Working in the mines

My fossil club, the Fossil Club of Lee County,

 was granted a rare visit to the Mosaic phosphate mine to hunt for fossils 

and since the "snowbird" members of the club had not yet migrated back to the Sunshine State, there were plenty of spots available to go on the field trip.

  What a relief to not have to FREAK OUT 

(as I normally do)

 about whether or not I'd get to go.  Instead, since my participation was guaranteed,  

I could relax and FREAK OUT 

about whether or not I'd find anything.

(fossil antler, Mosaic mine)

Whenever I tell non-fossil friends that I'm going to a phosphate mine,

 they grow concerned, imagining Chileans trapped thousands of feet under ground.

Not that I want to travel to the bowels of the earth in a cage elevator,  but I lose all "street cred" when I explain that I'll just be wandering around in the fresh air and sunshine, 

scanning the ground for shark teeth.

(dolphin vertebra, Mosaic mine)

The difference between an early October trip to the mine and a December/January trip (when I've gone in the past) is...

 #1. the fresh air I previously mentioned is being super heated by that previously mentioned sunshine,  and...

 #2. we're still in the rainy season.

Heavy rains the night before meant that more fossils might have washed out of the spoil piles,  but the dirt road to the hunting area was very muddy; muddy in a way that had me wishing I had 4 wheel drive.  One of the other club members snapped this photo of my little truck in action...

Much better than the picture I posted a couple years ago of my old Ranger stuck on a muddy path in Arcadia.

We usually have to wear hard hats at Mosaic

but this visit was to an area that was no longer being worked so we were allowed to wear our own headgear.  I don't know why, but the night before the field trip, I dug an old, beloved sun hat out of the back of my closet and decided I would wear it while hunting fossils the next day.  

Wine may have been involved in that decision.  

I bought this hat at Eddie Bauer on The Plaza in Kansas City, Missouri.

In 1994.

The hat looked a lot better (as did I) when I wore it to North Carolina in 1995.

Fast forward to last Saturday, 2015:

Not so good.

The hat has obviously lost its will to live so I think I will toss it on the funeral pyre,

 if it ever cools down enough to light my chimenea.

The fossil hunting was fairly good.

Lots of broken megs but a couple are good enough to be keepers, and I found a nice mako, too.

A great variety of fossilized material always make the hunting more interesting.  Pam found a big chunk of fossilized wood and I found some nice pink chert.

A handful of pre-equus teeth rounded out the day (and a stingray dermal denticle on the far left).

We got rained out 90 minutes before our time was up

but I'm so out of condition for Florida fossil hunting that I was shocked to hear we still had 90 minutes to go!  

Maybe they'll let us all pop back in to reclaim our lost 90 minutes?

One can dream...