Opals

The Aborigines of Australia have a legend. They say The Creator came down to Earth on a rainbow to give a message of peace to all mankind. The place where The Creator's foot toughed the earth the stones became alive, they started to sparkle in all the colors of the rainbow. And that is how Opals were created.

How did the Opal get its' name?

Opal is most likely derived from the Sanskrit word "upala", meaning "valuable stone".

And is probably the root word for the Greek term "opallios", which translates as "color change".

Up until the 1920s Opals were rather uncommon.

Before the discovery of Australian opal in 1849, the only opal sources were in Hungary and South America.
These gems were dull compared to the fiery Australian opal. The difference was so striking that Hungarian mines promoted the idea that Australian opals were not real opals.

Australian opal did not appear on the world market until the 1890s and due to the negitive publicity it took a few years to catch on.

What makes the Opal fiery?
For a long time no one knew.

In the 1960's a team of Australian scientists analyzed Opals with an electron microscope. They discovered that small spheres from silica gel caused interference and refraction manifestations, which are responsible for the fantastic play of color. In other words the Silica is sparkly and gives Opals their color.

Where are Opals found?

95% of all opals come form Australia. The rest are mined in The United States in Idaho and Nevada and Mexico, and in northern Brazil,
but recently the stones have also been discovered in Ethiopia and in the West African country of Mali.

Black Opal is the most rare and valuable of all opals.

These gems always have a dark background color.
The brighter and sharper the contrasting colors, the more valuable the Opal.


Black opal Cabochon that has been treated


Raw rough black Opal

Semi Black Opal
Not as valuable as true Black Opal. It has a grayish background and not as intense display of color.

Black Crystal Opal These are pure crystal Black Opals. These are transparent without any host stone matrix. Some people consider this the Holy Grail of Opals.


Black Crystal Opal

Gray Opals Again not as valuable as black opal. The background on these is dark gray to light gray with a smoky appearance. Still they can have a very nice color play.


Gray Opal

These light Opals are found in Coober Pedy, Andamooka and Mintabie in Southern Australia.

These are the most common of all Opals.

They are always light in color and generally display red, blue or green flakes of color or pin fire.


White Opals

Common white Opals showing various colors.

Extreme Fire 10x5mm Natural Solid Crystal Opal Marquise $20.00 each

3mm Multi Color white Opal round Cabochon $2.50 each

Crystal Opal is any kind of opal which has a transparent or semi-transparent body tone - i.e. you can see through the stone. It does not have any of the host rock or Matrix left on the gem.

A dark backing is often used with these gems to make the color of the gems show better.



These are pictures of the same Gem. It is a pure crystal opal you can see right through. See how adding a dark back ground makes the colors of the gem much more visible

For years Opals were only cut in flat backed cabochons because it was thought opals were too soft to be faceted.

However some extremely talented gem cutters can turn pure crystal Opals into gems of exceptional quality.

Side veiw

One one the most beautiful Opals I have ever seen

These Stunning Faceted Crystal Opals are all the work of Mc*opals.
An engineer by trade who has a passion for Opals.
People are always saying to him "That can't be an Australian Opal! Nobody facets those!"
Guess they should have told him that before he went and did it.
Mc is trying to change the way people think about Opals, especially faceted Opals. Most people don't even know faceted Opals exist.

To purchase one of these fantastic gems Mc*opals' contact information is available on request.

Boulder Opal is a solid opal.

It occurs as thin veins of precious opal in the cracks and cavities of light and dark brown ironstone boulders found in Queensland Australia .

Leaving the ironstone on the back of the gem can enhance the appearance of the gem causing a spectacular color display.



Boulder opal about the size of a billiard ball

This gem is available through Black Light Opals

Boulder opals set in sterling

These gems are available through TopGems

Harlequin pattern boulder Opal from from Queensland, Australia.
Harlequin pattern is rare and valuable. This gem was mined in 1937 and has never been cut.

Opals form in veins. Opaline silica fills in voids or fissures between grains of the host rock usually ferruginous sandstone or ironstone. But has also formed on Petrified Wood on the United States.



This is a piece of matrix that has been cut and has opal inclusion.


