March 2026 Stone Collecting Trip – Part 16, An Introduction to St Andrew’s Beach, South Canterbury, Tuesday 31 March

A member of the Facebook Group “New Zealand Lapidary, Rocks, Minerals, Fossils” mentioned to me three weeks ago that the beach near Pareora in South Canterbury was worth a look. Pareora is about seven kilometres south of Timaru South, a beach I often visit. I had a look at the area on Google Maps and decided to drop in on a beach just south of Pareora, a couple of kilometres north of the small town of St Andrew’s. I turned off the main highway onto Galletly’s Road – it’s a very short drive down that road to a freedom camping area right next to the beach. When I arrived at 11.15 am, there were a small number of buses and campervans making use of it, some of them sporting Gypsy Fair signs. A sign warns that an old landfill used to be located at the back of part of the beach. And there are some railway iron posts sticking out of the stones in front of the beach entrance.

I spent an hour on St Andrew’s Beach. The wind was cool, the temperature about 12 degrees, and it was mainly cloudy. There are a lot of grey stones on the beach. Initially I didn’t spot much else as I walked south along the waves’ edge. I turned back north and shortly thereafter found a small piece of petrified wood. I slowed down and began to look more carefully, soon spotting a few scattered stones worth examination. I ended up spending an hour doing this. As expected, there are a lot of similarities to the stones at Timaru South – some very interesting quartzites and jaspers with the odd unusual stone.

Nine of my finds are presented below. The first is the piece of petrified wood I picked up:

This next one is my favourite find, due to its colour and texture – I think it is most likely a quartzite:

I picked up this small dark stone because I thought I could see spots in it. The close-up photos suggest the “spots” could be spherulites, and maybe the stone is rhyolite – but this is speculation based on my experience with Slope Point spherulitic rhyolite. The photos are not clear enough to confirm my thoughts:

This small stone has a dark brown mineral through part of it and some brecciation in another area:

Maybe a quartzite, also with some mineral patches and brecciation:

Some fine mineral lines in this find which look like epidote green:

A smaller stone with a little more of the mineral through it:

I think this one could be jasper but I am not sure:

Finally, a dark green quartzite of a type that I have found before along the southeastern coast of the South Island:

Part 17 reports on finds from Ward Beach, the day before I arrived back home in Whanganui. An Index to this Series is here.