IMPORTANT: CACHE IS ONLY AVAILABLE BETWEEN MAY 15 - OCTOBER 15, 8 AM - 8 PM
A BEACON OF HOPE guiding wooden sailing ships during the Golden Age of Sail 1830-1880 and steel-hulled steamers through the 1970's, the Walton Lighthouse is the last original lighthouse in Hants County.
This wooden structure was built by Timothy Parker in 1873 at a cost of $620. The base is 15 feet (4.6m) square. The tower height is 20 feet (6.1m) to the top deck upon which sits the house, containing the light. The lantern is 8 feet (2.4m) in height, elevated 60 feet (18.3m) above high water. The lower floor's interior walls are finished with plaster while the walls on the second floor are sheathed with wood.
Walton Harbour was the second busiest port in Nova Scotia in the 1950's. For nearly 100 years, its light guided ships into Walton port where they loaded cargoes of pulpwood, gypsum, or barite. Shipping declined in the 1970's and the lighthouse was decommissioned. It was declared a heritage property by the Province of Nova Scotia on April 12, 1992.
In order to complete this cache you must use the 'Message this owner' function to send me the answers to the following five (5) questions. All answers can be found inside the lighthouse. Please note the hours of operation at the top of the cache listing.
For most of the Walton Lighthouse's active life, light from two large, flat kerosene wicks, magnified by means of a Fresnel lens with a 16 inch (41cm) reflector, shone through its brass lantern. It used kerosene the same as an ordinary oil lamp found in the homes. A black screen revolved around the outside of the lamp so that the light was visible 10 seconds, dark 3 seconds, visible 4 seconds and dark 3 seconds (occulting), through a repeating cycle. This sequence was printed on nautical charts of the day. It was unique to the Walton light allowing mariners to accurately distinguish the Walton light from others in the bay area. The screen was operated by a clock mechanism that had to be hand wound each night by cranking a handle for about 60 turns. In 1986, the light was converted to an automatic system with an electronic flasher installed. In 1999 a gas light identical to the original was installed. The tower now features an original 'Methane' lamp.
The lighthouse was serviced by a Canadian Coast Guard steamer from Saint John, New Brunswick, which delivered the kerosene for the lamp in 45 gallon drums. The steamer would anchor about two miles off shore on the flood tide and transfer the kerosene to a motor launch which ferried he drums to the shore near the breakwater. From there is was hauled, usually by a horse and drag or wagon, to a shed near the lighthouse, then put into a tank.
QUESTION #1: What were the surnames of the below men, and what were their jobs?
QUESTION #2: What was the volume (in gallons) of the tank used to store the kerosene at the lighthouse?
QUESTION #3: The lamp currently sits on a painted orange pedestal. What are the four alphanumeric characters embossed on the side of the pedestal?
In the middle of the 19th century, Walton and many other communities bordering the Minas Basin had a shipyard. The Walton shipyard was located near the site of the present location of the concrete barite silos. It was first opened by Francis Parker who had the barque Walton built there in 1855 along with several other ships.
William S. Vaughan, a prominent shipbuilder of the day acquired the shipyard in the 1870's and built several ships there.
QUESTION #4: What was the tonnage of the largest ship built at the Walton shipyard?
Barite was first noted to occur in the Walton area in 1874-75 by Hugh Fletcher of the Geological Survey of Canada. Interest in barite was rekindled in the late 1930's as a strategic mineral used for oil production in the Caribbean and South America.
Barite has a unique property of being a very dense rock, almost twice as heavy as granite. It is soft and can easily be ground into a powder. When the powder is mixed with water the resulting fluid is much heavier than the rock that hosts oil deposits. When drilling for oil and gas, if the barite fluid is pumped into the drill hole, the weight of the fluid prevents blow outs. In 1940 Springer-Sturgeon Gold Mines was exploring the old manganese occurrences of the Walton area. Manganese is a metal important in the manufacturing of steel. The old barite surfaces occurrence was rediscovered in 1941 and subsequent drilling outlined a barite deposit at surface of 5 to 8 million tonnes. In that year Canadian Industrial Minerals was formed and began mining barite under the product trademark CIMBAR. A mill built near the former Government wharf was used to crush and refine mud grade barite.
- An interesting read on Walton’s Link to the White House from author G. A. O’Reilly can be found here.
QUESTION #5: A Canadian Industrial Minerals Ltd. barite shipping bag is on display. How many pounds (lb) of powdered barite did it hold?
Optional self-guided shoreline tour
After completing the cache requirements I highly recommend taking a self-guided tour of the Walton River shoreline. Parking and reference waypoints are provided. For your safety stay away from cliff faces due to falling rocks, and as the area is home to a 40.7 foot (12.40m) tidal range be constantly aware of the tidal times. The tidal chart for Walton can be found here and a live webcam can be viewed here.
The earliest noted shipping activity from Walton was in 1820 where ships tied up along the bank of the Walton River near the creek outlet of the South Mountain gypsum quarry. In 1836 there are reports of a plaster mill and wharf near the present location of the aboiteau. The lighthouse was built in 1873 as a vital navigation aid to the increasing ship traffic in the area.
In 1889 as gypsum exports from the area were increasing, E. Churchill built a shipping pier near the location of the Government wharf. This was quickly followed by the construction of the breakwater in 1891 and an extension to the gypsum wharf was added in 1913. Various upgrades to the gypsum wharf were added over the years to mainly increase the loading rate. However, modern steel ships were upsizing to take advantage of lower freight costs. This was the undoing of the gypsum exports from Walton where the largest ship able to tie up could carry only 4000 tonnes of ore. The last ship loaded by National Gypsum sailed from Walton in 1972.
The Government wharf was built in 1914 and survived intact until 2012 when it was destroyed by fire.
Self-guided tour #1: Remnants of Gypsum Plant & Storage facility 
Self-guided tour #2: Condemned breakwater 
The Walton shore is underlain by sedimentary rocks of the Carboniferous age Horton and Windsor Groups. Horton sandstone, shale and conglomerate were laid down in a sedimentary basin at a time of extensive erosion of adjacent highland areas. Windsor marine limestone, sandstone, shale and evaporates were then deposited over the Horton sediments in a large inland sea perhaps not unlike the Dead Sea today. Between these two formations lie the conglomerate and limestone breccia of the Macumber formation. The region was subjected to periods of intense folding and faulting together with mineralizing events.
The key to the Walton barite, sulphide deposit was the porous nature of the Macumber conglomerate acting as a pathway for mineralizing fluids, intersecting faults that created a steeply dipping pipe-like structure that hosts the mineralization and the right time in geologic history that eroded the overlying rocks to a level where the mineral deposit was exposed at surface to be found at a time in human history when the minerals could be used.
Wikipedia: Fold (geology)
Self-guided tour #3: Geological fold 
Self-guided tour #4: Lighthouse from Walton River bed at low tide 
Thank you Geocaching HQ for awarding me this Virtual Cache to share with the community!
Virtual Reward - 2017/2018
This Virtual Cache is part of a limited release of Virtuals created between August 24, 2017 and August 24, 2018. Only 4,000 cache owners were given the opportunity to hide a Virtual Cache. Learn more about Virtual Rewards on the Geocaching Blog.
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