An Indians Dream

For this trip you will need to again go to Milford, Utah. Milford is home to so much geology you can go wrong. Just west of town they have reopened a copper mine which is surrounded by old shut down mines, just south you have Minersville, where they pulled silver and lead as well as many other minerals from the ground, southwest you have more abandoned mines and in this post I will take you to one more spot that has bee very interesting to me. Milford is also just recently home to a large wind turbine farm with many very large wind generators which they use to generate power to be sent all over Utah. One of the most interesting geological features powers its geothermal plant. A geothermal plant is a power plant which uses the earths heat to heat water and power turbines. The reason this is such an important geological feature is because it shows that it is volcanically active and is a definite way to place minerals up near the surface to be mined. I know you have probably heard of the term vein when it comes to mining, and that is where these hot minerals are deposited. Usually the vain is formed by a fault which opens up and is then filled the the very hot mineral liquid. Once it reaches near the surface it quickly cools and is deposited for future prospectors. Now I will take you to one of my favorite spots. The spot is filled with obsidian which can be casually collected. Native Americans used obsidian to shape into arrow heads and used for hunting, but also as a trading commodity. To get to this site you need to go north of Milford on Highway 257 until you can see a road marking the wind generators it will be a dirt road just to the south. Once you turn here follow the road up a few miles and you will see the geothermal plant on your left. If you want you can take a side trip just after the plant and turn left just before the cattle guard where you see the road going almost parallel to the road you were just on. Follow this road to the nearby hill which is surrounded by banded opal. It is not opal you are used to seeing but it is very colorful strands of minerals. The area used to be a free collecting site for rock hounding but the rights have recently been bought and now you may only look at the rocks but leave them on the site. To find the obsidian go back to the cattle guard and continue on the main dirt road into the canyon. Once you get into the canyon you should be able to see the obsidian laying on the ground everywhere you look. This is the site hope you enjoy.