Blogs from Coober Pedy, South Australia, Australia, Oceania - page 8

22nd November - 24th November 2009 Coober Pedy Coober Pedy is not much to look at on the surface. You do have the thought run through your head, 'who the hell would want to live out here'? It's not till you get underground that you really see how beautiful it is. Above ground it is dry, grey, treeless, grassless, boring and bleak. Underground it is magical. Coober Pedy is an opal mining town, it is the largest producer of opal in the world. The outskirts of town are full of mined opal fields, evidence of these opal mines is in the large dirt mounds that litter the landscape or 'moonscape' as it is often referred too. As you drive around you come across 'Danger' signs, warning you not to go for alittle wander around or you ... read more

The next day we were up at 5am for the long drive to Coober Pedy where we arrived at 2pm. Coober Pedy is roughly half way to Uluru. On the way we stopped at a salt lake that Doc (the tour guide) said is normally dry but today it had water. You could see the salt that had dried on the floor around the outside of the lake. Getting to Coober Pedy we had a little tour of the town where we went into the underground church. A lot of the population of 3000 lives underground because in the summer the temperature can reach over 50 degrees! The town is famous for opal mining, a lot of Australia and probably the world's opals come from here. We saw a short film, had a talk about the ... read more

Port Pirie - Marree - Leigh Creek - William Creek - Oodnadatta - Cooper Pedy Es ging von Port Pirie los aufm Stuart Highway etwas gegen Norden, aber dann schon schnell mal rechts abbiegen und über die Ausläufer der Flinders Ranges etwas Inland und dann wieder gegen Norden. Die Flinders Ranges sind mehrere Hügelzüge, übrigens die grössten Hügel in ganz South Australia, welche ein Nationalparkgebiet sind. Historisch ebenfalls interessant (Gold etc.) aber auch schlicht fantastische Natur. Eine der Zivilisation nahegelegene Wüste (Adelaide). Wir sind da dann von Quorn nach Hawker und dann über Leigh Creek nach Marree gedüst. Eigentlich ist alles verschlafen und es passiert nicht viel. Diese Orte haben dann so ca. 300 Einwohner wenns dann viel ist. In Marree haben wir unser Zelt aufgelschlagen. Ein seltsames Nest. Ich hab da zwei girls kennengelernt, eine ... read more

Up and off this morning to get to Coober Pedy nice and early. Although the hour difference between states did stump us when we got there. It was another pretty uneventful drive and apart from the odd lizard here and there, both dead and alive there really wasn't anything else to see. The first thing we did in Coober Pedy was the Old Timers Mine. It was cool to go down into the mines and learn about how they got the Opal. I'm glad hard hats were compulsory otherwise I'd have a very sore head. There was even an underground house which was really weird but strangely appealing if decorated! It even showed you big deposits of Opal still in the rock face. Outside we had ago at noodling for our own Opal through discarded rock. ... read more

Hi all. My turn for a scribble whilst the 5 kids are supposedly bunking down 34 steps underground. What a fabulous day. This country we live in is amazing. Vibrant green hills, blue waters and the next minute sparce vacant land covered only in salt bush and red unbeleivable salt lakes as far as the eye can see and then nothing but the rear of the stocker camper trailer. We can travel kilometres without the sight of another vehicle and then suddenly a massive roadtrain will appear on the horizon. Coober pedy is a weird place. Red dirt, more red dirt and then even still more red dirt. Kids have bought post cards and written them tonight, the receptionist at the backpackers has taken pity on the family of "9" and have provided the kids with ... read more