‘We found our people.’ WA’s rock hounds comb mountains and beaches for stony treasures
There’s treasure in Washington’s mountains, beaches and creeks. It comes in the form of crystals and agates, fossils and petrified wood. The state is rock hounding paradise, say those who pursue the hobby.
You’ve just got to know where to look.
A mid-August weekend outing by the 500-plus member Puyallup Valley Gem and Mineral Club and the Washington State Mineral Council revealed veins, rock hills and hidden digging pits in the mountains above Greenwater.
Experienced and amateur rock hounds gathered at the Mount Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest ranger station in Enumclaw early on the morning of Aug. 17, where club president Tony Johnson and others had spread rocks of varying types on folding tables. Petrified wood, geodes, opal and jasper shone in a variety of colors.
From their exteriors, the gray and brown rocks are as dull as a russet potato. But sliced or cracked open, they glow with colors and patterns.
“I’ll take somebody up here (to a rock site) and they don’t see it,” Johnson said of potentially spectacular specimens. “They walk right past it.”
Caravan
Trucks, SUVs, vans and even a few brave sedan drivers followed club leaders from the ranger station, up state Route 410 and onto Forest Service road 70, just past Greenwater. Participants drove from Seattle, Long Beach and Walla Walla for the adventure.
The group’s first stop was at a scree-filled slope. Here, the goal was to find moss agate. The veterans in the group immediately began pounding rocks with rock hammers and spraying the stones from water bottles. The water acts as a temporary polish, allowing colors and patterns within the rocks to briefly emerge.
Herds of passing Jeeps and motorbikes kicked up clouds of dust and temporarily drowned out the sound of hammering.
Hounding together
The Internet is full of information on rock hounding in Washington. But finding the exact location of sites can be confusing. That’s what prompted Milton couple Tasha Parker and Nate White to join the club.
“That’s why we joined, just to kind of get people to show us exactly where to go and where to dig,” Parker said near a seam of green and white agate. “We just found our people and love it.”
Parker and White are both lifelong hikers and enjoy wilderness.
“It kind of combines being outdoors, hiking around in the woods, and then the treasure hunting,” she said.
Lapidary
Some rock hounds like to leave the specimens they find in their natural state. Others are more ambitious.
Delicate minerals, like the examples found sparkling in museums, often require little modification for their beauty to shine. But many of the rocks found in the Cascades need cutting and polishing to reach their full glory.
Lapidary is the term used to describe the transformation of rocks into display items, jewelry and art.
The Puyallup club has a variety of machines used for lapidary work. Rock hounds know the joy of cutting open an ugly, unremarkable geode to find a sparkling center of crystals. Children are wide-eyed when the dull stones they put into tumblers come out in crayon-like colors and patterns.
Duds and diamonds
Not all finds are precious stones. Johnson tries to dissuade some rock hounds from slicing open stones he knows are duds.
“You don’t really want to waste time cutting this up because, yeah, it’s garbage stuff,” Johnson said. “But, everybody thinks they got a prize.”
Johnson says a snowmelt is a good time to find rocks in the mountains.
“They just pop out,” he said.
Some stones, particularly red and orange carnelian agates, can be found in creeks and on Washington’s beaches. One proliferate agate hunter, Chris Sims, who goes by the handle “Carnelian Chris,” has 180,000 follows on TikTok.
Parker and White use their finds to make cabochons — polished stones with a flat back and rounded front that are made into necklaces and other jewelry.
“There are so many different creative people that do different things (in the club),” Parker said. “Inlay, sculptures, wind chimes ... they wrap things in leather ... walking sticks.”
Family affair
Deep in a fir forest, the rock hounds spread out. As Ryan and Megan Armstrong of Tacoma looked for spots to dig, son Vorian, 6, was already pounding away with his rock hammer.
“Is this a rock down here,” he asked as he dug in a small hole. “Yeah!” he answered as he pulled up what, for him at least, was a major find.
Ryan Armstrong said he was a rock collector as a boy. The family has been taking rock vacations around the west since getting hooked on the hobby in 2023 when they went looking for geodes near a fire lookout in eastern Washington.
“We found a couple pieces, and then it’s all been downhill since then,” he said.
Ethics
Some rocks can be found next to Forest Service roads, or in some cases, in the road. Other sites require a hike.
After showing participants where a seam of agate ran down a hillside, across a road and into a rock slide, White led them to a gated road. The group, carrying buckets, shovels and rock hammers, descended into a mother lode of petrified wood and common opal.
White reminded the enthusiasts to not undercut tree roots while they dug and fill in holes when they were done.
“Some of the best stuff I’ve ever found has been in people’s tailings,” he said, referring to the dug out and picked over remains of a mining or digging operation.
Club members aren’t mining operations. They carry buckets and bring home only what they can work with, White said. The Forest Service allows small scale rock hounding on the land it administers. Rock hounding on private property requires the owner’s permission.
First time rock hounds
Amiera Abdel-Fattah traveled from North Seattle for the venture. After an hour, she had a filled the bottom of a bucket with her finds.
“I’m amazed at how much material is just around,” Abdel-Fattah said. “I kind of thought it’d be harder to find, but it’s abundant.”
Her mother, Jasmine Campbell, came along to support her 25-year-old daughter. But she was quickly bitten by the rock hounding bug.
“I’ve gotten the excitement, it’s so infectious,” she said. “I’m actually excited by the stuff that I’m seeing, and I’m grabbing this, grabbing that, grabbing this.”
Abdel-Fattah said she collected rocks as a girl and recently became interested in them again.
“I just think the rocks are really pretty and there’s something fun about the hunt, searching for something that’s a little bit hard to find sometimes,” she said.
Washington state locations
The state Department of Natural Resources maintains a website with rock hounding locations.
Here’s an abbreviated list of rocks and where to find them.
Crystals: Hansen Creek, Snoqualmie Pass.
Geodoes: Walker Valley, near Mount Vernon.
Agates: Damon Point, south of Ocean Shores.
Petrified wood: Saddle Mountains, east of Yakima.
Groups
Puyallup Valley Gem and Mineral Club (Puyallup) PVGAMC@gmail.com
Washington State Mineral Council (statewide)
Shelton Rock and Mineral Society (Shelton) SRMS242@yahoo.com
Washington Agate and Mineral Society (Olympia) WAMSolympia@gmail.com
