In Karelia and Kola 2021

Once you've trodden a path, it's hard to turn off it... I'm talking about Lovozero. This year's trip to Lovozero is the sixth in a row. Some raw materials have run out - it is necessary to replenish. And under this goal, other passing or almost passing points have already pulled up. As a result, the following route was outlined: Navolokskoye deposit, Karelia (copper) - Flora, Lovozero (Narsarsukit) - pegmatites 60 and 62, Lovozero (ussingite, natrolite, hackmanite, etc.) - Northern quarry, Lovozero (murmanite, hackmanite, loparite ) - Afrikanda (perovskite + magnetite) - Tersky coast of the White Sea (fishing, optional glendonites) - Ambarny, Sev. Karelia (belomorite, fishing). I must say right away that the entire route has been completed, the program has been completed.

The first day is the road.

Departure-road-overnight stay in Karelia. Everything went without incident. On the track I crossed paths with a friend who was already returning from there. He warned that it was +12 in Lovozero. Radio frightened future downpours in Karelia. Okay, let's wait and see.

The second day is a copper-prisoner day.

I drove up to the quarry of the Navolokskoye diabase deposit, which is in Karelia beyond Kondapoga, at eight o'clock in the morning. Why is he remarkable? – large samples of dendritic copper. The samples are chic and large, for some reason I did not see photographs of small samples at all. But according to the laws of nature, there should be much more small samples than large ones. We will look for ... The quarry is active, and they warned me that they were not allowed to go there. Well, if you ask, they definitely won't let you in. Let's break through ... The quarry met me with an announcement with a date that explosive work would be of such a number. The date was yesterday. I'm glad it's not today's. A naive person ... Looking ahead, I will say that when I drove from there back, it was already today's date. But I might not know about it.

Until then, I've moved on. And then - a guard fungus with the inscription “Post No. 1. Road up." But no one is at the post. I passed it and parked at the edge of the road. From this edge to the quarry is very close. And this short way and penetrated the quarry. He began to methodically bypass the tiers, trying to find such dendrites of copper. The walls of the quarry are very boring - the eye has nothing to stop at.

And suddenly something green flashed under their feet between the stones, very different from the boring background. Copper covered with malachite! The mood immediately improved. I wanted to continue. And I continued, gradually descending to lower and lower tiers. At last I descended to a platform where holes had been drilled for laying explosives. It made me tense - obviously preparing for blasting. True, the wires to them have not yet been stretched, but what if radio fuses are laid down? Yes, and the technique from this side of the career is allotted ... It became very uncomfortable. And then the siren sounded, which is turned on before the explosion. I ran into the forest. But the siren stopped after half a minute (before the explosion, it should buzz for 10 minutes). Maybe they check the serviceability before blasting? It became quite uncomfortable. And then a car drove up to the place of the drilled holes. I returned, approached him and went for broke: “Guys, where do you have copper here?”. “We don’t know, you have to ask the locals. And we are explosives - we arrive, blow up and leave. "Are you going to blow up today?" "Yes, at 17 o'clock." “Well, then I’ll walk here for a couple of hours.” The bombers were the only ones who did not care that someone was walking in the explosion zone. They are not local - they are not responsible for the perimeter. Here, nearby, a mining dump truck began to unload oversized cargo. I approached him with the question “Where is your copper here?”, But the driver got ahead of me with his question:

- Is this your Duster (I have such a car) in the clearing? Leave - now they will blow up.

I realized that I was "under Muller's hood", and it really was time to leave. Before I had time to move ten meters away, a security car caught up with me:

- Is this your Duster? Leave - now they will blow up.

“Of course, of course,” I said, and continued on my way to the exit—to the place where I had entered. And there is already another guard standing:

- Is this your Duster? Leave - now they will blow up.

- I'm leaving, I'm leaving.

And then I hear how the guard’s walkie-talkie is heard: “Come on, let’s get him here!” Well, they don't tell me, I keep moving towards the exit, hoping to sneak away. Further, already addressed to me, the guard's phrase sounds like this: "And you, Stirlitz, I will ask you to stay!" I had to get into his car, which took me to the authorities, where I had an educational conversation in a friendly manner. It turns out that I set the car very “successfully”: when they blow up in this part of the quarry, the stones fall exactly on this edge .... By the way, the authorities were very surprised that I found something: “After us, no one ever found anything!” Then the authorities took me in their car to my Duster, where we parted almost as friends.

“Dear Ekaterina Matveevna, ... I have met people, lately, sincere, one might say, delicate.” (FROM).

