The Sedona Gem and Mineral club is moving into its club activities for 2026. Its meeting will be on Monday, Jan. 19, at 7 p.m. The first speaker for the new year is Pat Tucci.
Tucci will be highlighting his mineral safaris that also included Zelda Nailey.
“We travelled to Namibia in southwest Africa twice to collect and purchase mineral specimens and to experience the beautiful landscapes, wildlife and culture of the country,” Tucci stated. “Namibia is a country about half the size of Alaska, and we travelled through much of the central part. The country is mostly arid with high plateaus, the Namib Desert along the coast and the Kalahari Desert in the east. The minerals that we obtained on the trip included aquamarine, topaz, amethyst, malachite, garnet, tourmaline and fluorite.
“Highlights of the trip included visits to the Hoba meteorite [the world’s largest], the Cheetah Conservation Fund, the Tsumeb Mine and Etosha National Park. We saw lots of wildlife such as lion, elephant, rhinoceros, zebra, a wide variety of antelope species and dozens of different bird species.”
Nailey and Tucci both have degrees in Geology and were mineral dealers for over 25 years. They have also travelled to Morocco and Bulgaria on mineral collecting trips, as well as to other countries in Africa and Europe, China, Cuba and New Zealand. Nailey’s other interests include jewelry making and painting, and Tucci can be found playing music at different venues around Sedona and the Verde Valley.
After the presentation the club holds a raffle. The monthly meeting raffles and rock show raffles fund the scholarship awarded to a deserving student from Sedona Red Rock High School.
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