Now
to the show: I
haven’t been yet to Ensisheim, but beside that show, Munich was always the
largest (sorry Rainer) and most important event for meteorites in
Europe. Where
shall I start – if someone is missing on the list: Don’t be angry, it’s just a
syptom of my weak brain, raise your hand and scream: I will be there
too! Which
dealers from the famous dealer’s list I remmeber to have seen last
year? Let’s
start with Fectay&Bidaut (for not getting angry mails) – they always exhibit
an impressive variety of the rarest types, you may imagine, planetary material
as well as marvellous oriented stones. Some larger pieces of historic falls
too. From
France too, you’ll find Grandseigneur Carion, cool impact breccias, Wabar
pearls, cheap bags of Gao and Tatahouine. Each year he fills a permanent display
case of the normal show program with museum pieces of his
collection. The
Labennes will be there with their lunaites and fresh crusted unclassified desert
goodies – last year they were looking somewhat
disappointed. A
great fun and a real highlight each year is Erich Haiderer’s wonderfull chaotic
stall, where you will find hidden under grab boxes with ordinnairy desert
chondrites and the most common irons fine achondrites. He’s the only dealer with
best-price-guarantee. The
Karls and Vassiliev will share a table: I remember fantastic, translucent Imilac
slices, large slices of the classical Shergottites and Dag 400 and I hope they
will bring this year all the superrare historic falls, which they are selling on
ebay during the last months. Of
similary quality will be the assortment of Mr.Pittmann (not on the dealer’s
list), last year he showed me a palm sized Mars – next to him, you’ll find (if
the other dealers won’t beat him up, because of his recent ebay hazards)
Comet-Shop Afanasjev: Many different Dho-treasures: lunaites, nice inexpensive
impact melt breccias, Chinga, Brahin – last year he had a chunk of the latter,
which showed Widmannstätter patterns.. Good
for some bargains is “From Stone age to Space age”, small assortement of african
meteorites, last year he offered two low-tkw-falls at an incredible low
price. “Abraxas”-Stehlin from Switzerland I have to mention.
Many historical meteorites in an astonishing fresh quality, rare desert types
too. Here a special hint from me:
Try to find Mrs.Kammel from “Rocksonfire” – there I made my best deals last
year! Let’s
go further through the list… There were some people from St.Petersburg, but I’m
not sure if it was Pilipiuk from the list, who sold Sikhotes in all sizes and
had also two large individuals of, I guess, at least 30kg each. Anyway, Sikhote
in all shapes was by far the most predominant locality, at least five different
dealers I found offering only Sikhote. Mostly in large boxes, totally
unsearched, so that it is always a real excitement to pick out the most oriented
specimens with flow lines and you’ll be always able to find such pieces
(starting around approx. 0,5Euro/g, for the case, that you take only a few),
which sell on ebay at high prices as so called “killer oriented”. And here
another hint: Take a little lighter fluid or acetone and some handkerchiefs with
you. All Russians like to oil their Sikhotes with a black, ropy grease, so that
you can’t see whether they still have the bluish fusion crust or whether they
are tumbled or overcleaned (85%). Also the finest flow lines are not visible
under this russian lard. The names of the Sikhote sellers I can’t remember so
well. Bulgak and Skorniakov comes in my mind. Because the fees for the table in
Munich are so incredible high, many smaller meteorite specialists occupy a
corner of the tables of friendly mineral dealer, thus you won’t find them on the
exhibitors database. Like this, I heard, Cimala Polandmet from the dealers list
will join the show. “Direct Line Resources” was there, I didn’t visit,
because once I got a cry for help from a desperate man, who bought there a gold
plated Gibeon “weddind band”, the gold was getting loose and was breaking of.
They never answered to his emails, nor to
mine. “Excalibur” I could read on a table with only a small
number of meteorites, but I don’t know, if those were the Excaliburs from the
list and in former times I bought some rarer US-localities at low prices, which
had Minresco-Cisnero labels, - I’m not sure, if they were there last year. List
complete or Dean
Bessey? |