Chapter Text
Chapter 5 – Arkansas – Spring Break 2025
Ziva moved next to her husband to show him her tablet, "We can fly to Fort Smith, Arkansas, but there is no direct flight. Total time will be around five hours, although only half of that is in the air. There are other much closer airports, but then we would have to drive to Fort Smith for you to see the Welcome Center."
"I really want to see Miss Laura's Visitor Center. It seems so intriguing…" he replied. "Something about a visitor center in an old brothel just makes me want to see it!"
"It does sound interesting, but is it appropriate for children?" Ziva agreed to a point.
Tony pulled up the website on his tablet, "It's a generic visitor's center, Ziva, with the addition of a museum of sorts for the legal brothel that was once in the house. It's on the National Historic Register as well. They have period costumes and furniture from the early 1900s, a history of the house, and information about Fort Smith as a 'frontier outpost.' The website has a link to arrange for group tours, including school groups."
Ziva nodded as she switched tabs to show Tony the four-bedroom, two-bathroom cabin that she found for accommodations while in Murfreesboro near the Crater of Diamonds State Park. "We can rent this cabin for four nights. It has a full kitchen, four bedrooms, two bathrooms, a wrap-around porch, diamond mining tools that we can take to the park, and on-site swimming, canoeing, and river access. It will be too cold to swim, but the children will have a place to be outside to play."
"Sounds good; are they available for when we need?"
Ziva grabbed her phone and made a call. Ten minutes later, she smiled and gave Tony a thumbs' up gesture. "We are booked for Sunday through Thursday. They gave us a free night with the four I requested. Check-out is by 1100 on Friday. We can check in any time on Sunday."
"I am getting our flights arranged as we speak," Tony glance up from his tablet. "Do we want the 0525 or the 0910 out of Reagan? Oh, never mind; it's the 0525 or we'll have a four plus hours layover in Atlanta." He tapped at the screen, "Done… and done. Flights booked. Spring break for the DiNozzos is ready to roll."
~Arkansas~
The family finally got settled into their lodging around 1600 local time. The flights had been uneventful and without delays, even though the kids were not too thrilled to have to get up at 0300 to get to the airport for the first leg of the flight. Ziva was glad the three younger ones had napped during the three-hour drive from Fort Smith to Murfreesboro. Anthony had dozed on and off for part of the ride.
Once in town, they stopped for groceries for that night's dinner, plus breakfast, and lunch for the next day. Ziva then text-messaged the owners to meet for check in and get the keys for the cabin.
Tony helped Ziva put up the food while the kids chose bedrooms. LJ and Anthony liked the bedroom with the red bedspread and curtains, not that anything else was different about the rooms. All had queen-sized beds, a closet, dresser, chair, nightstands, and rustic wood paneling. Rivka and Beth chose their room, leaving Tali to have a room to herself.
The open living room, dining area, and kitchen had plenty of modern amenities, including a large-screen television with cable access, internet access with wi-fi, relatively new appliances in the kitchen, and ceiling fans. Outside, on the wrap-around porch, there were more tables and chairs, a large grill, and lounge chairs to enjoy the outside. In the open area between the house and the river were a fire-pit and rustic seating.
The diamond digging tools were in a shed next to the main house, along with two canoes, some fishing gear, and a large wagon with inflatable tires. Tony figured out that it was for use in at the diamond field at the park. They could haul gear with the wagon.
On Monday, the family made their first trip to the park. First up was the park's visitors center where they learned about the history of the park, viewed diamonds found at the park, and learned about the area's history and geology from interactive exhibits. Next was the Diamond Discovery Center, where they learned multiple techniques for searching for the diamonds. The various rocks and minerals, besides diamonds, that could be found in the park were on display as well. A short video showed some of the techniques and how to recognize a diamond in the rough. They learned that diamonds come in all colors of the rainbow, but that the diamonds at Crater of Diamonds were white, brown, or yellow. Other rocks and minerals that could be found include amethyst, garnet, agate, jasper, quartz, sandstone, calcite, barite, and mica.
They learned that the diamonds from the crater were smooth, well-rounded, and mostly small – about the size of the head of a paper match. The typical diamond found by park visitors was around twenty points weight, but some as small as a single point, and as large as forty carats had been found over the years. Ziva reminded them all that the stones in her engagement ring were all about one carat so they were looking for tiny stones in their hunt for diamonds. One neat characteristic that they learned was that the diamonds feel as though they have an oily film on them. That prevents dirt from sticking to the surfaces. They also have a metallic luster and are not clear, but rather translucent. All rocks found were theirs to keep and park staff were available to help verify the finds.
"Are we ready?" Ziva walked to the cash register area of the Discovery Center to pay for the family's admission to the diamond field. She turned to the young man at the counter, "Two adults, two children between six and twelve, and three children under six." She paid the ten dollars each per adult and six dollars each for Tali and Anthony. The three youngest were free. Each had a paper wrist band for entry, color-coded and printed 'Monday.'
Tony retrieved the wagon, digging and sifting tools, and buckets from the back of the rental van. The family followed the path to the field. Anthony noted the shovel statue marking the location of the find of the largest diamond ever at the park – the 40.23 carat Uncle Sam diamond.
"I'm gonna find a big one!" he declared to his siblings.
