Zapata, Tx, where's good collecting?

Good luck. As you know there isn't much public collecting land in Texas. I suppose any ground under a road bridge or road cuts would be fair game. Maybe check if they have a visitor center or chamber of commerce. They usually have lots of local info. and may know of fee collecting ranches or rock guides i the area. Where is Zapata?

Matt Dillon hunts that area all the time from one of the fishing camps outside Zapata ( south towards Bob's Nob I think). From what he says, any of the exposed lake gravels yield good finds He also said that the gravels in alluvial deposits way above the lake were deposited during the period when lots of agate was in the mix and those also can be very good hunting. You should check out his flickr site dardilrocks. It contains a ton of good info and pictures from the area....Mel

Our snakes here don't wear boots.

Matt Dillon’s photos on Flickr are awe inspiring. And road-trip inspiring as well. I too have on old gem trails of Texas book and seeing matt’s “mines road” pictures as well as the Zapata agate pictures convinced me to take a trip. For me in Atlanta, that is about 1,400 miles one way.
The Laredo “mines road” location (see matt’s flicker text for enough clues to find it) yielded a few pieces that may or may not cut to yield nice patterns. So if you are out that way, give it a visit, especially the gravel pits around the intersection of the toll road with mines road just North of Laredo. But, don’t drive 1,400 miles one way just to visit this area!
I next headed south on the hwy headed to Zapata. Lot’s of gravel operation gated up with no one around. I finally found one “rocking”, as they separated the sand from the rocks and then in an automated process, sorted the sizes. Nothing but Mexican’s and I found one that spoke English as well as I speak Spanish, and he said “Si” to me looking around. I felt a little uneasy about the understanding, so after a quick walk-around on the large washed gravel pile, I grabbed a few pieces of gold moss and hit the highway.
This was in September of last year and I think it was 99 degrees with an eerily howling hot wind. No snakes though.
Around dusk I hit Zapata and check into the super 8. Nice clean hotel but the area, well actually the whole town, is kinda sketchy. Ambulance and police sirens screamed by every 45 minutes the whole night.
I hit Bob’s Nob the next day and it was another cooker of a day. I’m heat tolerant and used to heat and humidity and I have to say that this area is about as hot as the deserts of Namibia. And that – IS HOT!
Here too the wind was a hot one and howled in a very eerie fashion. I followed the books directions to the old bob’s knob location. Guess what?
This area is now a gravel pit!!!!! At my visit there were no posted signs and no gate. And the biggest pile of washed gravel I have ever seen. I spent a couple of hours walking over this 30 foot high pile that extended for 100 foot in every direction. I got one piece of very green agate (foot ball sized) and a couple of gold moss agates. But I didn’t see anything that looked like any type of banding or anything of interest.
I went within site of matt’s favorite fish camp but didn’t go down the hill to bother them. At the top of the hill is a big area of unfenced brush and cacti. I did pick up a dozen walnut sized agates that had crazy lace type banding.
I have a friend that has a lot of land in Tilden, Texas, so I departed this area head there for some petrified wood. By the time I got to Tilden I was in a pretty rotten mood, because I took a long trip for pretty much nothing. Even in early fall it was hella hot!
Doeblers pit is near Tilden and I couldn’t work it out with Matt for a visit. I didn’t want to step on his toes by trying to get permission myself, so I was unable to visit that location. I did ride down the dirt road and saw the locked gate to the pit so I just kept rollin’.

In my opinion--- and I am no expert on that area--- there are a lot better places to visit. You’d be a lot better off in Alpine, Texas with Teri Smith as a guide.

I was curious about what I might find in Zapata but when I saw Matt Dillon's finds I was hooked. It's a short trip for me and I'm used to watching out for dehydration and overheating so I'll be careful. To top it off an engineer at work offered me the run of his ranch which is ON the Rio Bravo less than 10 miles out of town. I speak Spanish so that won't be a problem, I just don't want to meet anyone in the brush with bad intentions.
Thanks Digforcrystals for the reconnaissance on Bob's Nob and the area.