And I continued my way to the north - to Lovozery. Somewhere in the area of the Polar Dawns or earlier it suddenly got colder. The temperature dropped to seven degrees. And it's even colder in the mountains. It started to rain. No, I have all the warm clothes with me, but I want comfort .... Okay, let's go and see. Then it got warmer again.

Day three - dreams come true

In the morning I drove up to the tailing dump of the Karnasurt mine and began to drive into the mountains. Last time I drove along the so-called "lower" road, which runs along the pipe and has a steep slope. In principle, nothing terrible, but why? This time I nevertheless figured out where the “upper”, more gentle road passes, and drove along it. Do not confuse the "upper" road with the "upper" road from the mine, or the path between the "upper" and the "uppermost" road. As a result, like a year ago, I moved the first and second Eastern streams. But my path lay further - to Mount Flora.

My first samples from my own collection were from there, so Flora has for me, as they say now, a sacred meaning. This is my fourth attempt to get there. The first was a few years ago, when I, still not really knowing the area, planned to go directly to it from the 60th pegmatite, going down not to the road, but immediately towards Flora. Without a navigator and a clear understanding of where this Flora is located. I then, having passed through pegmatite to the eastern slope of the mountain, looked down and into the misty distance and realized that this was a gamble, and did not go. And thank God!

The second time I managed to visit Flora with a friend who brought me there in his SUV. I have been there, but not by myself. This is unaccounted for.

The third time I wanted to get to Flora was last year, having already reached the pegmatites in my SUV. But I got wet, and the rocky road from the foot of the pegmatites to Flora frightened me - then I had no experience of driving on boulders.

And here is the fourth time. I move out in my SUV from the second East Creek towards Flora. My mark on the navigator is slowly moving along the road. In forty minutes I drive eight kilometers, successfully overcoming all the buldygans.

And I camp at the Birch Creek, where we camped the time before last. Well, I’ll walk a few kilometers to Flora somehow. We can say - the goal is achieved! I tie a spoon and a mug on a string to make it look like a bell - to scare away bears. The thought arises, what if, having heard this sound, the bear decides that this is the bell of a lost cow?.. On the road, stones turned out by the bear come across - under them he was looking for ants. But he turned them out not only that - the edges had already dried up.

Five partridges take off from a large stone three meters from me - I have time to examine them. After some time I reach the turn to the narsarsukite point, which is hidden in the forest. Strange, I can't find it. I take out the navigator, I look at its mark. It turns out that the point is much further. Wow, I was on it two years ago, but without a navigator I would not have found it now. And here it is - the Narsarsukite point. I start picking up rocks. Those that are better are just enough for me to barely lift my backpack.

I drag it up to the road, leave it there and move on, looking for the second narsarsukite point, which, according to my data, is located to the east. As a result, in a given area, I find a place where they obviously dug. And there are yellow inclusions. But somehow it doesn't look like what I saw before. Not sure if it's narsarsukite. Either way, it doesn't look interesting. I keep searching. I find another dig with secretions of minerals that I do not understand - it will be necessary to determine. I take samples with me. I return to the backpack and pull it out to the camp. On the way, on the frozen mud, there is a clear trace of a bear. The thought flashes - how big he is! - with a big plate. But I’m tired under the backpack, step on the track automatically, grease it and can’t see it anymore. In the parking lot I find a sample left by someone with incomprehensible crystals. It will also need to be determined.

Day four is hard.

I wake up early - at four in the morning. I collect the camp and advance to the foot of the pegmatites at the second Eastern stream. The way back along the stones passes easily and imperceptibly. I even scream in surprise when I suddenly quickly reach the stream. There will be my parking lot.

Back in Moscow, I had the idea to drive up by car along the first Eastern Creek to the “topmost” road and further along it to the 60th pegmatite, where to camp. From there it is much easier to climb up to the 62nd pegmatite than from the road at the foot of its mountain, where I camped. But I’ll have to go to the 62nd pegmatite more than once ... I’m going to explore. I go up the virgin lands from the camp to the intersection of the first Eastern stream and the "topmost" road.

Then along it I reach the 60th pegmatite. Well, to say ... You can call. But in terms of the load on the car, this is how to go to Flora again. There is no way to get to Flora behind a stone without a car, but here you can do without. The question is: what do I feel sorry for more, myself or the car? I decide that I feel more sorry for the car, and I will go to the 62nd pegmatite from the foot of the mountain.

