MINERAL EXPLORERS | S2 | Ep6 | PORTUGAL
appetites are not shrouded by legendary myths much like this forgotten empire the beauty of these specimens is often overlooked join us as we step back into the Age of Discovery and collect some of Portugal's impressive mineral history [Music] I'm Thomas Nagin and I'm a mineral Explorer I'm the guy that supplies museums galleries and private collectors with world-class pieces of nature's art come along with us as we travel the globe in search of rare gems crystals and other fine minerals it's not always easy but it's always an adventure Portugal established the first global Empire and by the 15th and 16th century this global powerhouse would lead the way into the Age of Discovery where their maritime prowess discovered a sea route to India then colonized what is now modern-day Brazil the exploitation of mineral wealth like diamonds gold and silver combined with the monopoly on the spice trade would fund further explorations into Africa and Asia the wars natural disasters and diminishing Mineral Resources would end this Empire however the mineral legacy of Portugal still lives on just up the coast in cascais we hope to find our own piece of Portugal's past [Music] I start collecting since little boy when when I travel with my father's any place I go I took some souvenir in rocks anyway my name is Alberto I teach but I like to feel free to go anywhere and this kind of business is perfect for that [Music] everybody likes appetite I like appetite yeah and this is like ten dollars most serious collectors have an appetite for apatite but that's not all these two are cooking up well I'm mainly based in Africa in Mozambique I worked in the bush for many years it's risky because there's a lot of diseases there like malaria you know insects and snakes and spiders and stuff like that but it's a cool job because you know you get to travel a lot then you mean a lot of different people and nice people with different cultures and I like the risk as well you know not always everything goes well that's what I've always enjoyed doing he also has aquamarine and tourmaline Jim ruff which helps complement this deal hundred for the box each for each piece yes so maybe if I put several things together we could get a little better price right it always works that way okay let me pick out some things let me just set out here I really like being out on the light actually you can see the pieces better you can see the color better you can see if they have damage easier making to make slice how much are these is Graham bindi station so this is watermelon tourmaline from the same problem from Zampa some BZ province and Mozambique this is a cute little appetite here sitting on top of the quartz crystal and this is a cute little appetite also from panas Kara here Lisa badi nice old lady so ladies you know it has to be broken here you only end up with this pretty much because it's just cleaner this one here is won't breakage to it but maybe he'll give me a deal on two of them a special deal you have a lot of pieces yes I have a look and our Sinnoh pyrites aren't that expensive right they're not my god appetites yeah it's the type of mineral that a collector can afford that can't spend too much money right many of the top dealers are only after the expensive world-class pieces but I like to find a varied price range of minerals so there's something for everyone with this to pick this out one thing take this out one end I don't count these these these or [Music] with the tourmaline he's giving away your tourmaline okay good deal the these two larger pieces are our appetites that'll make really nice pieces for a collector I'm going to trim this piece like this to make a really nice piece right here like that of course we have these pieces here that have the apatite on one side and the fluorite on the other and a nice lot of appetites here and this is a specially nice piece the apatite sits up nicely out of the matrix it makes it really aesthetic the way it sits up this is a really sweet apatite here buying appetites look for good color lustre and transparency some of the best come from the panis Cara mine just a few hours northeast of here before we visit the mine we stop to taste an iconic Portuguese beverage steeped in a mineral history all its own the city of Porto is the second largest in Portugal after Lisbon and it's the birthplace of pork the sweet fortified wine produced solely in the Douro Valley this is my first time in this ancient city it dates back to 300 BC starting with the Celtics then occupied by the Romans and Moors then invaded by the French Porto's had many influences taking in the diverse architectural styles that reflect the many cultures that were in power over the centuries it's easy to get lost in the charm of the city of bridges the impressive Douro River played a crucial role in the city's famous export taylors is one of the oldest of the founding courthouses dating back to 1692 but the history of Portuguese wine starts far earlier in 1386 the Treaty of Windsor created mutually beneficial trade laws between England and Portugal this allowed a significant amount of Portuguese wine to be exported to England in 1667 France and England would severely limit trade with each other cutting off England's major wine supply and thus the demand for Portuguese wine increased the Douro River was used to transport the wine because of the long nautical voyage the wine was fortified with brandy increasing its strength and keeping it from spoiling the wine was named after where it was being shipped from Oporto or an English port the earliest recorded shipment of Port took place in 1678 not long after that tailors would get into the business what does that have to do with minerals you may ask well sky has the answer you're in Portugal you've been making wine for really thousands of years right started with the Romans is that correct oh yes but it was very different vine okay today what this company produces his port and Romans as you can imagine it was regular wine and for very long centuries we had just wine in the region and even today in the region you may find d'Oro wines and port ok and d'Oro is