Day 39 – Crater of Diamonds State Park

Miles traveled: 10
Hours on Road: .25
States covered: 1 – Arkansas

I’d like to say I called Jeff and told him to quit his job and join us for the rest of our vacation. I’d like to say the vacation is going to be extended to….whenever we feel like coming back. In other words, I’d like to say we found a giant diamond that would allow us to take it easy for the rest of our lives. I’d even be content to say we found a little something that would make a nice keepsake. All I actually have to say is, we’re exhausted! We got to Crater of Diamonds around 9:30 this morning, with Mom determined to stay until closing time (5:00 p.m.), and we wound up leaving at 3:30, empty handed.

Searching for diamonds around here is done either with dry sifting or wet sifting. With dry sifting, you sit out in the middle of the field filling your tray with the clay you’re surrounded by, and sift it through a screen that has very small holes. With wet sifting, you fill a tray that has a screen with pretty large holes with the clay and place a tray with a screen with smaller holes beneath it, and you immerse both trays in water. The mud that is created runs through both screens while the large rocks stay in the top screen and the smaller rocks are caught by the lower screen. Then you dump the loads of rocks on a table and search through them. Either way you do it, it’s tedious work. We did it for six and half hours. Or I should say, I did it for six and half hours. Parker worked maybe a total of five of those hours, and Cal and Trey put so much effort into NOT doing the work, I think they worked harder than Parker and I did. They truly couldn’t have been less helpful. In their defense, the temperature ranged between 95 and 100 degrees, which is why we wound up doing only the wet sifting. The tubs of water were located underneath roofs, and that was enough protection from the sun to make a very big difference in one’s personal heat index.

We collected a few crystals and a piece of glass and some interesting-looking rocks, but we found nothing of value. We’re exhausted, and we have nothing to show for it, except a big cut on Parker’s toe that resulted from his dropping the big shovel on his foot, which he managed to do within five minutes of our arrival.

After giving up on finding that retirement diamond, we went to the only store we could find to get some snacks and soft drinks. We’d had only breakfast, so we were famished. I asked a clerk where I could buy some beer or liquor of any kind. She said I’d have to drive to Texarkana or Hot Springs for that, both of which were, at minimum, 40 miles away. That could mean only one thing: I’d planted myself squarely in a dry county…again. Just like at Mammoth Cave, where all I wanted was something to wind down with and take the edge off. What the hell is wrong with these people? Don’t they want a little something at the end of a long hot day, which appears to be the only kind of day you can have around here? Parker couldn’t even believe it: “The most redneck town in the most redneck state in the country and they don’t have beer?” I told him that may be precisely why they don’t have it.

So we went to Sonic again, ate dinner, and laid in bed watching TV; our new favorite show is “Pawn Stars.” Parker is walking around like Fred Sanford. I’m waiting for him to call out to “Elizabeth.” My feet are killing me; cramps keep racing through the bones at the tops of my feet. I was standing at that tub for six hours! The Littles are too tired to go swimming, which makes me happy because I’m too tired to walk to the pool.

Sleep will come easily tonight.

For corresponding photos, go to:
http://www5.snapfish.com/snapfish/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=1995391027/a=2740108027_2740108027/otsc=SHR/otsi=SALBlink/COBRAND_NAME=snapfish/