Today I'm going to tell you all about opals.  Opals are my favorite stone and I sometimes find a piece of rough that is so nice (and generally shaped in a way that would mean I'd lose A LOT of it when I cut it) that I just free form wrap it.  I recently got three different types of opal that I did that with so I thought I'd tell you guys about them.  I finally decided video was the only way to really show you what these stones look like.  In fact, if you are going to buy a special and/or very expensive opal ask for video.  With the right angle someone could light up an opal with very little fire and you'd be disappointed when you got it.

Admit it, when you think opal you think this:

Not a bad few stones at all but sort of milky white and with a little flash

Here is one that I particularly like that is the same kind - these come from Australia and are the most common and therefore the cheapest.  I just think this guy looks neat in rough form so that is the way he's gonna stay . . .

You can see, white with some pretty flashes - but look at this one.  This is also from Australia but it is only mined in one area - it is called boulder opal and is actually my favorite kind of opal . . . I've heard they are going to stop exporting it so I've bought a ton of rough recently.

Then this last one is just stunning - I can't imagine wasting one cut on it - it amazes me every time I look at it.  This is a good sized hunk of welo opal from Ethiopia.  I can't remember exactly what I paid for this guy but I know it was a hunk.  They have actually stopped exporting the rough welos now because they have figured out that they can make more money for their country selling only to authorized dealers and even then almost always cut stones.

So you can see there is quite a bit more to this stone than just the little white ones you see in commercial stores.  I haven't even included black opal or fairy opal or Mexican opal!