At the Mine Head

In previous posts I have described Topaz Rough found in Takeo Province, faceted stone sellers at the base of the mountain where the stones are found, the climb up the mountain, and the view from the top. We also met an old miner who lives on the mountain, after meeting him we followed three miners to their work site, the mine shaft they have dug.

Well these mine 'shafts' are not that large. Once a promising location is found, a place thought likely to produce sellable stones, a group of men is organized and digging begins.

We went to one such location with three miners to see how the work went. It is very low tech, but that is a good thing. These rice farmers have a source of income that they otherwise would not. They are extracting at a pace that they can sustain.

Though no one knows when or if the mountain will play out (but good digs are more and more difficult to find and at greater and greater distances), but in the absence of major commercial interventions (which destroyed the Pailin ruby and sapphire mine sites, and made major in-roads among the zircon sites in Ratanakiri), these people are set to make money in small increments for many more years.

As they have for about ten years now.

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Home on the Mountain

Most topaz miners 'commute' to and from their villages below. But a few live on the moutain-top, where small fruit orchards and vegetable gardens have been planted.

Our guide took us to the house of one man, who claimed to be more than seventy-years old. There we visited with him, took a look at his tools and the stones that he had recovered but rejected, unsellable quartz and topaz. Some of the discarded stones looked like rose quartz, another co-occuring mineral to aquamarine!

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