Sandstone matrix opal

These pieces can come in chunks weighing up to half a ton!


free form cabochons



4.25 carats. Opal matrix bright pinfire low shaped cabachon



Center of a hunk of sandstone matrix opal

This gem is available through Black Light Opals

Tiger Dog carved from Opal matrix

Horse carved from Opal Matrix

The carvings are done by a man in indonesia using all hand tools. (no electricity)
Sorry these are not for sale at this time.

Opal matrix is a recognised gemstone,.
It comes in various types. the top quality material in the rough can fetch as much as $200 per gram. The lowest quality about $40 per kilo. (These carvings)
These items were carved out of sandstone opal matrix. This is a host stone (porous ) that the opal silica has seeped into millions of years ago and set. It cannot be readily seperated from the host stone so it is called opal in matrix.
The stone is treated by immersing it in sugar and water and then carbonizing the sugar with heat. This does not alter the colours already in the stone,. It just darkens the background.
Opal as such is non porous and does not need hydrating.
These statues are never placed in water. they look like this all the time.

Located in the central east part of Australia, about 600 miles west of Brisbane, Queensland, the Yowah Opal field produces some of the most unique Opals in the world.

The Gems form in an ironstone (hemitite) matrix that creates magnificent patterns, that can also form pictures.


Yowah Nut, See the river of blue Opal running through it.



The Planet Earth



One of my all time favorite gems
Opal lake with valcano in the background

Gems like these are available through Alpinefire

Andamooka is an opal mining town located in South Australia's outback region, about 580 km north of Adelaide.

Opals were first found at Andamooka in 1930.

Today the town looks like something out of the 1800's with dirt roads, stray dogs, odd looking miners and the buildings are made, for the most part, from corrugated iron, fibro, breeze blocks, and bits of rock.

The town is driven by one economic imperative...the desire to dig a fortune out of the unforgiving desert soil. Everything else they say...is unimportant.

Despite the harsh conditions the opals mined here are some of the finest in the world!





When cut these gems sparkle with vivid pin flecks of color. Almost like looking at rainbow colored stars in a night sky.



Honey matrix Andamooka Opal
Green lights flash all around the stone as it is moved.


Beautiful Red Opal
Sadly this gem was dropped only minutes after this picture was taken, it shattered beyond repair.

Gems like these are available through Black Light Opals

jars of rough opal waiting to be cut and polished



Wheel barrel full of just mined Opals

Opal mining in South Australia. Or in particular mining Andamooka in southern Australia's far northern arid regions where water is more expensive than good wine.
Imagine an almost lunar like landscape almost devoid of trees covered with mullock heaps around 60 meter open cut holes in the ground. Scorching temperatures in the 50+ degrees (C)(122 degrees F) during the summer days and dropping to 0 (C) Freezing at night.
Nearly all of the mining in this field is open cut and put down with bulldozers and excavators. Very little driving (tunneling) is done. The only shafts you will find are the vertical shafts sunk by 1-meter wide exploratory drills.

The work is dangerous and hot. Some men work all their lives in these conditions and barely eke out enough to buy food. Others strike it rich and spend it all on alcohol and having a good time. A few invest it wisely in machinery and equipment and go on working and sometimes even prospering.
Those are few and far between.

Before even getting to the opal you have to remove thousands of tons of overburden you then (if your lucky come to a false level, then the clay, then the opal. (Again if your lucky) the distance between the false level and the opal level can be a further 10-20 feet. Even if you strike opal it is not usually found in great lumps. Rather it is small pieces that need to be gouged out of the ground with a screw driver . (Hence the name for opal miners **opalgougers)

My mate and I have put in cuts that cost us $10,000 each and found nothing. We have also worked an abandoned claim and found thousands.
To give you an idea of the depth of the open cuts imagine an area 50 meters x 50 meters (2,500 square meters) Then take it down a further 50 meters and you see that you need to move about 125,000 cubic meters of hard packed dirt just to get to the false level. $20,000 does not go too far. A DC9 excavator costs about $300 an hour to operate. 10 days at $2,000 per day. Do the math! OUCH!!!

