Well l can finally remember why l hated the drive up the center of Australia ten years ago! The drive from Marla to Coober Pedy, although shortish, was the most boring drive we'd done in a long time. All we saw was a long road with. Itching each side other than dirt and the occasional burnt out car.
We arrived at Coober Pedy by 11:30am, and it was exactly as l remembered. As you come in you see big sporadic mounds of dirt scattered in clusters with old mining trucks in amongst them. Then you reached town which has streets surrounded by dirt and old unused mining trucks. We pulled into the Big 4 Oasis caravan park to book into for the night, when we find the Cronans are still there. Even though it had only been a few weeks we were all excited to see each other again, and l secretly hoped that they had forgotten my embarrassing nights of profanities displayed the last time we had seen each other! Anyway, they were undecided whether to leave or stay another night and after a little convincing we suggested they we should travel to Adelaide together, especially seeing Mat had one tyre nearly bald and ready to blowout. So we parked the van under the shade cloth, yes that's right, this was the shade provided by the caravan park, under shade cloth. Great idea seeing were in he middle of the dessert. At first l thought the park fees of $35 per night were a tad hefty but then l went for a wee at the toilets, the amenities block was brand new and one of the best we've had to use on this trip. Hen the kids found the pool and games room, each in a separate silo. Again, your surprised! He quirkiness of Coober Pedy had started, or the great minds were displayed, will endeavor to work that one out. It is always so hot here, so they have put an unground pool in a dug out cement silo, and fitted the games room out with a big screen tv and pinnie games in another. The kids loved it, and so did we as we didn't have to worry about sunburn, but the downside was that it was so bloody noisy with the kids screaming and yahooing as the silo made everyone echo!!!

After lunch, Marty and the girls and l headed out for a drive just out of town to 'the Breakaways'. It was a short drive on a good dirt road and when we arrived, it took my breath away. The Breakaways is famous for being back drops in movies such as Priscilla Queen of the Dessert and one of the Mad Max movies. It is just spectacular, another place in Australia that everyone must see to believe the beauty of the place. The landscape is made up of flat topped are hills in a patchwork of rich red ochres, gold, white, yellow and browns. was just amazing how in the middle of nowhere of flat turran you are greeted with these colored hills. We tried to take the wonder in at the lookout while also trying to capture a brilliant shot on the Nikon. Hopefully the landscape will do the talking in the photos. We continued on the 70km loop track back to Coober Pedy where we drove up alongside the "dog fence". This is a fence which was originally built to protect sheep in the south from the dingoes in the north. it begins east of Surfers Paradise in QLD and stretches for 5300km and ends just north of Ceduna in the Great Australian Bight in SA. It is actually the longest continuous construction in the world!!! To anyone else who didn't research this area, it would have just looked like another farming fence. Was great to know the history of the fence before we saw it, was also funny listening to the girls talking to each other trying to spot a dingo at the fence....lol.
We arrived back in town and met the Cronans at Old Timers Mine to do some noodling for opals. Now if you already didn't know it, Coober Pedy is famous as one of the largest opal mining towns in the world. Australia actually mines 90% of the worlds opals, most of them are found here. Opals, or "fire in the stone" can be found anywhere in the area they reckon. So the kids were excited when we said we were going noodling in search of the big one. First thing though, we took a tour of Old Timers mine were we went underground. The girls loved it, especially seeing we had to wear bright pink hard hats on our heads. Was so glad l had a hard hat in as not long after going underground and l hit my head in the roof, would've hurt if l had no helmet on l reckon. Took the owners a while to turn the bloody lights on underground so we could see, before this Marty and l had our torches on our phones on trying to find the switch!! Lol... Was great for the girls to learn about the way life once was, and actually how life is, with the population of Coober Pedy living mostly underground to stay cool in the dessert heat. Was also greatly presented with old mining equipment and they have actually kept the underground house as it was back when the Goughs lived there. The Gough family was a huge mining family here in Coober Pedy back in the 1900's. After the self mine tour, we headed up to above ground to the bright sunshine. Oh yeah, it was bloody hot as always!! We then had a demonstration of "the blower". Now this piece of equipment is sort of like a huge vacuum cleaner on a truck. It sucks up the rocks and blows them out the other side. The kids thought it was great. They not only got to out their hand in but they also got to have big rocks sucked out of their hands into the blower. They couldn't get enough of it! I put my hand in and all l could focus of was all the loose skin flapping indie the sucker, like if you were parachuting out of a plane, what your face would look like. Nikki and l didn't like seeing this part of our body flapping in the wind.. After the demonstration the kids took to noodling for opals (in other words, fossicking) in the pit, Marty even having a big crack. You know Marty, always in search of treasure. I headed inside to purchase my opal earrings, worth a whopping $12. I know, such a big spender!!
