We went off prospecting this morning, or 'noodling' as the locals call it when you fossick through the mullock heap looking for opal. We all found a few small bits of potch which is white opal that is worthless. C was so excited at the start but was positively depressed after an hour or so. The ugly side of disappointed youthful enthusiasm.

We walked about the town a bit to have a look. Went into several opal places, but then again, every store in town sells opals.

Then headed home to get ready to do the tour. This took us to a real mine, the dingo fence, the moon plains, the Breakaway mountains and then to an opal museum and underground house and mine. The tour guide took us into a bedroom and closed the door to show it is completely dark, silent and cool. It ended with a visit to an underground church, which was very impressive. The dugout houses are always cool; 21-25° year round. 65% of the population live underground and this is the only place in the world for that. Water here is a precious resource. They have a bore 40km away and it still needs to be desalinated. Our guide was Yanni who is a funny old Greek man. He was a miner so his perspective was very apt. There have been a heap of movies filmed here including Pitch Black and The Red Planet. A space ship from Pitch Black is outside the museum in the main street.

Pizza was such a hit last night everyone wanted to do the same again.

The picture is the dingo fence looking south towards the moon plains. Unbelievably barren place.