This guide contains a detailed listing of collectable New Mexico minerals, agates, and petrified wood, and includes more than 125 collecting sites with maps.
"To discover geologic novelties in the Land of Enchantment, all that is required is a good map, a sense of adventure, and New Mexico Rocks, a guide to 60 of the most compelling geologic sites in the state. More than every other state except Hawaii, New Mexico was shaped by volcanic eruptions, from supervolcano calderas to young basalt flows and cinder cones. Ancient Puebloans likely witnessed the most recent eruptions as they carved their homes into volcanic tuff, used pumice as a water-retaining mulch, and traded obsidian and turquoise far and wide. Legends of New Mexico's fiery origins are surpassed only by magical twists on the state's geologic gee-whiz sites. Nearly every western state has a premier pile of dunes, but New Mexico's White Sands are made from gypsum, not quartz. Carlsbad seems like just another limestone cavern until you learn the rock was dissolved with sulfuric acid, not the normal carbonic acid of rainwater. Silver wasn't just pried out of veins in hard rock, it was found coating the entire surface of a cave-named the Bridal Chamber by Lake Valley miners. Dinosaurs-including the Bisti Beast and Coelophysis, the state fossil-inhabited New Mexico and left tracks on the Dinosaur Freeway, but the footprints at Prehistoric Trackways National Monument were left by Dimetrodon, which is not a dinosaur. With its beautiful photographs and informative figures and maps, this guidebook will get you up to speed on every aspect of New Mexico's diverse geology"--
New Mexico ranks among the best mineral and fossil collecting regions in the nation and is a destination for rockhounds the world over. Beginning with background information to get you started, New Mexico Rockhounding--organized geographically by county a
More than a third of New Mexico is public land that holds untold quantities of mineralogical treasure. With this book anyone can learn where to find unusual mineral displays, fossils, jasper, agate, petrified wood—not to mention more obsidian than one rockhound could possibly collect in a lifetime. The array and quality of such materials just waiting to be found in New Mexico are almost mind-boggling. Rockhounding New Mexico describes 140 of the state's best rockhound sites, covering popular and commercial sites as well as numerous little-known areas. This handy guide describes where and how to collect specimens, includes maps of each site as well as directions, and provides reliable recommendations for accommodations, camping, and other special attractions. It is, in short, a complete and outstanding introduction to the many sides of a fascinating hobby.
New Mexio is a rockhound's paradise. From micromount and gem quality mineral specimens to fossil pieces of life forms millions of years old there is something of interest for both the novice and experienced collector. This latest fully revised editon of 118 sites updates the old ones and adds 23 new sites. Photos, maps, and detailed site descriptions including GPS coordinates, tools needed, and driving conditions help, along with a mineral locator index, glossary, list of museums and rock clubs plus a full color specimen photo insert.
Get the perfect guide to rocks and minerals in the Land of Enchantment! The book features comprehensive entries for 127 New Mexico rocks and minerals, from common rocks to rare finds. The easy-to-use format means you'll quickly find what you need to know and where to look, while the authors' photographs depict the detail needed for identification - no need to guess from line drawings. With this field guide in hand, identifying and collecting can be fun and informative.
In the course of the hundreds of Rio Chama rafting trips that we've logged during the last 30 years, none of us has ever had a bad trip. Such is the magic of the Rio Chama. No matter the weather, the water level, the season, the crowded Big Eddy boat ramp on a blistering Sunday afternoon, or even the coffee forgotten at home, the Rio Chama remains "The People's River." Its stunning beauty, plus its exceptional camping, user-friendly whitewater, and mostly predictable flows, combine to create one of the Southwest's premiere, multi-day, river running experiences.The spectacular, towering canyon walls of the Wild & Scenic section through the remote Chama River Canyon Wilderness is New Mexico's own "Grand Canyon." The geology of the Rio Chama is so exceptional that this river is ideally suited for a river guide with a geological theme. And so, following the release of the Rio Grande geologic river guide in 2011, we turned our (part-time) attention to the Rio Chama. Although most Rio Chama recreation is focused on the El Vado to Big Eddy stretch, thedecision was easily made to include the entire boatable section, from the highlands in Colorado to the confluence with the Rio Grande, as each section of the river displays its own visual spectacles and assortment of adventures. Plus, the geology is magnificent and diverse along the entire length of the river.