Ametista

We had a long holiday weekend right after Halloween, so we decided it would be a good weekend for a road trip.  The world capital of amethyst mining is about a 3-hour drive from our house, so we thought that would make a good day trip.  We invited the Shaads to go with us, so in our two matching silver Zafiras we headed out for an adventure, and we found one.

 We decided to leave at 7am.  This is no problem for us since the boys are always up early.  Normally, on such an early departure, we would stop at McDonald's for some Egg McMuffins.  Well, McDonald's is a 7-hour drive from our house, so we kicked off the trip with pastels, a treat you can get any time of day here, from the nearest gas station.  A pastel is a fried pastry with some ground beef, onions, salt, and parsley inside.  Tasty...but no McMuffin.

Just the drive there turned out to be quite an adventure.  The town we were looking for was Ametista do Sul and it does not show up on any maps or in our GPS system.  I did get directions to the town from Google Maps, but the last set of directions just said turn left and drive 15km.  We did great up until the last 30km, then we had to ask 8 different people for directions and ended up driving on 15km of dirt road.  You would think that the Amethyst Capital of the World would have a better setup.  We did find a better way home that only included 9km of dirt road.  Anyways, thanks to some very friendly gas station attendants, restaurant workers and random farmers we found our way to Ametista do Sul.

 We had to ask another person to find the museum, which was our first stop on the visit.  Here the boys are in a cave/mine under the museum.  The amethysts are formed in huge geodes that they find by drilling small holes into the walls.  The boys are posing by one of the geodes that they left in the wall.

Here is Owen and Fin next to another geode of Amethysts.

 All the boys in their spelunking gear.  From left to right they are Cooper, Ethan, Isaac, Fin, Malaki and Owen.  They had a blast together.  With six boys and rocks everywhere, how could they not have fun?

 This is the inside of one of the geodes.  God creates some amazing things.

 One of the highlights of our visit was a stop at this church.  Its walls are covered in Amethysts.  It was so beautiful. 

Here is the whole crew in front of the altar.  They used Amethysts for everything possible.  Notice the candle holders.  There are huge amethysts on the chairs in the back.

 There were several areas like this.  Ethan gladly posed for me.  The bottom is a glass box full of stones.  The flower is made out of different colored stones.

 Isaac with the baptismal font.  That would be a cool place to be baptized.

 Our last stop was a winery.  They store their wine in the caves because it is the perfect temperature and humidity for the wine.  Here are Gwen and I posing in front of the Merlot. 

 After our tour of the wine cave the adults got to sample the wines.  We had a ton of fun sampling wine with Jason and Gwen.  I actually liked the wine and picked 6 bottles to bring home.  They also made some grape juice that was phenominal, and we bought a whole case for the boys.

 Here are the boys goofing around while we tasted wine.  They are buddies.  So cute!

This is a view from the winery.  It was a gorgeous place.