In the meantime, I'm on the 60th (ussingite) pegmatite. Nobody left anything interesting on the surface this year. I'm starting to shovel the dumps. Ussingitis comes across. I take more samples. There are a few relatively large pieces. Even one small ball can be carved. I find one sample of a very rare Gerasimovskite. In fibrous aegirine I find large eudialyte crystals (up to 41 mm) filled with cirphesite. Zirfesite is a powder product of its alteration. At the same time, the shape of the crystal was preserved. And its shape is unusual: columnar, not tabular.

Got a couple of crystals do not understand what. There are suggestions: chkalovite or komarovite, or sodalite after nepheline, or ussingite after it, or ussingite with spar. In general, chemical analysis is needed.

As expected, production at 60 pegmatite is low. I climb the 62nd pegmatite with her. It is transformed from year to year through the efforts of diggers. I am also making my own contribution. My strength is enough for several walkers with a backpack up and down. Natrolite, white and black hackmanite luminous in UV.

I managed to get one transparent crystal of natrolite. Not a massive natrolite, but a crystal.

The weather is amazing all the time. Sun, blue sky, not hot. This is not often here. But tomorrow is predicted to rain. But what if on a wet stone a laden car does not master a steep climb? Last year I had problems with no rain. I decide to break camp today and try to ride on dry stone. Oddly enough, climbing up was fairly easy. Maybe I've learned something from cross-country driving?

Much has been accomplished in a day. But pretty tired. But not in vain. Already at home, joy awaited: for the first time I came across hackmanite with the effect of tenebrescence - with color restoration after UV irradiation and subsequent fading in the sun.

I reach the Northern Quarry, where I camp for the night.

Day five - North African

“North” - because the Northern quarry, “Afrikandsky” - because that is the name of the settlement.

I go to the North Quarry. Industrial work has not been carried out on it for a long time, but I do not recognize it. Its landscape has changed so much that it is impossible to recognize in a year. The Murmanite mine, which was thirty centimeters deep two years ago, last year a meter, this year it has become two meters. And the width increased accordingly. Expanding, it buried the point where I mined hackmanite crystals of a rare prismatic habit. It's a pity... And what about eudialyte pegmatite in the side of the quarry?.. It simply doesn't exist. It feels like it was blown up. But this is unlikely. More like perforators. What were they looking for in it? He was pretty boring. But in the remaining fragments I find idiomorphic crystals of eudialyte. Idiomorphic crystals are crystals of constrained growth. Eudialyte crystals are quite rare.

Next, I collect murmanite. I thought that this year large samples could not be obtained. But after splitting a certain number of stones, I got not only small, but also large samples.

Well, glowing in the UV red-green hackmanite in association. I didn’t understand the career, I just threw a canister of stones. At home I will shine UV and choose the right material, if there is such a thing this year. And he turned out:

By the way, when splitting a couple of pieces, I saw the effect of hackmanite fading: a bright crimson hackmaknite was found on the chip, which, under the action of sunlight, faded to gray in two seconds. At home I tried to restore the color by irradiation. Unlike hackmanite from pegmatite 62, these samples failed to restore the color.

I also pricked loparite crystals in the rock. This year, the crystals were born larger than last year - up to four millimeters.

After the Northern Quarry, I decided to visit the ruins of the neighboring Umb-Ozersky mine again. I stopped by. Again, I did not understand anything among the heaps of overburden rocks.

On this, my Lovozero program is completed. I start moving south. The nearest point that I want to visit along the way is a quarry of titanium-magnetite ores in the village of Afrikanda. It is about to be launched again, and it may very well be that this year is the last one when it can be visited in order to extract collectible minerals. I was there last year, and last time I managed to get some very good knopit crystals. I will not describe the African quarry in detail here. For those who are interested, check out my report from last year.

Turning off the road, I soon find myself in the center of the forest, where the quarry is located. Indeed, it is clear that it is being prepared for launch. A direct road was cut through the forest and hills to it from Afrikanda. Asphalt has not yet been laid. In the quarry itself there are landmarks - where to lay the road there. There are also landmarks around the quarry - probably there will be a fence. And almost all dumps fall inside the fence ...

I go to the place where I mined knopit (a kind of perovskite) last time. I inspect the sides and scree. There is nothing interesting on board. There is something in the scree. Knopite, due to the increased content of titanium, has a gray tint. I collect on this basis a certain number of small gray crystals. But color is not enough. I check with a magnet. Those that are magnetized, I throw away - this is magnetite. The rest - knopit. I collect pieces of titanium-magnetite ore, selecting with a magnet those pieces that are not magnetized or are weakly magnetized. This time I have no plans to stay here for a long time.

