Coober Pedy – 31 July, 1 and 2 August 2009

 From Wirraminna we drove to Coober Pedy – the Opal capital of the world - staying at the Stuart Ranges Camping Park.

Mining on a large scale started after World War I – and the ex-Diggers faced with lack of timber and used to living in trench occupied the failed mines. The local aborigines thought these men were the ghosts of their ancestors who had lost their colour, and called them Kupta Piti loosely translated as white men jumping out of holes. This became Coober Pedy.

 

Next day we took the Stuart Tour. This was a fabulous tour with a wealth of information.

 

 

 

We saw the Breakaways and gazed out on what was once the bottom of the ocean bed many millions of years ago. We saw moon rocks and the moon plain. We also saw rocks made of fossilized salt water. Moon rocks are very popular for decorating the above ground buildings.

 

We stopped at the dog fence which is designed to keep the dingoes north.

We visited the Serbian Church, an underground church that is world heritage listed [only twelve years after it was built], and the only one we know of with a bar.

When you look at this hill every vent has a room underneath it. Air goes out through the small vents. The larger vents pull air in very slowly and it is either warmed or cooled by the rocks depending on the season.

Correctly done the temperature will remain between 23C [73F] and 25C [77F] degrees all year round. This is why underground living is so popular here as the ambient temperatures on the surface vary from -2C [28F] to 65C[149F].

We saw an old time dugout, very dusty, and a modern dugout which is finished with silcrete to eliminate the dust. A new dugout it is left for a year or more so the rock dries out. Otherwise there are constant problems with damp. Houses can be as grand as you want; all you have to do is dig another room and as miners these guys are pretty good at that. One has an indoor lap pool and shooting range for his high powered rifle. And noise from parties stays indoors.

 

The vacuum cleaner truck [a local invention] sucks excavated rock from the mine. When the drum fills the vacuum is blocked, the drum base opens and empties the drum thus restarting the vacuum and sucking the drum base closed again. All the mine dumps are about 10% opal and a popular pastime is noodling for opal, that is sifting through the piles of rubble and seeing what you can find. Noodling can be dangerous because of all the mine holes and because the dumps are inherently unstable.

 

When a seam of opal is found, it still has to be mined by hand.

Opal is formed from a solution of silicon dioxide and water. As water runs down through the earth, it picks up silica from sandstone, and carries this silica-rich solution into cracks and voids , caused by natural faults or decomposing fossils. As the water evaporates, it leaves behind a silica deposit. This cycle repeats over very long periods of time, and eventually opal is formed.

Golf, mostly played at night with glowing balls, is on a course which replicates Royal St Andrews minus the grass. This is the only golf course which has reciprocal rights with St. Andrew Golf course

Before leaving we filled our tanks, water is scarce here. It comes from a bore into the Great Artesian Basin and reverse osmosis is used to make it drinkable. This means they have great water but they charge for it.

Main street Coober Pedy. The Desert Cave Hotel has some dugout rooms and excellent coffee

Wirraminna Station – 30 July 2009

    

From Roxby Dam we drove to Wirraminna Station where we camped near the shearer’s quarters.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

On the road to Wirraminna we passed Island Lagoon a salt lake where the Americans built their tracking facility.

Shortly after this we stopped at Lake Hart.

 

 

 

 

 

The line for the modern Ghan passes next to Lake Hart and it was interesting to see the modern concrete sleepers with sprung steel attaching plates, in place of the old Jarrah sleepers and steel ties.

Tricia enjoyed one of her favorite pastimes, salt lake walking.

 

Quite often we pass Wedge Tailed Eagles feeding off road kill.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sections of the Stuart Highway have been developed as airstrips to allow the Royal Flying Doctor Service to use them in event of emergencies. They come about every 80 kms.

Roxby Downs, Andamooka, Woomera - 28 to 30 July 2009

We left Marree in the afternoon for the mining town of Roxby Downs, following the Oodnadata Track.

By chance we met Paul Clancy, who had left Beltana Station the day we arrived, and was trekking with his four camels from Port Augusta to Alice Springs. He stopped for lunch and a chat and we passed on Graham and Laura's best wishes and replenished his supply of dark chocolate.

 

 

 

 

Along the track a local homestead has commissioned an artist to do an annual art work. Some of the results are below.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The recent rains have brought out many of the desert wildflowers - beautiful and delicate in the harsh landscape.

Having visited most of the abandoned copper mines in South Australia, Roxby Downs with the nearby Olympic Dam Mine the world's sixth largest copper and largest uranium deposits, is still in its growth phase. 

In addition to being a good pit stop as the water [bore water put through reverse osmosis] is perfectly pure and being a mining town the shopping is good, it is also a most interesting area.

The first day we toured the Arid Recovery Reserve. This 86 sq km fenced area of Arid lands excludes feral animals especially cats and foxes allowing the reestablishment of populations of Greater Bilbies, Burrowing Bettongs, Western Barred Bandicoots and Sticknest rats which had survived on off-shore islands.

They have designed a special fence dug in with a floppy over hang which prevents cats from climbing over. They hope by eradicating foxes and cats they will be able to use these ark populations to repopulate mainland Australia.

Both the Bilbies and Bettongs dig small holes when they forage which leaves behind a perfect little seed bed for indigenous plants.

The highlight of the tour was seeing the Bettong's after sunset, although they did not perform perfectly for the camera. As the guide said the Bettong "is not the sharpest knife in the drawer" when it comes to species, but it is extremely cute, looking like a miniature kangaroo.

The next day we drove to Woomera 80 km. south of Roxby Downs. It still is a prohibited area, although the village is now open to tourists. A woomera is an aboriginal word for a spear thrower which enables the spear to be thrown faster than by the arm alone. Woomera is the worlds largest defense systems test and evaluation range.

