White Man's Hole

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Probably one of the weirdest places we've ever been to is Coober Pedy, roughly half way between Alice Springs and Adelaide. For about 40km each side of the town you drive through a surreal apocalyptic landscape of white conical mullock heaps and old machinery, signs warning of the presence of thousands of mine shafts, each dug in the hope of finding opals. Coober Pedy itself is a small, dusty town with a population of about 2,000. Previously it boasted over 40 different nationalities although this is down to about 20 or so now that many people have left to try mineral mining elsewhere. Prominant in the town are the large Greek, Serbian and Croatian communities.

Opals were first found by a fourteen year old boy in 1915, there with his father looking for gold. Mining really took off after the first world war when the returning soldiers put their trench digging skills to use, living in the dugouts to escape the intense heat (which often hits 50 oC). Today about 50% of the population still live underground and there are underground churches, a bar and even an underground campsite! The town was named in 1920, a corruption of the bemused local aborigines' name for the area of Kupa-Piti, or "white mans hole".

Anyone can become an opal miner. For $37 you get a miners licence allowing you onto the opal fields. An additional fee gives you sole rights to a 50m x 50m area and plastic tags to nail onto four posts, allowing you to literally "stake your claim". Initially though, the licence allows you to try your luck anywhere, although you are not allowed to mine with equipment anyone elses claim. In theory you could legally enter a claim and hand pick through their waste heaps although it wouldn't be recommended! Illegally mining someone elses claim is known as "working the nightshift" and if caught would, if dealt with through the courts, cost you up to a $1000 fine. More likely you would be dealt with by the other miners and depending on their temperament could mean you being run out of town, or your body never being found, rotting away at the bottom of a shaft somewhere.

There are so many old shafts around that many miners make some degree of a living out of going through disused workings. Searching through old waste (mullock) heaps is known as noodling and there is a safe public area, away from any shafts, that apparently despite the thousands of people who have picked over it still gives up the occasional decent opal. We were advised by Gary, a miner, to try alongside an old creek, and along with Carl and Mel who we had previously met in the MacDonnell Ranges spent a few hours searching. Between us we found a few pieces but most of it was just potch, a white stone with little colour or value. What you're looking for is "colour", the reds, blues and greens of true opal. We found a few poor quality bits, one that Gary thought was maybe worth $50 if cleaned up and made into a necklace. He warned us against licking the stones to bring the colour out...not because it might be dirty but because its addictive, we might never leave. There is enough opal about that we could see how people became addicted, if you spent a few hours searching you would probably find something of interest so you didn't feel you were completely wasting your time, but of not enough value so that you didn't have to look anymore. A bit like gambling, you win enough to keep you interested but never quite win the big one. Gary certainly got a thrill out of the stones themselves, for their colours and interest, not just for any money they might be worth. He explained that it was better than looking for gold because although one piece of gold is much like another, every piece of opal is unique.

The proper miners these days normally dig a 1m diameter shaft, and then go down on a winch to check the sides for seams of potch that might lead to opal. The waste is sucked out with "blowers" and checked, sometimes with UV light, for any colour. If the shaft looks promising, a couple of bombs will be chucked down to create a "ballroom" big enough to stand up in, and then the miner will tunnel out from there. The sandstone around Coober Pedy is pretty stable and the mines don't need any props or supports. They can dig a number of shafts a day and so the number of mullock heaps around town is increasing all the time. Mining in the town itself is banned now because of the danger of weakening the ground, but dugouts used for housing can still be extended. One single man who lives in town by himself lives in something like a 30 bedroom house, obviously still finding enough stones to justify extending his house!

Its probably true to say that Coober Pedy has more than its fair share of eccentrics, maybe just because its such a weird place. We came here three years ago and visited Crocodile Harry, a Latvian immigrant who lived in a dugout decorated with thousands of womens underwear and assorted old junk. He was infamous for marching down the main street on Anzac day one year, wearing a German spiked helmet and goose stepping. So the legend goes. He also reakoned that it was him who Crocodile Dundee was based on. He was at deaths door when we saw him and has since died, but we found his grave that was suprisingly normal although it did have two tankards with naked women for handles. Another grave had a beer keg for a headstone along with a pump so when filled up the visitor can have a beer on the occupant! Crocodile Harry's house is still open for visitors although this time we didn't go. His bedroom was used in the film Mad Max III, completely unchanged from real life although the film crew left behind a mobile made from bits of old metal for him. A few films have been made around town and sometimes looking at the junk laying around its hard to know whether its old mining machinary, film props or somebodys crazed attempts at modern art.