Day six - fish

The path leads me to the Tersky coast of the White Sea. Never been there - interesting to see. And spinning in the trunk is not just. The Tersky coast is famous for glendonites, which are mined near the Olenitsa River. But over the past year, I have been offered glendonite three times from other points. I know one of them. Unfortunately, not the point itself, but only the village - a landmark. But right there I have other things to do. The Tersky coast is the coast of the Kandalaksha Bay of the White Sea. Is the White Sea already the Arctic Ocean or just the sea? I like to think that I have been to the ocean. Right in front of the hood, a fox crosses the road and stops, looking somewhere in the distance, not paying attention to me. I arrive at the right place on the shore at high tide.

On the shore of a heap of algae. It smells very strongly of the sea. In the water, to my surprise, jellyfish. With red tentacles. It’s not cold for them there ... I wander along the coast, peering into the pebbles. Maybe you will come across a lilac amethyst brought from the nearby Cape Ship? I go, I go and I find! Only not lilac, but green. Not amethyst, but amazonite. Very surprised. Amazonite points located on the Kola are very far away. Then they confirmed to me that amazonite is indeed regularly found there - obviously dragged by a glacier. But the amazonite I found is very different in its structure from the amazonite of the city of Ploskaya or the city of Parusnaya. It seems to me that somewhere on the Kola there is another, yet unknown, manifestation of amazonite.

I'm looking at the tide chart. It is morning now, and the lowest water will be at 18 o'clock. Until 18, I am completely free. Passing by I saw a river, which was a lot of cars. I guess why... I'm going there. My assumptions are confirmed: on the river, people are actively waving their spinning rods. I take mine and go down to the river. The spectacle is impressive: fishermen, one by one, pull large fish out of the water - pink salmon, going to spawn. The males have already formed humps and twisted noses. But the fish is not yet red, which suggests that it has not yet reached the very moment of spawning, after which it will die and become carcinogenic.

I look closely at the gear of fishermen - very large tees. I don't have any. Well, I will catch what is rich. Although I am somewhat surprised: I thought that the fish going to spawn do not bite - they are not interested in food. Soon I notice that the fish is pulled out in a strange way: its tees are hooked either by the gills or by the fins. This means that the fish really does not bite, but they pull it out with a hook, taking advantage of the fact that it stands tightly in the water. Men from St. Petersburg are fishing on my bank, and locals are fishing on the opposite bank. Well, like the locals… They live on the Kola near Norway. And although both banks carry tackle in the same place across the entire river, the locals catch it three times more often - a well-chosen weight and size of hooks and sinkers keeps the tackle at a certain depth - where the fish stands. Locals pull out a fish about every four casts. Sometimes there is a hook for stones, sometimes it catches already dead fish from the bottom. I understand that with my small tees it will not be possible to catch any fish and I stop casting. But the Petersburgers leave and leave me a large tee-anchor. I adjust it and start throwing. On the fifth time the rod bends! Rock hold?

To my questions whether such fishing is legal, the locals answer evasively:

this is pink salmon, not rare salmon,
a license is required on Umba, but not here,
If it were illegal, there would already be fish supervision.
And finally, to my question “Is it illegal to catch fish during spawning?” reluctantly agree to this.

Therefore, I inform everyone that in the photo where I am with the fish, they gave it to me. Trust me!

Well, I have one fish - I can’t eat more. Why do I need more? I go to the forest to cook it. A plate of caviar falls out of it. I wash, scald, as they said, with boiling water, add salt. Delicious! Probably just such caviar is called "five-minute". I eat two-thirds right away, and leave a third for dinner. I fry the fish itself, but it turns out rather boiled. It also tastes good with onions.

I eat it all at once! This is lunch. Ate a few. Didn't have dinner after that. Digging glendonites also got sick. I went to wash the dishes. He bent over the water and saw that the whole bottom of the river was littered with the corpses of spawning fish.

It's 16:00. Nearly full tide. He walked along the exposed shore, sluggishly dug the clay with a shovel. The soil is heavy, the exact coordinate of the point is unknown. Well, him! I'm better off doing my other business. I decided and went back, very pleased with how I spent my time. Also lucky with the sun.

The seventh day is a white sea-emergency day.

