wwh: I found some great stuff on salt on a link below! There are photographs of salt crystals, some pink halite and one a colorless halite that has a blue cast. They are very beautiful, in some cases.

What was most interesting was the refining process, in which the mined salt is completely doused with water. When it dries, it forms something called a hopper. The link below will take you directly to a sketch of the hopper:

http://www.minerals.net/glossary/terms/h/hopper.htm

and this link will take you to a page that is loaded with information about salt:

http://www.minerals.net/mineral/halides/halite/halite.htm

That's the page where you can click on the photographs of the salt crystals.

I do want to read about the salt mines in Ireland...

Best regards,
Rocky