Desert Messenger

October 15, 2014 www.DesertMessenger.com 15 MOUNTAIN QUAIL C AFE Open 7am - 7pm 7 DAYS/ WEEK 928-927-8890 Open Year Round! 490 N. Moon Mt. Ave., Quartzsite (corner of Moon Mt. & Quail Trail) B-10, Main St. Moon Mountain X Quail Trail N Hwy. 95, N. Central • DAILY SPECIALS • Thurs. SPAGHETTI & MEATBALLS • Friday FISH Special • Sat. PRIME RIB Enjoy our Famous Bread Pudding ! Home Style Cooking! 175 E. Main St. 928-927-5585 www.sillyalspizza.com WELCOME BACK TO SILLY AL'S! SILLY AL'S PIZZA Famous Gourmet Pizza KARAOKE DJ • Wed - Fri 7pm Kevin James Serving Quartsite at Same Location for over 20 years! LIVE MUSIC • Sat. 7pm Ern Cunningham Fri Oct 31 • 7pm cash prizes for best costumes Halloween party QUARTZSITE BAKERY OPEN MONDAY, NOV. 3 RD "Get Your Buns in Here!" 415 E. Main Street Coffee & Fresh Baked Donuts, Burger Buns, Cakes, Pies, Maple Bars, Bearclaws, Apple Fritters, Homemade Breads, Rolls, & more! Monday - Saturday - 6 a.m. - 5 p.m. 928-927-5794 Arizona is known for its beautiful turquoise, as well as copper and copper-oxide minerals like chrysacolla, malachite, and azurite. But also found here in Arizona, not far from Quartzsite, is another beautiful gemstone: Fire Agate. There are only two known Fire Agate deposits in the entire world. One covers an area be- tween the Sierra Madre Occidental and the Si- erra Madre Oriental Mountain Ranges in Mex- ico about 100 miles north of Mexico City. The other is the Sonoran Desert region in Arizona and California. The closest sites to Quartzsite are the Opal Hill Mine, in Palo Verde, Califor- nia, the Little Horn Mountains near Safford about 35 miles east of Quartzsite, and Oatman, AZ. The Arizona and California Fire Agates have more brilliance, fi re, and color than ones from Mexico. Fire Agate is a Chalcedony that was formed dur- ing the Tertiary Period, 24 to 36 MYA. It is a cryptocrystalline silica with a hardness of 7, and is created when hot water saturated with colloi- dal silica and iron oxides is forced by volcanic activity up into cavities in the host rock. The Chalcedony cools in botryoidal (bubble) forms. The "Fire" is created when alternating layers of iron oxides and silica cover the mounds of Chal- cedony, and then another layer of Chalcedony forms over top of these layers. The iron oxide and silica layers refract light in a process called interference. This causes the "Fire" we see in Fire Agates. Fire Agate is sometimes considered to be an opal, but it's not. Fire Agate is a crystalline form of silica, not a hydrous one like opal, so it will not crack, craze, or fade. It is a much more durable gemstone than opal, and very well suit- ed for jewelry. For the lapidarist, however, Fire Agate presents unusual challenges. First of all, it is diffi cult to tell if a piece of rough contains fi re or not, because the fi re layers are hidden under layers of Chalcedony. If it does, getting By Jenn Jedidiah Free for RocksInMyHead™ to the fi re requires skill and exactness. Layers of chalcedony must be ground away to expose the layers of fi re, and it is very easy to remove too many layers, cut into the fi re layers, and lose the fi re altogether. Arizona Fire Agates are typically a brown to red- dish brown color, with fi re ranging from reds and yellows to greens, blues and purples. Some stones have fi re containing all the colors of the rainbow. Typically, Fire Agates are cut in free- form cabs to best enhance the natural shapes and patterns of fi re within the stone. ADVENTURES WITH ROCKS Arizona Fire Agates are available from RocksIn- MyHead at www.RocksInMyHead.com or call us at 605-376-8754. We have Fire Agate from Oatman and the Opal Hill mine in Blythe, cabs, preforms, and rough, information on the local Fire Agate dig sites, and much, much more. We have books, maps, tools and everything you need to go out and have some exciting prospect- ing adventures of your own here or elsewhere. We are open from 10am to 6:00pm, at A37 Rice Ranch in Quartzsite, 605-376-8754, and 24/7 at www.RocksInMyHead.com. Don't wait until November. Come by today! We are here! Fire in the Desert - Arizona Fire Agates NOW OPEN! OPEN DAILY 6am - 8pm 7 Days/Week Year-Round Western American Food Seats 153 • Banquet Room • Large Groups Room Service Available in our 10-Room Motel 904 W. Main St., Quartzsite 928-927-5718 $1 TACO TUESDAY! FISH FRIDAY! Check out our Facebook Page for Dinner Specials

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