Why do we do it.? The beauty of the stone. The thrill of the find. The quest itself. Each man has his own devil that drives him on. The loneliness, the thirst, the heat, flies, cold, deprivation, the life style where he is free from bureaucracy.
A hundred men would come up with more than 100 reasons. It is a gamble. Generally the men are hard working, hard drinking, loners.
But all of this is worth it for the thrill of holding in your hands natures' most beautiful creation. THE OPAL.

Digging with and excavator at Stans Hill Field (Andamooka)

Cliff face

This is one of the old original gougers shanty. It is partly dug into the side of the hill adn the dirt throuwn on the roof as insulation. An old dtrum is the chimney at the back and the dunny is up on top of the hill.

False eye made from an Opal

Beautiful red-orange fire opals are primarily found in the Mexican highlands are popular for their eye-catching colors.

Mexican Fire Opals come in various shades of Red, Orange and Yellow with red being the most valuable and Yellow the least.



Pure Red Fire Opal. This gem is sometimes called Cherry Opal.


Orange Fire Opal


Yellow fire Opals

5x2.5mm orange Fire Opal Marquise $5.00 each

5x2.5mm Marquise faceted Orange Fire Opal $5.00 each

Peruvian Pink Opal is a beautiful pastel pink. It can be nearly translucent to nearly opaque.

Sometimes referred to as Angelskin Opal, Peppermint Candy Stone, or Andean Opal.

It can run from light pink to almost mauve in color.

Peruvian blue opal is relatively rare and is only found in the Andes mountains near San Patricio,Peru.

It is translucent, meaning you can see some light through it, but you can't see through it.

It has a beautiful Aqua Blue color unlike any other stone.
Some say it is nearly the color of the Caribbean Sea.

It often has black fern like inclusions.

The Blue Opal is the national stone of Peru.

Please be advised. This gem is being widely faked by people dying gems to make them look like the Peruvian Blue Opal. If the blue color is uneven or blotchy you are probably looking at a dyed stone.


Blue Opal cabochons with vains of Quartz running through them. Sold



Blue Opal Cabochons



Opals from Peru showing various colors


Blue green Octagon cut Opal

The most famous Conk Opals come from the Bonanza opal mine in Northern Nevada.

Conk Opal, see how the petrified wood core is still visible.

This piece has been has had most of the wood removed leaving a beautiful opal behind.

The Bonanza opal mine is located in the Virgin Valley in high desert of Humbolt County, in northwestern Nevada.

Virgin Valley is an ancient lake bed at about 5000' elevation. Once the lake was lined with trees that were felled by repeated erouption from a near by valcano. As the wood decayed, it provided cavities which then filled with a Opal silica.

The Bonanza opal mine is open to the public and for a fee you can dig for buried teasure.

The mine opens Memorial Day Weekend and closes September 30th.

Hours of Operation 8 AM to 4:00 PM

The fee is $45 per day. One child, 12 and under is free when accompanied by one paid adult.

You keep what you find.

Contact Information:

May 20 - Sept 30
Bonanza Opal Mines, Inc.
P. O. Box 121
Denio, Nevada 89404
Millsite: 775-941-0111
Paul Wood, President

Conk is when Opal silica replaces cells in dead wood. It is VERY rare and only found in a few places in the world. It is probably the most valuable of all American opals.

The Royal Peacock is open to the Puplic and you can dig your own opals and keep what you find.

OPEN
May 15 thru Oct. 15
(Weather permitting)

Rock Shop hours:
8 am - 5pm

Mining hours
8 am - 4 pm

Children 12 and under with a paid adult dig free in the mine dumps and tailings only.

Tools you will need.

Short handled pick, shovel, or garden rake
Long #2 Screw driver,ice pick or similar tools
Small bucket-like container,ZipLoc Bags
Gloves ,Hat, Sunblock
Water squirt bottle
Kneeling pad,or Carpet sample.

You can also rent equipment at the site.

Phone: (775) 941-0374

The is a new group of opal specimens from Ethiopia, only discovered 6 years ago.

Windowed Ethiopian Opal

Still in the cutting and polishing phase

These gems are extremely rare and only a few gem cutters in the United States can even get the rough.

These gems are available through TopGems

Some regains of Africa also produce Fire Opals.

SOLD

Yellow African Fire Opal from Tanzania

Faceted Pink Opal



Rare pink opal from Tanzania for sale.

Sold

With 50 + lenses on Squidoo