Lower Dacite Mountain

We went to the area south of Dacite Mountain, near Lake Roosevelt to investigate the area at the base of the “mountain”. We have previously explored the “mountain”; more information can be found at the listing. The area near the lake is National Recreation Area and thus off limits to collecting rocks and minerals, but it’s still a very nice area and one can always look but not bring home the rocks. The lake is actually just the Columbia River and the mountain is more of a very large hill.

The bank of the lake here was sand and mud. We checked an eroding cliff for concretions which are rumored to be somewhere in Lake Roosevelt, but the cliffs were pure sand and mud. There were some interesting pieces of mudstone on the beach and near the cliff we spotted a bear print, but luckily the bear was presumably long gone from the area.

We then walked the lower side of Dacite Mt and found some very small tourmaline in the dacite, but nothing else of interest. This area isn’t very popular when we’ve been there, but it looked like it would make a nice swimming spot for a hot summer day.