Fakebusters: Boulder Opal

This is a quick two part Fakebusters, as initially there was a fake, but then the fake got so much worse!

So, this was supposed to be boulder opal. Normally there is some nice, often stratified layers with patches of firey opal between them. This looks more like chopped up pieces of opal in a type of resin, which is way too translucent to be the fossilised mud of boulder opal. But there is also something else not quite right, and I couldn't put my finger on it until I saw the next photo from the same seller.

This fake gave me my "Eureka!" moment. The chopped up pieces are actually a type of milky glass, often called opalite or even girasol, which it is neither. So this one is a fake within a fake!

This time they really went all out on the opalite, with great big whopping chunks of it present!