Tali smirked and retorted, "Yeah, right. You'll be lucky to find a tiny diamond like the ones we saw inside. I'll be happy to find any of the rocks or minerals we saw, especially an amethyst."
With nearly forty acres to dig and sift, Tony looked for a spot away from other groups, but near one of the furrows made by the plow when the field was freshly plowed a week prior. They could dig as deeply as they wanted, but before leaving for the day, had to refill any holes made. The sifting and sorting of the dirt and rocks was the time-consuming part. Ziva, Tali, Anthony, and Tony worked for most of the six hours the family was in the field. Ziva had packed lunch and beverages for the family in a wheeled cooler that was at the cabin. Rivka and Beth helped quite a bit, but when they got bored, the two little girls just picked up rocks from the surface and added the interesting ones to the bucket of 'keepers' from the sifting process. LJ liked to dig, so Tony let him shovel the dirt into the sifting trays. The little boy dug even when the others were busy hunting through the sifting trays; he used his hands to sift when he spotted something interesting in the dirt. When he did find an interesting rock, he added it to the 'keepers' as well.
At the end of the first day, the collection included several nice pieces of jasper, calcite crystals, a few pieces of agate, multiple colors of quartz, and one small amethyst crystal that LJ found on the surface.
Ziva stopped at the grocery store again for more supplies for the rest of their stay, now that she knew how much space she had in the refrigerator, freezer, and pantry for storage. LJ was very happy when his parents added ice cream to the cart! Back at the cabin, everyone was tired out.
Day two yielded more calcite crystals, some mica, two more pieces of amethyst, a large piece of jasper, two small garnets, and a five-point white diamond. Anthony found the diamond in his sifter and got so excited he nearly dropped it in the dirt. Luckily, Ziva was able to steady the wood-framed sifter and keep the diamond from spilling out. Park staff certified the find and gave the boy a certificate stating the date and size of his diamond, and his name. Again, the family was exhausted when they returned to the cabin in the late afternoon.
They decided to do one more day at the crater on Wednesday, and then use Thursday to see other sights in the area. On day three, they had just finished lunch and resumed digging when Beth found a brown diamond in the sifter she and Tali were using. Rivka and LJ had been searching for calcite crystals on the surface as well as the tiny white diamonds they hoped to find. Each had added at least a dozen possible tiny stones to the bucket of 'keepers.'
Clouds were moving in, so the family decided to call it a day before rain started. Tony was moving dirt to refill the hole, and noticed two small white pieces in the loose gravel. He quickly pulled them from the rest of the rock and added them to the bucket of rocks to keep.
At the Diamond Discovery Center, Beth's brown diamond was measured at six points. The two white rocks that Tony found turned out to be ten- and twelve-point diamonds. Several of the tiny white pieces that were retrieved in the sifting process also were tiny diamonds, two at three points, and one at two points. The four garnets were measured at around thirty to forty points each, and the three amethysts were similar in size to the prior finds at forty-five points. The last of the possible diamonds had been found by Ziva as they were sifting the final tray of gravel and dirt. The park staffer grinned at Ziva after checking the stone.
"You have a thirty-seven-point diamond! That's about a third of a carat."
Ziva grinned as the park staffer certified her diamond and took a picture of her with the stone. The family each held one of the diamonds as the staffer took pictures with the DiNozzo's cameras.
"Ima, how did you find the biggest one?" Anthony wanted to learn his mother's secret to having the largest of their finds.
Ziva shrugged, "Pure luck; I did not do anything different from what we had been doing each day."
On Thursday, the main event for the day was a visit to the Ko-do-ha Indian Village, an archaeological site that had a self-guided tour, and on-site museum show-casing some of the digs, excavated mounds, a historic trading post and gift shop, and a field for digging for relics from the native peoples of the area.
In the museum, the exhibits held pottery jars and water bottles, pipes, stone tools, and projectile points left by the prehistoric residents who inhabited the area for over one thousand years. Examples of the houses, cooking utensils, and clothing were also on display in both the museum and mounds area.
At the plaza field, the family found two arrowheads, two pottery shards, and some calcite crystals. As Tali noted, they were 'old pros' at discovering items in the dirt from the experiences at the diamond crater. The kids made the choice to skip the trading post; as Anthony noted, it was too tourist-y for his taste.
Thursday afternoon and evening was spent relaxing at the cabin and enjoying the warmer than usual day. Ziva did two loads of laundry so that most of what was packed to head home was clean rather than needing to be washed. The final night of the trip would be spent in a hotel near the Fort Smith airport on Friday night. The flight home on Saturday would leave at 0730 local time.
On Friday, the family checked out of the cabin after breakfast and headed back to Fort Smith. Before checking into the hotel, they made the stop at Miss Laura's. Tony chuckled when the visitors' center staff handed him a 'souvenir wellness check' paper similar to what Miss Laura's girls had used after their weekly medical checks. The self-guided tour of the house took about an hour. The rich tapestries, colorful Victorian-era carpets and furniture, and the period costumes were more interesting to Tali, Rivka, Beth, and Ziva than to the males in the family.
At the airport on Saturday when the family walked to the waiting area for boarding, Tony joked that his backpack had gotten a bit heavier.
"That's 'cuz you have all the rocks, Abba," Anthony shot back with a grin.