The 3 tonne Roadstar and the camper trailer left today. Later, three vans came in, so that was a measure of how quickly the road had dried out again.
We went into town, to the markets held at the Information Centre. It was a mish mash of stalls, many selling bottles of opal chips and uncut pieces, some selling polished stones. There was a lot of poor-value, “suck in the tourist” stuff. I bought some novels at a used book stall – the best stall in the market, in my opinion! John bought one piece of opal, for $10. D was there and did a lot of investigating. He knew some of the stall holders, but he did not buy much.
I had to do a supermarket stock up. D was taking John out to the Grawin tomorrow, in return for which he was invited to a roast lamb dinner tomorrow night.
D sorting out his acquisitions
After lunch back at camp, John went to bowls. He won $10. I “patched”.
Had a brief sit round the camp fire after dinner, but it was an early night for us.
Blue sky, and with only water-filled tracks as a reminder of the rain event
A station worker ran a bush “grader” – two big old tyres laid flat and weighed down by a sleeper across them, towed behind a tractor – over parts of the camp ground, to smooth it out a bit. I thought he’d had a go at the track to the road too.
The second Econovan left this morning.
D went into town and fetched our newspapers whilst he was there.
I got our washing done – and dry!
The ground under the annexe floor matting had dried out also, over the past day or so, and no longer oozed mud every time we looked at it. The matting was going to need a really thorough clean at some stage – didn’t really want to contemplate that, though. Not going to be easy, or pleasant.
Definitely shoes off at the door…..
After lunch, went for a walk on the property. The lady manager took walking tours of points of interest around this part of the station, but we wanted to take our time exploring by ourselves. We had picked up quite a bit of information about the place, whilst we had been here.
Our first destination was the Lorne Lookout, on top of a big mine waste dump, on the western boundary.
Forget the Black Stump……we went walking beyond the pink stump.
The station was about 10,000 acres in size. To its west was one of the oldest opal mining areas – the Three Mile and Lunatic Hill, where we’d explored on the Yellow Car Door tour route.
Apparently the father of the current owner had a lot of problems with the opal miners: digging mines on his land without permission, eating the “wild” sheep, making off with fence posts and fencing wire – not from stores, but from where they were actual fences! He eventually carved 3000 acres off the property and gave it to the Mines Department. Then, all mining on the remaining station ground was banned.
P – the owner – can’t dig for opal on Lorne, because then it would have to be opened up for all comers. But he did have a mine, on Lunatic Hill.
So, with that history, there were a lot of remnants of the earlier mining history around the station, like the waste dump. From its top, we could see a fair way over the surrounding farming country.
Outlook from top of waste dump on Lorne
We then followed the fence line between the station and the mining areas. Could see some current mining camps on the other side of the fence.
Came across what appeared to be the remains of a railway carriage, including the wheels. That was really incongruous and we speculated about how it got there. Could only presume that some old carriages may have been brought to the fields for accommodation? I thought we’d seen some doing duty as homes around the town?
Once was a railway carriage?
We eventually came to a large dam, with quite a lot of bird life around it.
Ring necked parrot
Nearby were three old agitators – the barrels of old cement mixers that were used to wash opal containing gravel in, to make it easier to spot the stones.
Agitators and a big heap of old dirt
Judging from the big heaps around these, they had obviously washed a lot of gravel in their time. They still had motors in, and looked in working order, so we wondered if they were still sometimes used? Maybe the station owner brought dirt from his Lunatic Hill mine and washed and sorted it here?
Old agitator with dam in background
Retraced our steps to near the waste heap, then followed tracks that brought us back to camp, via the old pig yards and the homestead dam. One could get lost on this place!
Old station pig pens
It was a really interesting and enjoyable walk, and great to get some exercise!
We had a camp fire again, at night, after having pasties for tea. The stars were so bright again – a very good sign, I hoped.
Today was fine. Through the day the ground began to dry out really quickly.
One Econovan left this morning and apparently got out without needing a rescue. Later in the afternoon, a camper trailer made it in.
John was able to borrow a ladder to undertake roof repairs.
He took off one of the rear solar panels and re-attached it. Said it was definitely better attached now. He put fresh silicone on some old screw holes he found, as well as on all his work. Where would we be without silicone? Hopefully, that had done the trick. The way this trip had been going, to date, there was bound to be some more deluges along the way! Later, this observation was to turn out rather prescient….
