Habach valley collecting

12th May 2008

Summer 2004

In July 2004 my wife, daughter and I were on a holiday in Bramberg, Austria.
So I finally had a chance to visit the famous Emerald locality in the Habachtal.
After finding some dull grey Beryl crystals, Pyrite and Fuchsite on a rainy Wednesday near the "Alpenrose" guesthouse I set out on Thursday the 29th of July for a visit to the Bergwerk (Emerald mine) in the Leckbachrinne. I took the 7:30 taxi from Habach to Alpenrose (15 min.). About 20 m. from Alpenrose the trail to the Leckbachrinne starts (if you have difficulties finding it, just ask the people at Alpenrose) the first part will take you to the Sedl and will take you an hour (and a lot of sweat, we call it the Schweisshang, meaning sweatslope...).

With luck and perseverance you can find Emeralds in the Sedl, halfway between Alpenrose and the mine. Material from the Emerald bearing zone accumulated there caused by many sometimes massive landslides, but you'll have to dig deep to find a layer of sediments were nobody has looked before.

If you follow the path to the right of the Sedl you'll arive at a big Serpentine boulder after about an other hour (the spot is ideal for a halfway smoke....or drink and snack of course), from here there are two ways to get to the Emerald mine. On the left hand side the trail is very exposed to falling rocks and the (safety)rope near the end is only partially attached, so not very useful. The best option is to take the trail on the right hand side (orographic left), from the serpentine rock you'll have to cross a small snowfield, from there the trail is visible. Just follow the trail but only follow it if you have high-alpine experience. The trail is very steep and there are two passages where you have to do some easy rock climbing (for people without any experience these passages can be difficult, and they are very exposed). The spot where you have to traverse some rock (there are some ledges to stand on, that's all...) is very exposed, if you look down from there you could get the shivers (many people do!) and if you slip from a foothold there you most likely won't live to tell...on top of that it can happen that it starts snowing (also in summer!) making those steps very dangerous......

When you finally reach the mine (40 minutes from the serpentine rock, that makes the whole climb from Alpenrose to the mine about 2 hours and 40 minutes) you can go right to the spot where the Steiners (Aloïs and his son Andy) wash out the Emeralds, or better you should go and look for Emeralds where the trail crosses the Leckbach stream (about 10 meters below the mine). On that spot the terrain is a little less steep and you can find a lot in the gravel that accumulates there in the water of the Leckbach (I found 14!! Emeralds and one Aquamarine and nice Actinolite there in only three and a halve hours!).
When I came back down and showed my finds to the people in the Alpenrose I started to realize what a great find it had been.
I found Emeralds up to almost 4 cm long, some of them very clear with the best colour imaginable, on top of that some pieces with Emeralds scattered all over them.
One of the pieces was the best Emerald found since 20 years according to the Steiners.
Upon returning to our holiday retreat I showed the goodies to my daughter and my wife and they were just as amazed as I was looking at the beauty of the Emeralds.
There are several things to keep in mind when you are looking near the mine (Bergwerk). For most of the time you'll be standing in ice cold water, so bring waterproof boots (in the backpack, use mountain boots or sturdy trekking boots for the climb!), the host rock is Talc-schist and gets very slippery when wet (and if you fall the drop is very deep, once more, you won't live to tell...) and in the Leckbachrinne very frequently rock slides occur and rocks are falling from above all over the place at some days. The adits (Stollen) themselves are off limits as well as the area around the adtits, they are privately owned and leased by the Steiners. Always keep in mind that you are in a high-alpine environment, you won't be the first person that has to be evacuated by a helicopter... Be sure to visit the Steiners at Steinach (near Bramberg), Loïs and Andy have got a fantastic collection of alpine minerals (of course a lot of Emeralds but also brilliant Titanite, Quartz, Fluorit, Milarite etc etc, the museum Wilhelmgut in Bramberg with its outstanding local mineral collections and the collection of Kurt Novak in Wald im Pinzgau.



Summer 2005

In 2005 we were back in Bramberg, I once more got permission (really..;-)..) from my daughter and my wife to go out and do some collecting.
I wasn't very succesful, only some small Titanites, Stilbites and some Quartzes (small ones) were the fruit of my labour.....
The day before we were to return home we undertook one last trip, starting out above the Moaralm, finding nothing we decided to have a nice walk back to the parking at the entrance of the valley, enjoying the scenery and the lovely sunny weather.
About 1 km before the parking I wanted to check out a suspicious spot close to the road.
We climbed to the spot only 10 meters above the road and I started to check the Quartz rumble when my wife asked me what kind of blocky small crystals were sitting on a rock face.
I looked at them and saw tiny Adularia crystals, so nothing special.
Then she asked what the tiny black shiny things were sitting on them.......I looked and saw some small Anatase!
Still it wasn't the great find I was dreaming of and I started thinking about quitting.
After some time I heard my wife joking that she found the find of the year....I rushed towards her and found out she had uncovered some tiny Quartz crystals, damn, not even close to a proper find....
When I looked closer I saw some bleaching around the Quartz and some traces of Chlorite.
Because the rock around the Quartz vein was full of cracks I thought it wouldn't cost me a lot of sweat to probe the rock with my Strahlstock (a long crowbar used by alpine Strahlers), and after poking the Quartz vein twice a 50 by 40 cm cleft opened up, wow....!!
Out of the Chlorite filled cleft came some very nice Quartzes (up to 12cm tall) and some good Calcite and Aragonite pieces.
The prize of the cleft however were hundreds of shiny Anatase crystals scattered all over the pieces, together with small Apatites and Monazites, and 3cm large shiny Rutile crystal we found when we turned over a small rock near the entrance of the cleft.
The next day we drove home with a car filled with beautiful minerals and good spirits.



Over the years I regularly returned to Bramberg (at the entrance of Habach valley) with my wife and my daughter and we have met some great friends there (I'll never forget the evenings with lots of wine together with Erwin and his family), some of them great Strahlers (Erwin, Andy, Lois).
I have been standing in awe before their collections, amazed by the beauty they collected from the surrounding Alps, collections of Alpine minerals of which many museums would be jealous......some of them one can only see to believe....
I've been equally amazed by the hard labour they had to do to even get close to these treasures, nothing comes easy in these mountains, no pain no gain....I'll remember the fellow Strahlers that found their death looking for minerals.
I am touched by the fact that my Strahler friends always tried to help me and have given me lots of advice on where to find clefts (and the rides on the back of Erwin's motorcycle up to the higher regions were a thrill in themselves...)
We will return to this lovely place!

Harjo

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