Better know your gems or you'll be overwhelmed by your bags of rocks after your "mining" for gems in cold water and not know what you're bringing home. Staff is more knowledgeable than they appear so hopefully they are not too crowded to spend time with you.

A fun place to go with the kids! I loved the little museum you could walk through!

The mines were interesting and free to view, the gem buckets helped kill time, and were an active way to entertain the kids. well worth the stop.

We "mined" for gems and found it to very fun and rewarding. We both found several gems and each had a ring made from one of our "finds". We ordered the rings right there at the mine and they were shipped to us. We learned about different stones and just had a wonderful playful time. It was almost like being... More

I had picked out this place as a fun sidetrip for my wife who is a gemologist. We had expected it to be a bit cheesy, but thought it could be fun. It is out of the way, which is not a problem. However, after spending a short amount of time here, we were sorely disappointed. We chose not to... More

I last visited Emerald Village about 20 years ago and really enjoyed it; so today on my day trip I made a point of going back again. I think it's a great place for kids and families but adults it's a waste of time. The free exhibits look like a pile of junk. There were several items in the music... More

We stopped here after visiting Linville Caverns. This is a great place for families to visit. The staff is all very friendly and knowledgable. Gem mining and panning for gold were both successful (kids went crazy over finding gold and gems). And the tour of Bon Ami mine was beautiful and educational. Great for families

Granted there is very little to do in the Little Switzerland area (I drove thirty miles up the blue ridge parkway to discover this the hard way - I hope Switzerland doesn't look like this), but I wouldn't get too excited about the emerald village. I paid $7.00 a person to tour a mine and museum. There wasn't much to... More

We visited here with our children 6, 8, 9, and 11. It was by far the cleanest gem mining place we have visited. We purchased two $25 buckets and it had better gems than the $10 bucket. The water was actually very clean and it was more like picking through the rocks to find the gems. When we have been... More