The Murphy’s Law of tools…..that which one needs most is always buried deep in back of Truck
I did some cleaning up in the van, which was showing the effects of our muddy feet of the past days.
John spent the afternoon having a pasty making session – all twelve of them! Four turned out to be vegetarian, because he ran out of meat. The van oven, which we hadn’t used for ages, lit immediately and worked perfectly. The surrounds got rather hot, as happened whenever the oven was on for any length of time, and was one of the reasons I didn’t use it often.
The pasties were excellent. D was invited to dinner with us, and given a couple of extras to take away for tomorrow. In return, he gave John some chips of opal.
That sky was still not cause for optimism…..
We had a camp fire tonight – the first since Monday, though it was hard to find dry wood. Out little woodpile had gotten very damp.
Today was the start of our third week here. It was certainly a much longer stay than I had envisaged.
Today was the birthday of John’s elder daughter. The other day he had mailed her a really nice card bought from the John Murray Gallery, here in town.
John Murray’s art has a very distinctive style and themes. Australiana caricature, I guess, with very much of a local flavour. I had bought some postcards from there; loved one that was a sort of cartoon style, showing an airborne 4WD and caravan, on a rough road. Hard to describe but real fun.
The rain did ease off somewhat in the afternoon. It was still grey, cloudy, damp and the ground was still a muddy mess.
The road was open again, if not particularly advisable.
We set out to drive into town for supplies – because we would not be getting the van out of here any time soon. Discovered that Truck was bogged, right where it was parked! This was shaping up as the trip of new bogging experiences. The previously hard ground had just gone so soft with the rain, and Truck had sunk where it was standing. Much head scratching ensued.
Wheels just turning in the one spot – not going anywhere….
D manoeuvred his car onto a small area of hard ground beyond the front of Truck and John hooked our winch cable around D’s towball and winched Truck forward and out of the bog – with everyone standing a very long distance away. Not recommended practice but it wasn’t a standard scenario either. Actually towing Truck out was not an option because D’s car was just a Holden Berlina and because there was just the one little patch of firm ground. John didn’t want to get him bogged too. That was today’s adventure – of the “you wouldn’t believe it” variety.
Using D’s car, on firmer ground, as a winch anchor point
The track to town was very wet. A small creek had appeared at the corner with the main road. It was very slippery. We just stayed in the wheel ruts made by others because that limited the sideways slipping.
We bought the necessary items for John to have a session tomorrow of making pasties as he’d decided that would be a very desirable way to fill in time! Also bought some screws because he would need to do some roof fixing, as well.
I was quite relieved to get back to camp in one piece and thought they had been premature in opening the road. D had continued to go back and forth in his Berlina, though he had stopped using the short cut track to the highway.
Our wheels on firmer ground….
This morning I’d discovered a small leak in the van roof, that was dripping onto the front of the stove. It must have only just started, maybe as the wind and rain swung around to a different direction. Another bane of the caravanner’s life – leaks! We suspected it was coming via a solar panel roof attachment. There had been occasional issues of that type ever since the original installation in 2002, by the incompetent clown whose misdeeds I have described in earlier posts.
We dropped one end of the poptop down to form a slope, and that stopped it – as well as the rain easing.
Through these wet days the only other tourist occupants of the camp ground had been D in a cabin, a family in an Expanda who had been here for six weeks, two Econovans that arrived not long before the rain, and a big Roadstar van, ditto. Just these few people, plus the assorted permanent dwellers, were sufficient to make the amenities floors a wet and muddy mess, despite the cleaner’s efforts.
I was woken, just after 7am, by a text from daughter, asking if we were dry? I replied NO!
Initially I was surprised that daughter in Bendigo might even think that we had rain issues. Then via an internet search, found out that there was a nasty low pressure system over the coast of southern Qld, which had dumped much rain on the Sunshine Coast and Brisbane, and was now moving south. We were on its edge. There were flood warnings for the rivers on the NSW north coast. It looked very nasty on the weather radar – I rather almost thought I didn’t want to know this. Might have been better if the internet hadn’t had one of its infrequent bouts of working, this morning. This early awakening by daughter also indicated that her knowledge of NSW locations was rather lacking: she thought Lightning Ridge was a lot further east.
The forecast indicated that things “might” begin to improve here, from tomorrow.