The UK Government, having suffered the German V2 Rocket attacks, put a high priority on developing their own capacity. As there were no suitable places for testing in England in 1947 Woomera was established as an Anglo Australian joint venture. The Woomera Prohibited Area now 127,000 sq kilometers, about the size of England or Florida, was established. It was initially twice that size.

In the 1960's the USA also built facilities there. The national Missile park has examples of missiles and Rockets tested over the last 60 years.
The Woomera Heritage Centre has an extremely good historical overview of Woomera. It must have been a great place to live, working with very smart people at the forefront of research. The town has very happy vibes.

Although Woomera is less relevant it is still used for testing.

The following day we toured the Olympic Dam Mine. which contains Copper, Silver, Gold and Uranium, and is owned by BHP Billiton.

This was a very good and instructive tour. We were not allowed to take photographs. Olympic Dam is named after a tiny water bore and tank established by the Roxby Downs sheep station the year Melbourne hosted the Olympics.

At present it is an underground mine but they want to move to open cut. Like all things Uranium this will be a controversial political decision.

Marree - Lake Eyre 26 - 27 July 2009

From Arkaroola we drove to Marree via Copley. This tested Trish's packing for dirt roads. We have been pleased that so far it has stood up successfully and we haven't found the biscuits reduced to crumbs or the oil all over the cupboard.

Marree was known as Hergotts Crossing until WW1 when anti-German sentiment saw the name changed. Marree means place of many possums. It is the intersection of the Birdsville Track and the Oodnadatta Track.

For a while it was the rail head for the Ghan Express train. Later when the line went to Alice Springs the track's gauge width changed here [don't ask - it is an Australian thing!!] it was where one was woken up in the middle of the night to get onto a narrower or broader gauge train.

 

People who endured that journey say it was a nightmare, but at least the hotel did a roaring trade as all the passengers had to leave the train. Marree declined when the train line relocated west.

The Oasis Caravan Park is basic but offers a $10 barbecue. For that you get a mixed grill and dessert of apple strudel and vanilla slice, cooking like Nonna used to make courtesy of two Italian backpacker girls who along with a visiting station owner who had flown from Bellingen to see Lake Eyre, provided the evenings entertainment of poetry and singing. This was a great evening.

It was here we first saw what must be an outback phenomenon of circling of the wagons, where even with space to spare, people parked as close as possible and then surrounded their vans with vehicles. We are not sure which predator was of concern.

The next day we flew over Lake Eyre. It really is a fantastic sight, with water. Lake Eyre is the worlds largest internally draining system. Normally it is a salt pan.  It fills infrequently mostly from floods in Queensland this year from floods in the Georgina River. When it fills it is a mecca for birds and humans.  Because the floods came late in the season less birds came to breed, although the air was quite busy with flights from Marree, William Creek, Birdsville and elsewhere.

Maree alone averaged thirty departures a day.


The Lake Eyre Yacht Club at Marree is a triumph of optimism. The Commodore had a two week cruise this year.





We also flew over the Marree Man, a 4.2 km tall man ploughed into the desert, making him the world's largest artwork.

There is a great deal of speculation about the originator of this Artwork and theories abound. Some believe it was the Americans then based at Woomera because they had access to GPS tracking, although this seems unlikely as they would have found it hard to have 3 months of spare time required to do the plowing.

 

 

A former policeman we met in Coober Pedy believes it was a local "bushie" from the Roxby Downs area, rich enough to have a bulldozer and GPS, but it seems unlikely the truth will ever be known.

Arkaroola - 24 & 25 July 2009

We left Beltana heading for Arkaroola, one of the best known locations in the Northern Flinders Ranges.

On the way we called in at Iga Warta an information centre owned by the Adnyamathanha people.Their display enables you to learn some of their history in the area.

Arkaroola [http://www.arkaroola.com.au] was established and built by Reg Sprigg in the 1970’s when he took over the lease of Arkaroola Station. Arkaroola comes from the Adnyamathanha word Arkaroo meaning a mythical monster. The owners refer to it as an ark for the flora, fauna and rocks of the area, and they have done a lot of work to eradicate feral goats, rabbits and camels. This private sanctuary was one of the first true ecotourism ventures in Australia.

Dr. Reg Sprigg was a rock star [geologist] who first came to the area as part of the wartime Manhattan Project, to reactivate the Radium Hill Uranium Mining field and to regionally map the Mt Painter Uranium field.

He made many important discoveries, the most significant being the world’s first multi celled organisms which left an imprint on the sedimentary rock in the Ediacara Hills. These organisms have been dated at 620 million years old. Their discovery has led to the naming of a new era the Ediacaran era.

Arkaroola is now a period piece from the 1970’s. It is attractive and comfortable. We enjoyed the Native Pine restaurant and did the Ridgetop Tour which is a fantastic way to see the unique geology of the area from the comfort of a 4wd. Their tyres last about 4,000kms on the very steep rocky roads so we were glad it was not our Landcruiser doing the tour.

This road was built by the uranium prospectors and Exoil. The views are fantastic and it is obvious why Reg Sprigg wanted to preserve it.

The mining companies have left behind a lot of good tracks. Nowadays prospecting is done by helicopter [a dangerous job as they fly within 3 or 4 meters of the slope amongst strong updrafts] and also by analyzing the leaves of deep rooted plants. The plants roots bring minerals to the surface and what is below can be inferred by the trace elements in their leaves. Although it seems unlikely that the Government would allow mining on Arkaroola mining companies are still prospecting.

Confirming our ability to tow rain clouds behind the caravan, it rained overnight. Not a lot, but enough to settle the dust for our drive to Maree.