Day 24 - Coober Pedy

Let me start this blog entry by saying I thought everything in Coober Pedy was underground.......silly me it's not.

However there is a lot under ground and it's definately part of the tourism appeal.

We are staying at the The Lookout Cave under ground motel, after sleeping in the camper with most nights being below 0 degrees the constant 25degrees in our underground room is feeling a little warm, sleeping last night was cosy & felt almost too warm, sad really. But it's a really nice motel & the family running it are lovely. So this morning started with a nice private hot shower and toast, toast is a luxury when camping and I had not eaten any for the past couple of weeks, delicious.

After ambling out slowly we met up with Linda & Tayla and decided to go to a working mine for a tour. Toms Mine. We were greeted by the owner Jimmy, a very funny man and then taken on our tour. Very interesting. We got to go underground and see how they mine opal. Jimmy had a funny sense of humour and didn't hold back telling us what would kill us underground and gave the kids a crash course in making bombs. Chloe even got to take a ride up the swing lift to get out of the mine. Coober Pedy supplies 95% off the worlds opals. Opal is worth $30,000 per troy ounce. But because Australia cannot keep up with the worlds demands they can pretty much charge whatever they want. Opal is beautiful but not my personal favourite gem so Matts wallet was safe.

We found a bakery for lunch with the best jam donuts. After lunch we went to have a look at the Serbian Orthodox Church which is underground. It has some beautiful religious carvings cut out of the rock face.

After lunch Matt, Chloe & I headed off to the Breakaways, these are a group of hill & rock features sitting on their own and given the name because they look like they have broken away from the Stuart Ranges. They are an interesting landscape, almost like sand and all different colours. Most also have an aboriginal story about them being dogs & emus.

Tonight we got together with the others at their caravan park for a BBQ and a couple of drinks. Tomorrow we are heading off to stay at a sheep station out past Port Augusta.