I have always been fascinated with rocks. I remember keeping a "rock collection" in my earlier years, and it was in a large tin bucket where I kept some fascinating rocks, fossils, flint, and pieces of arrowheads. My first science fair project was also on the subject of rocks and minerals. I knew that I would be spending a lot of time at the Gem Rock Museum in the village of Creetown in Galloway, Scotland. There is a little bit of everything here from fossils to gemstones to meteorites to man-made stones to stones carved into artwork.
The collection was started by Bill "Maverick" Wilson and includes many rare British stones as well as minerals and gemstones found all over the world. Highlights include a 4.5 billion year old 3 kilogram meteorite, gold nugget, fossilized dinosaur egg and dinosaur dung, and cut replicas of famous diamonds to the correct size and displayed next to each other. Another attraction here is the crystal cave where visitors can walk around and see lit-up crystals and flourescent light shining on other rocks that then glow a range of bright colours in the dark. There is also a gift shop and a cafe.
Near the entrance to the museum, there is also a bear skeleton in the museum. The bear was discovered in a cave, and it is thousands of years old. It is now extinct in Europe, but the closest relative is the brown bear. It is 30% larger than the brown bear.
Each display cabinet in the museum contained information about the rock or mineral, and this included its uses or properties as well as location discovered.
One of my favourites was the faceted flourite, the blue green stones. This mineral is used as a gemstone, and there are many different types of it, such as Blue John stone. The mineral has many uses. It is used in steel making, glass making, cosmetics, and it has helped to mass-produce aluminum. It is used for the human body to make teeth and bones stronger and used for some cancer treatments. The mineral was also used to treat the water in the Great Lakes as it was found to remove lampreys and not affect the game fish. Other uses are for lenses of binoculars to remove glare and in high octane fuels. The mineral is too soft to be used as jewellery.
Different types of marble, including a piece of stone used in Salisbury Cathedral, were on display and cut to form beads.
Soapstone is a soft stone that is used to create carvings. It is very easy to carve. There were many carved items of other stones. There were many items carved from jade, which is a popular stone to use in carvings in Asia.
Some of the items are dedicated to the memory of Bill "Maverick" Wilson, who lived until 2003.
There is a rare garnet discovered in Nigeria, and it is called the "Scottish Garnet".
There is also a gold nugget found in California.
There is a fairly large collection of interesting fossils that are rare.
Shells are often used as a mineral. Some of them are used ground up into pigments, and others are used in trinket boxes. The above shells have been carved.
Malachite is a bright green stone that was used in ancient times by the Egyptians. It's also been used to decorate whole rooms in Russia and trinkets. The blue stone is lapis lazuli, and it was used for ancient jewellery and as blue pigment for paints. It is associated for royalty only. The chess piece created from malachite is beautiful.
There were some examples of agate carved into beautiful pieces.
There was even a display for petrified wood.
Before going to the cave, there is a small room called the "professor's room" that you can sit down and relax in. There's also a workshop for the stones, but no one was working any stones during the visit. The cave is a small area designed to look like a cave with some stones placed over lights to show them off.
Overall, this was a great museum. There's so much to see, and I could see families enjoying their visit and learning about all of the different types of stone and the fossils.
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