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till Sunday afternoon., when they were looking at Whitecliff
Bay, We spent a happy tine bashing up bits of rock.
Unfortunately I had forgotten to bring a hammer, so I had
to use a piece of rock, this led to three broken finger nails
and a bashed thumb.
On the Monday we studied Shanklin Beach, well the others did,
I just enjoyed the walk and the view and the thought that I was
getting tanned. It was after lunch that I struck lucky at
Ventnor. I was getting rather bored sitting down all the time
bashing stones and stated so. Of course, the next stone I
picked up and broke open contained a large ammonite, well large
to ne, about five inches across.
Having been told by Mr, Coates to tap the rest of the rock
away carefully, we dispersed. Later, after purchasing a hammer,
I began to tap away as carefully as I could, which meant bits
of rock were flying about all over the place and the doorstep
was a mass of white dust, I'd got quite a bit of the surplus
rock off when suddenly the ammonite broke, not quite in half.
It left ne very disappointed, I'd broken the first ammonite
I'd ever found.
When I took the pieces apart, I found a lump of something
inside, it was almost spherical in shape and rough in texture,
I managed to pull this out and realized that it was much heavier
than the rest of the ammonite, I didn't like to break it open
in case it was a casing of some other creature.
Upon returning home I consulted another expert who told me
that through the process of nucleation, iron and sulphur had
dissolved in water and formed crystals, more and more formed till
this nodule appeared. Upon breaking it open now, it was
shimmering gold, fool's gold the expert told me.
Anon.