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BA
BA Si (translated means 884. It was opened in april 1984 hence
88-4) is a Tin Mine located south of Changsha Hunan province in
China. It was quite an experience. Having dropped my 14 year old
daughter at the airport, she was flying home unaccompanied via
Guangdong airport then to Melbourne, Zhouping , Mr. Zheng Jiang
Rong and myself went by train 3 hours south of Changsha , from
there we took a taxi 2 hours into the mountains, we stopped when
the road was no longer passable by normal vehicles. After about
two hours including lunch we managed to hire another driver and
a 4 wheel drive. This was a part of China where no westerners
had been before. My appearance created a lot of curiosity with
the local people. The country side was very rural, passing through
small unkept villages. After 2 hours of hellish roads with massive
rutts and potholes we managed to get to a small town. There seemed
to be a reluctance of the locals to tell us the exact location
of the mine. Mineral dealers have never been here before. This
area in considered undeveloped and hence is not open to foreigners.
In theory I could have been arrested being in the area, but as
there were no police for hundreds of miles, it was not considered
to be a problem. Our vehicle seemed not to handle the road to
well, the constant jarring and jolting distorted the frame, making
it difficult to open the doors. Whenever traveling off the beaten
track in third world countries, the more remote you go the more
people are required as guides and interpreters. By now our party
of three had become seven an we were all crammed into an old 4
wheel drive. We finally made it to the house of the miners who
had the Calcite twins. They were still underground in the mine
but we managed to get the daughter to show us some of their crystals
. They had hundreds of calcite twins
to
be continued
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