the region that it grows in where the shift comes from right right so what helps you have such a good flavour and such a great wine here is that these these are very strong plants that try to grow deep into the ground and what helps them grow deep into the ground is the formation of the ship a rock with a coarse grain made up of different minerals that occurs in thin plates so the roots can grow down deep into the ground up to 30 feet and the schist really helps quite a bit in the production of the the port right right minerals are all over this world and they even help with the port wine right minerals help everywhere okay see I told you this was about minerals and not just an excuse to drink pork the clare twisted our arms and we just couldn't say no to trying this historic mineral influence beverage Cheers we're here in Portugal they would say [Music] it's like Portugal with the crew and host refreshed we headed out to explore the birthplace of Portugal's other natural treasures a mine with as much diversity as Portugal's history a land that has given the collector community breathtaking specimens the mine of panis Guerra one of the world's largest tungsten mines specimen enthusiasts know it for the crystallized minerals of apatite tungsten arsenopyrite and many more located in Cavalia Portugal this industrial mine is focused on mining commercial tungsten as with many careers mining can start as a hobby it's like a passion you know that comes from from when I when I was kid and starting to collecting some some rocks some minerals and then I follow the geologists feeling so my name is Philippe miguel de vasconcelos pinto so I'm a geologist in the Spanish kada mine I have collected also some minerals from around the world in this mind we have some particular nice specimens like the hepatitis there say no pyrites hole for mites we have nice nice and big crystals and there are very famous around the world all these minerals that qatar here comes from the mine yeah we have some nice specimens big big ones the smallest ones but so these are all the minerals to come from them all the minerals that that comes from the mind n hannahs Cara is renowned in our community because of its rich diversity with over 18 different crystallized minerals you never know what you'll find you have a nice display over here it looks like yes we are trying to present one of each mineral specimens this is the piece that strikes me a lot is that or if I take it out yeah you can take a look it's one of our best specimens or personal photos this piece here is really attractive it has large RC no pyrites and they have really nice terminations and they're very brilliant and then it has sticking out of it nice wolframite crystal and a little bit of looks like sitting right then that's right for me to say it's also the one of my favorite pieces from here that's because we are trying to not solve them so maintaining a museum for the decoration of the that's a shame because I'd really like to take this one yeah these are the main minerals that you're getting out of the mine then right yeah you're getting the copper from the chalcopyrite you're getting the the tin from the Casilla right and then you're getting the tungsten from the Wolfram is our target this is the name tungsten has the highest melting point of all minerals it's sought after by many industries and you can find it in things like race cars and rockets as well as light bulbs and x-rays and the team in panis Guerra knows just where to look he's tired because he worked so hard it's a rare opportunity to be given access to this extensive mind that's been working since 1888 now it's Western Europe's leading tungsten producer so you really have a lot of water in here now right it's just more than normal or smaller than normal we always have water but not so much over the last a year or two years ago they started cutting some trees on the surface and so the terrain don't have the sufficient capacity to absorb all the the water in 1974 the company started to rapidly mechanize the mining process to reduce labor costs this increased efficiency eventually changed the mining practice from longwall stopping to a more mechanized method and allowed them to dig deeper soon mining was viable on two different levels at the same time I notice up here we have some veins of Wolfram ID and quartz is that right yes this is still the main infrastructure of the mind and mine entrance the mine main galleries base galleries for the equipment and for the people but sometimes we have lucky and you get vine in this part so that's what we have here we have the schist and now we have a small vine but we do some wolframite because this is this rich enough to work if it wasn't the main entrance to the mine yes it would be you would be working this yes to protect protect the infrastructure I was in awe of how quickly we started seeing clues of mineral richness and soon I'd experienced the depth of panis Kyra this is a orb in our pass and we're pass okay and this is connecting the two levels from level 1 to level 2 we have this great to avoid big rocks to pass you can see there an interest to stop so Manuel a stop is a work area right yes a production area a production area is a stove okay it's a long ways down there how deep is that this is 60 meters 60 meters it's about 200 feet wow that's a long 20 stories let's throw some rocks down there that took a long time to go down there [Music] man well this is a typical looking vein yes it has the the band of mica on top or bottom it's very typical and this is all ports in here yes all quartz but it's no good for us it's no you just want the Wolfram yes you just want the metal and the copper in the tin but okay so after the blasting it's the first miners that come in they really get the good specimens the workers are as long as they deliver to the farm and into the so everybody's allowed to take it out yeah it needs to be given over to the company yes who benefits from the crystal shop everyone everyone yes is during the Christmas we normally use the we pick the the money form for the crystal shop that we made during the year and we congratulate all the workers of the mine so