This was one occasion when I was prepared to concede that having TV in the van did have some value! If we’d had TV here, with weather forecasts, we might have followed the herd and left here before the rain.
Could there be a ray of hope in that lighter patch in the sky?
In the meantime, the road out of here was now closed. If it did dry out enough, we might try to leave here on Friday, when our second week was up.
Part of my rough trip plan had been to go and camp in the Mt Moffat section of the Carnarvon Gorge National Park. This was less accessible and thus less visited than the main section, which we had already visited back in 2002. However, from what I was now seeing, of road reports and closures, we would have to give Mt Moffat a miss.
Another day of sitting around inside the van, sewing reading, John gaming. I was able to send some emails while the internet was working.
It was days like these – mercifully rare – that led us to dream of maybe getting a bigger van. Maybe one with a couch? Our small dinette seats were not very comfortable for long hours of sitting, even though we had added extra foam padding and pillows.
With the two of us bumping knees and competing for table space, days confined here became tedious.
Because the bed went east-west, only one person could sit on this at a time – and not with any back rest because of the angle of the roof.
Today, dreaming also included a van with an ensuite. There was a lot of very muddy ground between us and the amenity block, not to mention muddy flooring right outside the van door. Cleaning up after this lot was not going to be fun.
Getting from here to the amenities in the background involved muddy feet!
Yep, we should have followed the herd and left yesterday. There were very few campers left here now.
That sky promised more rain!
The camp ground was very muddy and wet. The rain was blowing in under the awning, so I got John to put up a shade cloth barrier, but it didn’t seem to make much difference. Going to the amenities was a matter of carefully picking a route via little bits of ground still above water.
The floor mat in the annexe began to ooze thin red mud up through its mesh like structure, whenever it was stepped on. That meant we were effectively confined to the van itself.
I did patchwork for some of the day, read and wrote postcards. John played computer games.
The rain persisted for much of the day, with the occasional short dry period.
In the afternoon we drove into town, really sliding around on the unsealed road, until we reached the sealed town roads by the airport turn off. The worst section was actually the few hundred metres between the camp ground and the Lorne gate at the road into town! That was really treacherous.
John wanted to visit a shop that sold opal cutting gear. He was astounded at how expensive the gear was. I took the opportunity in town to stock up a bit on food. I thought it was possible that any more rain would close the road.
There was more rain – even heavier – through the night.
There was quite an exodus from the campground this morning. At first I thought it might be because people had come only for the weekend. Later, too much later, I decided it had everything to do with the weather forecast for rain.
After John’s opal seduction of yesterday, I went up to the office and did some negotiating to extend our stay by an unknown time, and pay up at the end of each completed week. Very obliging, they were. The $54 I had paid for our previous extension reverted to part of the next $100 per week payment; couldn’t argue with that.
I was able to do two loads of washing, since there was now no competition for the machine.
Then we left for the Grawin. The drive out was starting to seem quite familiar.
I sat in Truck and knitted while John went noodling up on the heap. D was there too. I went up for a while after we’d eaten the packed sandwiches and mostly just watched the men digging about. They were not finding much.
The Keep Out notice was ignored by everyone.
Today was cloudy, which made it harder working out on the heaps because there was no sunshine to catch a glint in the gravel. John gave it away about 2pm and we drove back to camp.
My washing was dry and I picked it in before the cloud developed into anything nasty.
We went into town late in the afternoon, to the Opal Bin opal gallery and shop. I bought that solid opal pendant that had been niggling away at my mind for the last few days. It came from the Grawin and was a very attractive chunk of black opal. I loved the modern simplicity of the setting. That was it – got my opal! Didn’t want to go looking for any more…..
Talked with D round our campfire for happy hour. He showed us his album of stone work he’d done and John showed him his photo book of wood furniture he’d made. Both were talented, creative guys. D showed us some more of his opals. He had some nice looking pieces. John was not game to show him the jar of pieces he’d earlier bought out at the Grawin, in case D confirmed that he’d been conned.
Typical Lightning Ridge…….
There was quite an ominous cloud build up through the afternoon. During the night heavy rain set in. For once, the forecast was right, it seemed.
Today was younger grandson’s 3rd birthday. I hoped the card I’d earlier posted from here arrived in time, and that his father managed to buy him the present I’d pre-arranged, from us.
