We had a fantastic time! The staff is friendly and helpful. Had so much fun we added a day to our vacation and went back for a 2nd day! Get there early and plan to get dirty and wet. The native buckets do take some time and work so I wouldn't recommend making a day of it with small children. They do have "Rainbow" buckets that ...

I'm from Ohio & have been taking vacations in the Franklin NC area for the past 8 years. Sheffield mine is the best when it comes to actually finding native rubies & sapphires. I have went to almost every mine in the area & for the past 5 years I have only visited the Sheffield mine. The number of people going to this mine has ...

We visited a few months ago and paid to have a gem cut and polished and shipped home. We never received it, and my numerous emails have gone unanswered. Don't trust them to cut your gems......please! It was a huge disappointment to my daughter, who was so looking forward to having a special memory of our trip.

The staff was friendly. Get there early. The buckets of dirt were mostly clay and much harder to work than a mine we went to. We found basically nothing after 20 hours.

We had visited a couple mines the day before going here and had great experiences, however, after succumbing to the tourist attraction of Sheffield Mine...we arrived (30 minutes before they opened as recommended in their advertisements)...and there was already a line of almost 50 people! We waited and chatted with other miners...then finally they ...

There were many mines to choose from along the way to this place, but I did not want to visit just a tourist trap. My 4 year old daughter and i spent about 5 hours there. The staff were extremely helpful and eugene King was also there and is full of experience and stories. They taught us how to mine the rocks in the flume and also showed us what ...

Saw the mine on the Travel Channel and just had to give it a try. My wife and I spent 2 days playing in the mud with a wonderful group of folks and found over 100 carats of sapphire. I have probably bored our friends to death with our stories but a good many of them are going back with us this spring. Most fun I've ever had with my clothes on!

We felt like you did an awful lot of hard work and received very little back in return. I found one ruby, between two people and it was so small that I gave it to a little girl of about 4 or 5 years of age so that she would feel happier about going there. The price was fair but I felt very unhappy with our visit and finds.

We saw this place on the Travel Channel and we thought we would give it a try. I knew my son & I would enjoy doing this but I was skeptical that my wife would like it. To our surprise she enjoyed it more than we did. We went back for a second day and our son found a 33 Carat uncut ruby! We found over 100 Carats of gem stones during our two day visit. Don't forget to wear old clothes because you will get dirty.