[meteorite-list] Ensisheim 2004

From: bernd.pauli_at_paulinet.de <bernd.pauli_at_meteoritecentral.com>
Date: Sun Jun 20 14:45:34 2004
Message-ID: <DIIE.0000000A00002359_at_paulinet.de>

Hello List,

My Pauline and I are back from the Ensisheim 2004 Meteorite Show where
I received the honor of now being an honorary member of the St. George's
Confraternity of the Guardians of the Ensisheim Meteorite.

It was great fun meeting all those meteorite people in person. Let me enumerate
some (not all of them because there were too many) and let me say "thank you"
to Zelimir who saw to it that "things went smoothly". There was Peter Marmet
(from whom I purchased my little Ensisheim slice that he had once got from Anne
Black - Anne just in case you wonder where it now resides :-) I think it is a "must"
for an honary member of the "Ensisheim Confraternity" to own at least little slice
of this historical fall from 1492 - in my case a modest 0.773 grams but beautiful!

There were Alain Carion, Bruno and Carine, Moritz Karl and Sergei Vasiliew with
his wife, Philippe Thomas and his wife L?a, Stefan Ralew, Michel Franco, Peter
K?mmel, Fr?d?ric and Christophe, Erich and Silvia Haiderer, Siegfried Haberer,
Norbert Classen,Christian Anger, Hanno Strufe, Vincent Jacques, Serge, Pierre-
Marie and his team ...

There was Jean-Claude Lefebvre whose wife shared and exchanged with my
Pauline some of their grueling experiences with husbands that have the "bug" :-)

And, of course, there were many others - no ill will if I did not mention all of them.

The pepper steaks my Pauline and I had at the "La Couronne" were delicious as
was the beer "la pression" they served. We had a very spacious room there with
four beds ... but I still can't figure out what for ;-))

Meteorites, ... yes for every purse. NWA's, historical falls, lunar, martian (Bruno
placed one in my hand that made my mouth water but I knew there was no money
for such a martian now as I was firmly determined to get a slice from the Ensisheim
LL6. Sikhote-Alin was well represented - both big chunks as well as small pieces
(shrapnel, oriented, regmaglypted) and I was lucky enough to grab an oriented 74g
piece with flow lines, lipping, and a frothy rear side from "kachalin_at_mail.ru" and I
got it cheap!

Peter K?mmel had several exquisite German historical falls and finds, Moritz Karl
and Sergei Vasiliev offered several choice specimens that you wished you owned,
Alain Carion had some little Ensisheim specimens plus quite a few other falls and
finds of interest, among these several Tafassasset slices. I didn't need one as I had
already got mine from Anne some months ago. There was also a Monsieur Alain
Weissler who offered thin sections - among them two Tafassasset thin sections,
one of which I acquired (can't wait to let my eyes wander over its weird texture :-)

As for our Libyan Desert Glass thread: Monsieur Weissler also had two LDG thin
sections and I could not resist buying one of them with interesting inclusions that
were once thought to be "biogenic". Will also have to look and marvel at this one.

Pierre-Marie's team had a beautiful little Brahin that changed owners when I saw
that one half of it was translucent olivine and the other half was metal that had been
etched and displayed a delicate Widmanst?tten pattern.

I also bought a Jalu thin section from M. Weissler so that all I could do was go back
to Peter K?mmel and buy his 13.5-gram choice Jalu slice, because what good is a
thin section when there is no meteorite specimen :-)

Siegfried Haberer's lunars and his 25-kg Dhofar beauty (see METEORITE, Nov. 2002,
Volume 8, No.4) were clearly eye-catchers! Well, and you should have seen that large
Saint-S?verin slice that Peter Marmet was offering. Boy, what a beauty, what a sight!

No need to tell you that both Philippe Thomas and Michel Franco had several superb
and extremely fresh-looking Hot Desert meteorites. Michel showed me a slice of one
that will keep scientists busy for quite some time. Something unheard of, something
never seen before! It was a thrill to hold it in my hands! Thank you Michel!

If you really wanted some excellent but affordable NWA's at down-to-earth prices,
then Stefan was the right person to go and look. Mesosiderites, rumurutiites, and
so much more.

It was also very nice to say hello to Marcin from Poland and wander over his NWA's
and his Morasko irons - of course also had Zaklodzie, Pultusk and other meteorites
that he offered. Marcin, all the best for an "enjoyable" 11-hour trip back to Poland!

Fr?d?ric and Christophe's desert finds were a feast for the eyes and their Tanezrouft
057 C4 ANOM with its weird clasts was really there to make you salivate! Would have
love to buy a slice, but ... well, you can't have it all! Fr?d?ric and Christophe are very
friendly, good-humored people, I can tell you!

Serge was offering a wide variety of Dhofar meteorites and thin sections (among them
several lunars) and that reprint of the Sikhote-Alin fall that he has also put up on EBay
several times recently.

>From Jean-Luc Parodi I got a beautiful LL5 (S2, W2) slice with beautiful fresh fusion
crust and a large metallic (FeNi + troilite) inclusion that reminds me of Lake Constance.
It will be published in one of the upcoming Bulletins and will probably be a Tanezrouft.

There is so much more I could tell you but this post is already too lengthy. What a pity
there were no American list members this year. Oops, I forgot! I think Nick Gessler
was there but somehow I did not find a moment to talk to him or to at least say hello.
Maybe next time!

Just when I wanted to leave the show on Saturday evening to go back to "La Couronne",
because my Pauline and I felt the need to enjoy a delicious "c?te de boeuf", Michel Franco
stopped me and "handed me over" to 2 friendly-looking French reporters of a local Alsatian
radio station who had found a victim they could bombard with a lot of meteorite-related and
meteorite-collecting-related questions in French.

Oh boy, Ensisheim was quite an exciting adventure. Thank
you all who made it happen and thank you all for listening.

Best wishes,

"Confr?re" Bernd :-)
Received on Sun 20 Jun 2004 02:45:30 PM PDT