This morning, we were excited to go on the Rio Tinto Mine Tour. We arrived at the Visitor Information Centre with our closed in shoes, and there were 47 people in the group. 2 days ago, they still needed numbers in order for the tour to run - people sure came out of nowhere! We selected some very ill-fitting hardhats and safety glasses, and made our way onto the bus - our driver/guide was Bob - he turned out to be very knowledgeable.

Bob took us through the town of Tom Price, and pointed out the various features including the sports ground, swimming centre, etc. The mine was a couple of kms out of town so Bob had lots of background info to tell us about. On arrival at the entrance gate, you could already tell that it was a working place - cars, people, trucks, trains all around in a relatively small area. Bob drove us around the site and he described the uses of some of the areas, including the FIFO (fly-in, fly-out) accommodation - workers (men & women) fly into Tom Price, work hard on day shift for a week, then night shifts for a week, and fly out for a week off). It's pretty hard work, but they get paid well for it.

After a while we came to "The Lookout" - a dusty area bound by 'windrows' - we were allowed off the bus, and this is where our safety hats and glasses had to be worn. You can see down the few hundred metres where iron ore has been mined already, and across to Southern Ridge where mining is currently occurring. Right next to us was Mt Price, where the first discovery was made back in 1962. It was Hamersley's Mine (after the Hamersley Ranges) for a long time, until it was bought by Rio Tinto. There was a large stationary excavator at the lookout, but more interesting was waiting for the humungous tipper trucks coming along every few minutes full of the iron ore. They were huge, and use 20L of diesel every kilometre! The place runs 24x7 and is expanding into other areas nearby Tom Price. We got back on the bus, and Bob drove us through and around all the conveyor belts that transfer the iron ore from crushers, to water tanks, to other crushers, to piles etc, until eventually it gets onto the trains which are about 2.5kms and about 260 carriages that head to Dampier to the ships. That was about it for the tour - it was 1.5 hours long and well worth the $90 for the family ticket.

After the tour, we ran into the couple whom we'd met at 80 Mile Beach that had the yellow bird called Bob - we caught up with them and their friends, did a spot of shopping at a great little boutique called "Mister & Sister", and went back to the van for lunch.

Then we took off to Mt Nameless, the highest point in Western Australia. It's a 4WD track only and only a few kms long - it took us high above Tom Price and we could see our caravan park, and the town, and the Rio Tinto Mine Site - Mum & Renee also ran into a nice little lizard. That done, we came back to the caravan park and had a refreshing swim. During the afternoon, we noticed quite a malodour in the van and around the front boot area, so we cleared out the boot to try and isolate the smell. Dad happened to ask our neighbour to take a whiff to see what he thought the smell might be. Well, the neighbour was an auto-electrician, and he immediately diagnosed a short in the battery as it was burning hot. So the smell was basically battery acid. He disconnected the bad battery and the smell immediately dissipated, thankfully. We are 1 battery short, but at least can breathe easy.