This afternoon I drove north to Christchurch. Before I did that, I made a last visit to Seadown Beach. It had been frosty overnight, and was only four degrees when I left my accommodation on the hill in Kakanui at 10am. However, the sun was shining brightly. When I arrived at the beach ten minutes later, the temperature had climbed to seven degrees. On the way, I stopped to take a photo of the new bridge being built over the Kakanui River. The current bridge is a narrow one-lane rickety one, and heavy goods traffic can’t use it. It was built in 1899, the second on the site, the first having appeared in in 1871. “The new replacement bridge will be a fully concrete structure, creating a single-lane suitable for heavy goods vehicles, as well as a separated pedestrian/cycle path” (Waitaki District Council, 1 April 2025). It is costing just over 11 milllion dollars and expected to be fully operational by the middle of 2026 (Waitaki District Council, 14 July 2025).
Arriving at Seadown Beach, I found the tide was low enough for me to walk past the rocks at the south end to visit the patches of stones in the small bays there. I found very little of interest past the first two bays. In fact, today’s fossick was not very productive at all, certainly much less interesting than my first fossick here two days ago. I ended up with about 30 finds. I spent some time walking on the rock platform in the south of the beach, checking out any stones that might be there. I found very few stones fit for the tumbler. For a time, I got distracted by what else I saw there:
At the end of the fossick, I got a tray from my car and filled it with water from the sea so I could photograph some of the more interesting ones – I knew the weather would be a lot less sunny after today and it might be difficult to get good photos tomorrow. Filling the tray from the edge of the waves, I glanced up and saw the fin of a Hector’s dolphin a few metres away. I spent the next 15 minutes trying to get photos of the two or three dolphins out there. I was fortunate enough to catch one of them just as it was re-entering the water after a leap.
Here are six of my finds from this morning. When I found the first one, I thought it was most likely what is called limonite prase in this area. The close-up photos then revealed tiny veins with what looks like a kind of agate (banded chalcedony) in them:
My second featured find is not like anything I have seen on this beach before. It’s a real mix of a number of different unusual elements, colours and shapes:
This next stone looks to be a red jasper with some “washed-out” veins:
A quartzy breccia – tiny fragments inside it:
Another one of those gray quartzites that I find sometimes on this beach:
I suspect this last one is a jasper. In the past, I have found that stones like this don’t always take a polish, but I like their subdued hues:
The next Post in this Series describes a Ward Beach fossick, the last on this trip. An Index to the Series is here.
Those hector dolphins are a cute distraction aren’t they!? Still looks quite sandy at Seadown Beach.