell Park, Buckfastleigh - Bossell was my childhood home. Plus half a brick from the foundations of the now demolished signal box at Wool, Dorset - it stops the door to my 'study' from hitting my all-in-one printer! Do rocks retain anything from their past?

 

[HistoryBuff]

I'm a crystal collector and I'd love to get my hands on some local "gems".

Welcome to the forum. How's your collection?