After an hour or do of noodling, the kids had found some awesome rocks with some remnants of opals in them. So we headed off for our quick drive around town to look at the tourist spots. First stop, the Big Winch. Another famous thing is Australia is our big monuments of strange things. In Coober Pedy, it's a winch! The lookout area where the winch is located is a terrific view overlooking the town and horizon. The big winch was actually a tourist attraction, not surprising, it was closed down with a 'for sale' sign out front. Next stop was the 'moon rock yard' which had these weird looking space type sculptures with quirky crap around the place. Some of it looked really cool and some was just strange. Thought was a bit of cheek that they had a money donation box there, obviously l didn't contribute! The kids had fun exploring around the yard though. We all then drove into town and took happy snaps of this funny looking done up VW buggy and a spaceship!!! I told you Coober Pedy was strange. The kids had had enough so we headed back to the caravan park for some chips and wine/beer (for the adults of course!).
One thing l will never forget of our time in Coober Pedy was the amazing sunset that l witnessed. The sun was setting and Nikki told me to head out to the street were l could get a better photo. The sunset was amazing, bright orange sun heading off the horizon with the sky turning pink and red as it set. Whilst trying to enjoy the moment l had the fortune of listening to some local mob yelling abuse in their language loudly. I actually felt like l was back in Alice! Anyway, after a few moments they started coming my way. I was a little unsettled but also felt like l wasn't going to be harmed. Still, l did turn round to see how far l was away from the caravan park entrance. Anyway, as it turns out, l had the great fortune of meeting a fella called Chris Norris, you know, like Chuck. No s***, this is how he introduces himself. He was a little drunk, but was a nice bloke, had a little chat. From now on l also know to introduce myself as 'sister Bell' as when l did this with Chris, he knew straight away that l was a nurse and l felt like his guard came down a bit. I took this as a lucky chance meeting and didn't want to test the waters too much, so headed back to the caravan park.
Back at happy hour, Leanne and her daughter Harmony (l know!) joined us with the Cronans. Now that was an experience. Nice enough lady but a bit of a free spirited person who was also traveling, but chose to call it her "journey". One thing that was pretty cool about meeting her was that she did a taro card reading for me. My cards were actually "letting go" and "healing". Really bizarre and freaked me out. Not saying anymore, but those that know my story will totally understand.....
We all eventually called it a night, a little late than would have liked. I was just finishing up reading on my kindle when l heard these footsteps outside. I thought it was the people next to us coming back from the toilet, but it kept going on for ages. I stuck my head up and could see these two black fellas looking thru the Cronans and our stuff. I yelled out "what the Hell are you doing out there?", and the response was "lookin for some smokes". My response to the bloke that didn't run off straight away was "f*** off home you b******!!". Gladly, he did just as l asked!! After l had handled the situation Marty wakes to add "yeah, go on ya b******, get out of here!". I had to laugh to myself, glad my husband protected me....Obviously it took a while for my nerves to settle and l was a little scared they would come back with more of their mob, but eventually l dropped off to sleep.......
Tomorrow we are finishing our last leg of our trip down south, and now it is made better as we have the Cronans to do it with.

Bell Xxx