everybody gets a crisp a crystal Christmas bonus being in these mines particularly the big ones it feels like something from a sci-fi movie or even a common thing like eating lunch can seem out of the ordinary with history behind us I was ready to witness brand new minerals being discovered just ahead or so I thought they'd say that this is about five square kilometers underneath this mind of running tunnels on several different levels I think we've walked it off I'm kidding pretty tiger finally there were signs were close to the production zone and I hope the hike was worth it this area was just blasted last night then they came in and they washed down the walls so they could see everything and today they're gonna muck it which means they're going to take out all the rock that was blasted out of there so it can go through the whole process of extracting the wolframite [Music] with the new rock mucked out we were ready to try our luck at finding specimens you saw wait almost five tons of material unfortunately commercial mining comes at a cost machines often damage or crush most collectible mineral specimens during the extraction of the more abundant industrial ores here's a big arsenopyrite right here sticking right in the middle of this cavity and then over here we have a big quartz you can see it's probably about five inches long there seems to me a lot of mineralization in this area what did you find there Wow an appetite oh yeah appetites are kind of pretty rare to find these days but it's one of the things that panas Kara is famous for and here we have some crystals of Sidda right that we found right near the same area so this mine is just filled full of a really large variety of minerals the large quartz vein is a good sign that specimens are near and here there's no telling what treasures you'll find and this is a really cute one this is one of my favorites here is it is my favorite it's a really clear quartz with a pretty little center right perched right on top of it I'd like to keep west one is that all right sure okay okay thank you you guys help me okay let's count the minerals we just found we got courts and wolframite we have arsenopyrite pyrite and chalcopyrite we also have apatite and sit right and spell right that's eight minerals that we found right here in this one area right after a blast and they all occurred like right in the same pocket not only is the diversity of specimens noteworthy what really sets panas care apart is the amount of different minerals that occur in the same specimen a city unto itself exploring this historic mine had been a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity but having walked nearly eight miles I wasn't ashamed to take the easy way out [Music] excited and exhausted by our extensive tour of Panna steerer we had one last stop to make back in Barcelona where our old friend Jordi would share some of his best panis Guerra pieces majority this case is all panis caralyn right this is a case for one mind look how different are the minerals from that mind they present a lot of different combinations of the different pieces from that mind some pieces has even ten different pieces altogether ten different pieces Wars Mosca white cedar I'd dolomite calcite fluorapatite arsenopyrite casita light and something else 4x4 right here's a furball right right here yes and this has our sin of pyrite with it right on the top yes sir the appetites is is one of the minerals that probably panis Kara is best known for and then you have the really colorful this one is really fantastic oh that's fantastic color that's one of the nicer ones I've seen and then this one on the very top is yeah very pretty awesome that's very pretty yeah it's not on matrix there's some matrix on the corner but the core is very nice and you can see the green core in the center so the problem in panna cotta is to find good minerals they are real rare that's why they are so well paid and you are always in competition with other dealers who are looking for a deep color full appetites and many times that fight could be aggressive because it's many people wanting that and very few pieces coming out so there's really a lot of competition a lot for the best mineral or only for the best see this one here stands out to me it looks like it's some kind of a uranium mineral yes this is not to dilute anything so it's not radioactive it's a little bit really very slow radioactivity but many times in just in the air in the heard in many places you have a natural radioactivity but this is really a very low radioactivity comparing with radioactivity that the human-made concentrating tones of natural uranium so you have to take a whole lot of this oh yeah and process it yes to make the material you need for atomic bombs yes or for nuclear plants you're right tons tons of this this is really attractive here this arsenopyrite yeah but it looks like it has chalcopyrite on it that no no it's colorful because some arsenopyrite have really send like some Goya ties a religion and some yes and the matrix is muscovite it makes a nice contrast because the colorful between the colorful or Singapore I've and muscovite yeah this really yeah really pretty apatite here it's well if you want to hear a funny story this is the reason why I am NOT going to pass kata for maybe six years because I wonder more than 50 times in the past I learned Portuguese I went so many times always looking for the piece that I really want from panis Qaeda and the day I got this one I canceled my trips to there because I was full I have what I really look for before you found the peace of your dreams correct okay Jordi you really have a fabulous Clerk thank you thank you so much for sure thank you equation Portuguese specimens are both uncommon and enchanting the diversity and quality of these pieces are worthy of another look and with each stone were given a chance to hold an empires history in our hand [Music] if you want to see more episodes or check out our mineral collection click the link in the description and of course like and subscribe to our channel thanks for watching and we'll see you next time on mineral explorers [Music]
2021-01-04 01:05