It was a lazy morning. I’d planned to do some washing, but the one machine in the laundry was in use, so I didn’t bother.
John messed about with his collection of stones. He thought one bit looked really promising. After an early lunch, he went off to bowls. I defrosted the fridge, washed the van floor – the one following logically from the other! I hand washed the cotton floor mat in a trough in the laundry. Then I rewarded myself for all that housework by doing patchwork for the rest of the afternoon.
Lorne amenity block, with cabin room accommodation block at right
John came back happy. his team had won and he collected $20.
I invited D – a man who had moved into one of the nearby cabins a couple of days ago – to happy hour with us. He was a stone mason by trade, and John was interested in talking about that. He was also an opal buyer, which was why he was up here. He told us that he’d been to the Grawin a few times, but that it was too rough (dangerous?) out there for him, so he preferred to stay here, where it was more secure, and just drive out there. He had two rather nice dogs with him. While we sat round the fire and talked, I threw sticks for the dogs – and got muddy slobber all over my track pants, for my efforts.
D told John that it was cheaper to buy opal cutting equipment here, than in the cities. He lent John a business guide, to look up the sellers of same. Later, when John took his book back, D showed him a tray of cut opals that he’d bought. John came back starry eyed. NOW we were no longer leaving here tomorrow, but going back out to the Grawin instead!
It was a much cooler, cloudy day today. The night was chilly enough for me to drag the heater out from under the bed again.
In town, bought the papers. Went to the tyre place, where the tyre and its tube were patched. This was a relief, as we were envisaging the expense of a new tyre, which would probably have to be brought in from somewhere else, at even greater cost.
We went car door touring, and did the two tours on the western side of town.
The extent of the Lightning Ridge opal diggings. First diggings were NE of town; Three Mile SW of it
The Green Tour took us to the first area that was mined, which was on an ironstone ridge that tended to attract lightning. Local lore had it that, way back, a shepherd and some of his flock were fried by a lightning strike in that area – hence the name of the town.
Original diggings
The local indigenous people clearly knew of the opal to be found in the area, as they have a Dreamtime legend that explains it as a rainbow that was trapped in the scales of a dying ancestral crocodile creature.
Random finds on the pastoral runs of the late 1800’s led to the first rush, in the early 1900’s, mostly by miners from the White Cliffs fields, attracted by this dark opal, and promoted by the man regarded as the father of opal mining in the Ridge, Charlie Nettleton.
The Green Tour went to that first mining area, and the first shaft, hand sunk by Charlie Nettleton.
I did find it interesting that the wild orange tree is supposed to be an indicator of underlying opal. Obviously, the larger trees grow along fault lines because the roots can get down more easily to water – and opal is associated with fault lines. But there was no explanation of why the wild orange is a better indicator than other trees.
Green car door by Wild Orange tree
Out there, we also saw where some (more modern) person had begun to build a hut out of empty beer cans. It wasn’t finished; we had a bit of fun speculating why this might be so.
Did they just get sick of doing it, or…….?
There was much more of interest on the Yellow Tour. This mostly took in the larger Three Mile diggings.
A novelty there was the Lunatic Hill open cut.
Open cuts were not normally used for opal mining here because of its unpredictable and patchy occurrence. Particularly in the earlier times, before the use of modern machinery like bulldozers, the effort involved in making an open cut was not proportionally rewarded. Two possible reasons why the Lunatic Hill cut was made was because the ground was very unstable for shafts, and the opal there rich enough to justify it.
Ventilation shafts for underground mines
The tour route wound through the mining area, past lots of shacks – works of art and ingenuity in themselves. I particularly liked one where the roofing iron was held down by large rocks on it.
Rocks are cheaper than nails around here – and maybe easier to get in the early days….A trap for the unwary explorer….
We came upon a church structure made of sheets of corrugated iron – spooky, gothic, incongruous.
But it wasn’t really a church, having been part of a set for an art house film “Goddess of 1967”. I had never heard of it, but later found out that it was made in 2000, the goddess of the title was a 1967 car, and the dark and gloomy film won some awards in overseas film festivals.
It looked realistic enough…..
It was late lunchtime by the time we finished exploring along the Yellow Tour route. Back in town, John decided to buy a cooked chook. We had to go back to camp so he could eat some of it then store the leftovers in the fridge.
Then we backtracked into town for the other two tours, which were the shorter ones to the eastern areas.