Other legends that may or may not be true describe the time that the local newspaper got the TV listings wrong, and a miner missed his favorite programme. He was so furious that the newspaper office got a stick of explosives through the letter box blowing it up! Another time two new police officers started in town and were so despaired of the complete unroadworthiness of many of the vehicles driving around that they started to crack down and give people tickets. Their car also found itself the wrong side of a bomb!

Along with two couples that we met in Coober, we moved on 30 km to The Breakaways, a multi-coloured range of small hills that like the town of Coober Pedy also feature in several films, Mad Max III was partly filmed here, as was Priscilla, Queen of the Desert. The scenary is absolutely stunning, and we ended up staying a couple of nights, partly because we weren't happy with the sunset the first night!

Sue, Steve (and Andy their dog) and Trish and Graham met in Tasmania and have been travelling together ever since, much like we did with Pete and Nirbeeja when we first started our trip. All as mad as each other, we had a brilliant time and did our best to frighten off anyone else from camping near us. We'd have loved to have travelled with them for longer, but they're sensibly heading north to the warm, wheras we're only going to get colder going south. Linda, a German nurse was brave enough to join us and in actual fact is still with Claire and me now in Port Augusta. Probably the most infectiously enthusiastic person we've ever met, she's doing her best (although she really doesn't need to) to fatten us up, insisting on providing breakfast and then catering for about twenty.

On the way down to Port Augusta (or Porta Gutter as its often known) we stopped with Linda at Lake Hart for the night. A large salt lake its about 150 square kilometers in area. Walking on it its hard to believe its not snow, and especially in the early morning felt really cold to walk on. It was cold, but I think it was also partly psychological. The Lake backs onto the Woomera Prohibited Area, a massive weapons range (larger than England) used amongst other things for testing the UKs first atomic bombs back in the 1950s. One of the rocket test sites is just the other side of the lake, although not visible from the rest area. I thought it would be interesting to walk over there someday to see if there was any sign of the test sites. Later we went to the museum in Woomera and there was a model of the firing pad and a map of the lake and the observation posts and shelters. It said that the pad had been dismantled back in the 1960s. Still be interesting to see though. Back in Port Augusta, I looked on the net and found a website with photos of missiles being tested over Lake Hart recently. It is, apparently, still designated a "missile impact area". Probably a good job I didn't wander over there then.

The town of Woomera was established for the staff at the missile range in 1947, but was secret and didn't appear on any public maps until about 1982. It had a population of something like 6000 in its heyday, but its now down to about 300. Its a pretty spooky place, almost like a ghost town with a collection of various rockets and missiles in the town centre. Its a weird feeling to look into the back of a missile that was designed to carry a nuclear warhead (the Blue Steel missile carried by the UKs Victor and Vulcan Bombers until about 1970) and to see how utterly everyday it looks, wires and plugs and circuit identification plates, almost like looking into the back of a TV or something. The Woomera Prohibited Area has been scaled back a bit, but is still something like 127,000 square km and is apparently the biggest military range in the world. It makes you wonder what still goes on there.

So now we're back in Port Augusta and have completed a big circle round Perth and Darwin. We were here before back in January. Doesn't seem possible that we've driven 18,000km or something since we were last here. We're staying here a second night along with Linda, she's just popped into town with Claire to buy another few carrier bags full of food for dinner tonight. Off to Iron Knob tomorrow to see the guys we met there in January and to take any Knob pictures that we missed last time.

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Photos

The first tree in Coober Pedy!
There is no top soil in Coober Pedy so almost nothing grows

Inside a dugout
Part of Old Timers Mine

Crocodile Harry's grave
No more goosestepping down the highstreet!

Keep off the grass!
The "green" is actually old engine oil poured onto the dirt!

Bit dusty then!
After 11km of dirtroad