And here I am at the turn on Ambarnaya. Near Ambarny there is a depleted deposit of belomorite. Thirty-four kilometers on a grader, then eighteen kilometers on a forest road. The road is so-so. Half normal, half with the remains of a gati (logs sticking out across) and boulders. But in general, the road is much easier than to Flora. I try to avoid boulders. But I was lucky - the summer was dry. There are only three puddles on the road. And, they say, in a wet summer the road is a continuous channel. And although the soil there is good - not viscous clay - the problem is that the puddles hide boulders, and you can drive into them well ... You can only drive there without puddles on an SUV. In due time I get to the abandoned quarries near the lake "Long Lambina". The quarries are flooded, it is necessary to search on the dumps.

I walked through the dumps - not a single blue eye of the White Sea. “I felt a little sad, without melancholy, without sadness” (C). So you need to look better. Oops! A small viper scuttled away over the broken stones. I'm going to put on my boots... I started looking better. Finally, based on the small fragments found with a blue game, I determined the place where to dig. I began to dig and was not mistaken. Belomorit with a blue game ranging in size from a fingernail to half a fist came across with enviable regularity.

And even got to the bottom of the cavity. Of course, this is not a zanor, but just a cavity among oversized. But it's still nice to see something that no one has seen before you. There is also a practical plus: it is easier to pour waste there than to throw it out of the mine. By evening, I began to think about future plans. The plans were as follows: to go fishing in the evening on the Long Lambina. According to the reviews of different people, perch (or pike) were caught there well (or badly), and the next day go to the white seam vein on the neighboring Dense lambina. By six in the evening I got to the bottom of a large stone. He took it out, cut it off from different sides. It shimmered blue all around. This will definitely make good balls. With a feeling of deep satisfaction, I took it out of the mine. And then there was thunder and a thunderstorm began. The good weather that accompanied me the whole trip (the first trip to Lovozero without rain!) ended. Nature, having given me this large specimen, seemed to have lowered a curtain. I understood this in such a way that she gives me a sign "it's time to finish."

It got boring and damp. I don't like working in the rain. Went from nothing to do to a career on the other side of the road. It's half way to Dense Lambina. Looked further way to her. It is overgrown with shrubs above the hood, but you can drive through. That's half the distance I've already covered. And the same amount of walking through the swamp. Those. you can get there without a car. But he didn't go. The mood went away, and I began to get ready to go home.

I left the forest, then drove back along the grader. Almost the entire grader drove back along the oncoming lane, because there are almost no cars there, and there are fewer potholes on the oncoming lane. And the devil pulled me fifty meters before the track to change lanes and stand on the right side of the movement. And I immediately caught the hole. Then I drove to the crossroads with the highway. And then something terrible happened. The car did not exit the turn. Partially did not come out. Rather, the car came out, but the gearbox did not. She got stuck. I only have 3rd gear left. In any position of the handle. Even in neutral. Reverse speed did not turn on. And here I am at the third speed, and this is no more than sixty kilometers per hour, I went home from northern Karelia. 1600 km. at 60km/h. It can’t be faster - the gearbox starts to “yell”, and if my only speed fails, it won’t seem enough to me: there are no settlements for three hundred miles, and where they are, there is no car service, and where there is a car service, the manual transmission still won’t be repaired. Soon the second trouble overtook me. I refuel on the track in proven places. Since I had a detour to Ambarny, I made an additional gas station at the last gas station I checked before this detour. But she wasn't enough. I look at the devices, and I understand that I do not have enough to a proven gas station. And whether there will be any other gas stations before, I don't know. The red light is already on. Finally, a blue sign appeared: the nearest settlement is Kem, 45 km away. Not so bad - the district center after all, there should be a gas station there. We'll have to leave the highway to Kem and visit the Kem parish. And so, “on parole and on one wing,” with the emergency gang on, I was driving along the highway. We didn’t have to drive to Kemi: there was a gas station on the highway at the turn to it, and one problem was eliminated. But the problem of 1600 km at 60 km / h remained. Staying overnight is also a problem. Reverse speed does not work - you can’t drive into the forest, then you won’t be able to turn around. On the rise, it is better not to stop. And in general, it’s better to stop where there are people: what if tomorrow the last speed falls off ... I never thought that you can sleep soundly in a tent right behind the ditch near the parking lot, where trucks park all night.

Day eight and nine - return

But in general, I got it. At 19:00 I ran into this problem, and the next day at 14:00 I was already at home. But saved on fines from video cameras.

Apart from the last chord, the trip turned out to be very successful. The itinerary and the program are fully completed. We were lucky with the weather. What I wanted, I got. And the car has already been cured, although the money came, of course.

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