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Cuasso al Monte is a municipality in the Province of Varese in the Italian region Lombardia, located about 50 km northwest of Milan and about 6 km northeast of Varese.
The area is lying at the foot of Monte Piambello, a 1125 meters high mountain, which is part of the Italian Alps. This mountain dominates the landscape in the area between Lago di Ghirla and Lago di Lugano.
There are sevarall active and abandoned quarries in this region, for instance Cava Bonomi, Cava Laghetto and Cava Puricelli.
(pictures by Domenico Preite)
Cava Bonomi is located 1km north of Cuasso al Piano. It is an active quarry, which is owned and operated by Cave Bonomi. The rocks extracted in Cava Bonomi, is known under the commercial name of “Red Porphyry”, however petrographers have given the stone the modern name “granophyre”.
It is a volcanic hypoabyssal rock, chemically sialic, essentially composed of K-feldspar, quartz and biotite in a lower quantity.
Mindat.org on Cava Bonomi.
Click on the Google Earth logo to go to a map of Cava Bonomi...
(pictures by Domenico Preite)
Cava Laghetto is an abandoned quarry, located close to Cavagnano and just ½km northwest of Cava Bonomi.
Mindat.org on Cava Laghetto.
Click on the Google Earth logo to go to a map of Cava Laghetto...
(pictures by Domenico Preite)
Cava Puricelli is located in between Cava Bonomi and Cava Laghetto.
Mindat.org on Cava Puricelli.
Click on the Google Earth logo to go to a map of Cava Puricelli...
(pictures by Domenico Preite)
Besides this 3 bigger quarries, there a several little abandoned quarries in the area, like for instance Cava del Prete.
Domenico Preite visited these four quarries and the surrounding area frequently over the last three decades. It is a very good locality for mineral collectors who prefer micromounts.
Some of the possible finds are minerals like Bertrandite, Hingganite-(Y), Gadolinite-(Y), Molybdenite, Xenotime-(Y), Bastnäsite-(Y), Synchysite-(Y), Synchysite-(Ce) and more common minerals like Albite, Quartz and Orthoclase.
(pictures by Enrico Bonacina & specimen by Domenico Preite)
(pictures by Matteo Chinellato, collection Domenico Preite)
Domenico Preite also gave us permission to publish some pictures of his specimen on this locality page. Photo's were taken by Enrico Bonacina and Matteo Chinellato.
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Also see:
Associazione Micro-mineralogica Italiana,
Mineralienatlas
Mindat.org on Cuasso al Monte.
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