Saturday May 17, 2008 was a perfect day to spend in the west desert of Utah hunting for the beautiful Dugway Geodes. The temperatures were cool in the morning but warmed up into the 80's in the afternoon.
We had 13 vehicles of anxious rockhounds meet at the old Teddy Bear truck stop at exit 77 of I-80 at 8:00 AM. All of us had high hopes of finding a real treasure that day, but it really didn't matter because we were more interested in just getting out and having fun. For many of us it was our first rock trip after a long snowy winter.
Our caravan stretched out for quite a long distance after we left the pavement and hit the gravel roads. It was so dry out there and we kicked up quite a dust cloud. I remember several years ago you would be lucky to see one or two other vehicles along the Pony Express Route road, but on that day there were many other people out enjoying the west desert. We did not see the herds of wild horses like we have in past years because the water holes close to the road were already dried up this year. We did however see many antelope on the flats and we passed 6 snakes along the road too. (Yes some of them were rattlesnakes).
When we got to the geode beds we were amazed to see so many people there. There were several groups of RVs, tents, Boy Scout troops, etc. camping out and many more vehicles out for the day like we were. It was so good to see so many people out enjoying the desert.
I think that everyone found some nice geodes during the day. Some picked up smaller ones on the surface for tumbling. Others dug and raked through the piles of dirt left by the tractor that had been working on the claim there. I saw some nice geodes in buckets as I walked around and visited with people.
I tried to make a list of those in attendance. If I happened to miss your name please forgive me, I apologize. Those in attendance were DeWayne and Debbie Pendleton. Paul Curtis, Don Kimball, Bob Rumel and friend Rebecca, Jane and Magie Huntington, Cleon Davies and his daughter Laura Memmott and grandson Ronin,, Bob Booth, Kathy Meyer and her children Mckenzie and Ryland, Larry and Barbara Hardenbrook, Kevin Nagle and his daughter Allysen, Jeff Huefner, Dennis King, Dave and Claudia Pack and their son Michael and grandsons Andre, Alex, and Brennan, Murray Becker, and his friend Steve Hohnke. There were some other members that said that they were going to go a different way out there and they might not have been hunting in the same area as we were. We only had one flat tire on the Pack's vehicle but their son just picked them up and brought them the rest of the way out.
