★ Tourist location: Shanghai Pudong Oriental Geological Science Museum

The appearance of stratigraphy stones is not prominent, and can be said to be not astonishing in the calcite family. However, the layered stone displayed in the museum is really big, coupled with the beautiful shape and the rare light red color, which makes it very eye-catching.

There are also some layered stones that are dusty in color, common white and light gray, but their shapes are very strange. They look as if rocks have been cut into thin slices and then spliced together.

There is a layer stone that is very beautiful. Although it is not big, it is very shaped like a flower. The color is also very warm, with a little flesh color, and the patterns are very delicate.

Calcite is a common natural calcium carbonate ore with various shapes and rich colors. Their aggregate can be clusters of crystals, or they can be granular, massive, fibrous, stalactite, etc. Because you can get many square fragments by knocking on a stone, it is called calcite.

Calcite is also a large family of mineral crystals. Its transparency is comparable to crystal, but its hardness is slightly inferior. Its color is far more beautiful than crystal. Needless to say, the white ones look similar whether they are crystal, plaster, or fluorite. Pink is very charming, big red is very gorgeous, and yellow can also be very positive.

Although in essence, calcite and lime can be regarded as quite close brothers, the appearance of the two is vastly different. Calcite is very rich in colors, the common ones are white and gray, and the more beautiful ones are golden yellow, blue, purple, red...

Iceland spar is a colorless, transparent and pure calcite crystal. However, when it is contaminated, its color becomes a brilliant red-gold color, which is very beautiful under the light. This kind of stone is a good optical material and can be used as laser switches, large-screen displays, astronomical telescopes with high filter, etc.

Fluorite is a relatively common mineral in nature and can coexist with many other minerals. Because the texture is relatively crisp and soft, although it has a beautiful color, it will not be used as a gemstone. Common fluorite is green, not as deep as emeralds, but rather like the softness of jade.

Of course, there are also some darker colors, almost dark green. There is a piece of fluorite that is coexisting with milky white, which looks a bit like a androgynous feeling, which is very strange.

Purple has its own dreamy feeling, and purple fluorite also has this dreamy temperament. When I first met it, I even thought it was agate.

There is a piece of fluorite that has a particularly high face value, and its veins can be clearly seen. There is a layer of green, a layer of purple, a layer of pink, a layer of white, and a layer of green, a layer of purple... If it were smaller, it would really make people think it is a watermelon tourmalade.

Aragonite is also my favorite stone. You don't need to make any special shapes. They are a high mountain and a glacier in themselves. The color is pure white and gorgeous blue. The aragonite displayed in the museum are larger than those seen elsewhere. Several aragonite pieces have different shapes, but without exception they are beautiful.

Stalactites are also relatively common, but each stalactite has strange shapes. Some are like mountains, and some are like hills, as if one can see a magnificent picture. I once thought of stalactites as corals. Some stalactites are really similar in shape to corals, especially since they also have a flawless white color in addition to their ordinary brown color.

Water-zinc ore is a strange ore. It is obviously stone, but it gives people the feeling of soft fluff. Of course, there are coral-like shapes, pure white or gray.

There is a two-ton water-zinc specimen in the exhibition hall, which is one of the precious mineral crystal exhibits collected by the Science Museum. The color is soft, crystal clear, and the color is fine, like mountains. It looks like crystal at best.

The main component of desert roses is hydrated calcium sulfate, or to put it more popularly, gypsum. However, its shape resembles a rose and is often found in desert areas, hence its name. Although they seem very vicissitudes and can withstand desert sandstorms, they are actually extremely hard, only 2. So in terms of texture, it is very easy to damage. Not to mention that it does not have a bright color, even if it is beautiful, with such low hardness, it is destined to only become an ornamental stone, and cannot be among the gems.

Gypsum is the most inconspicuous stone, but the geological museum has a pure white plaster column, but its appearance can definitely rank among the top ten. It is large and transparent, and its shape has excellent meaning, like a swallow spreading its wings and ready to fly.

The plaster displayed in the window looks more like crystal. Either clusters or columns, if they were not marked with their names, it is estimated that most people would regard them as crystals.

There are also penetrating plaster that is not so transparent. It is generally large in shape and has a natural and unique shape, so it cannot be ignored in the geological museum.

Celestite is my favorite stone, but celestite without cutting and polishing does not look so eye-catching. The white and gray background color only reveals a little azure color.

Of course, there are some smaller mineral crystals placed in window displays. I don't know if it's the texture or the lighting, but although it's smaller, it looks cuter. Various crystal columns and crystal clusters shine brightly under the lights. Hair crystals are relatively precious crystals, especially golden hair crystals, which look very rich.

These needle-like minerals are distributed inside the crystal, which looks like the crystal is surrounded by many thin hairs, hence the name. Red and yellow hair crystals look more gorgeous, and there are also some silver hair crystals, black hair crystals, and even green hair crystals.

There are also some ores that are symbiotic, and their shapes are even more peculiar. There can be countless combinations of two different ores, not to mention that many times, it is not just two ores that coexist?