The highlight of the Blue Tour was the Cactus Garden. The entry fee here was $5 a person, but it was well worth it.
I had no idea there were so many different cacti, ranging from tall ones more than twice my height, to tiny ones.
Ever read “Day of the Triffids”?
Some had fearsome spikes, others were almost soft. Some looked like they might suddenly come alive and chase you.
The gardens were extensive and very neat, tidy, with clear explanatory notes about some of the plants. Obviously a huge amount of work had gone into establishing and maintaining the gardens. I did hope, though, that the Hudson Pear had originally not been an escapee from here!
I nearly bought a very pretty, small cactus, but then decided that it might not travel too well, there might be quarantine issues – and it wasn’t a very friendly house plant to keep in a small van, either.
On the Red Tour route, there were two unusual structures. Amigo’s Castle was built of ironstone. There were mine tunnels under it, but one could only tour it with the organized, paying, district tour. This was not for us, being herded around like cattle, straining to hear some semi-audible commentary, and cooling our heels whilst some attention seeking type asks questions no-one else is interested in the answers to.
Apparently, there was a full Plesiosaurus (?) fossil down there – that would have been interesting.
We also saw a really strange, cement, “Astronomers’ Monument” structure – a bit castle like. It was not open to look at though. I found it a shame a feature like this that could attract tourists, was closed off.
One heavily publicized local attraction was the Theatre of the Black Queen, featuring a house built from coloured bottles, lots of old lamps, and a one-woman dramatic act/presentation. This was another Ridge experience we decided to pass on – just didn’t come across as our sort of thing.
Back at camp, John had the remaining chook and some salad for tea. I had a fire-baked potato, and salad.
That was an interesting and varied day of being a tourist.
This morning, I managed to sew a complete patch before John was up and about – and there were five pieces of varying sized material in a six inch square patch, to be hand sewn together, with tiny stitches, so it wasn’t done quickly.
We left at 11am, for the Grawin. Took the back way – the gravel road from town that came out to Lorne, then continued on to meet the highway opposite the Cumborah road. It was the short way to go for us.
The drive out to the Grawin was pleasant enough for it not to matter that we were doing it so soon again. I found myself looking at the farmland – and the bush – that we passed, and wondering if there was opal to be found under there? Given the history of subsequent fresh finds in these parts, it could be possible that there were new fields yet to be unearthed? But I guess modern geological surveying methods are much more able to detect likely opal bearing areas, so probably the areas ignored were for good reason.
We parked amongst the trees by the Waste Dump. John got out and exclaimed “I’ve got a flat tyre!” The rear diver’s side was leaking – we could hear it going down. It wasn’t totally flat, yet, so it must have just happened. We had hit a couple of gutters in the track a bit hard. We changed it, finding that the air was coming from a fracture in the rubber. This created a discussion about whether the tyres should be deflated a bit on these hard, stony roads. It was not usually our practice – and “expert” opinions differed. I remember Adam Plate, of the Pink Roadhouse at Oodnadatta, telling us the first time we went up that way, not to run tyres softer than usual, except on sand.
Then we finally got up on to the heap. There were lots of other noodlers there today. I got sick of it quickly, and went back down to Truck, for lunch and to read and do some bird spotting.
Noodling on the waste dump, in fresh “biscuit” coloured heap
John came down later. for lunch, then went back. I went up later to take some photos, to find that most of the others had gone. Maybe because it was Friday, to get a head start on the night’s festivities?
John was working alongside a tourist, like ourselves, and a local. The latter was in his 30’s, had been a shearer, did some boxing around the country circuits, then had a stroke. Now, he noodled – and drank. He was doing both together, up there. When we drove away, he was just sitting on the front of his old car, all alone, drinking – a forlorn, sad, picture. I guessed there were a lot of hard luck stories to be found around here.
The tourist was out from the Ridge, for the day, like us. He was new to opals and noodling, and had left his ailing wife back at their van. He was dealing with some big problems and seemed pretty timid. He found a nice piece of opal on the heap and was soooo excited – it was nice to see him happy.
The little pile the men were working on was interesting, so I joined in for a while. I might have found a few small, good bits – I found it hard to tell if they were worthwhile.
We left at 4pm and got back to camp an hour later. The place was yet more crowded. A couple of camper trailers had set up quite close to us, and the Hacienda was still occupied.
Truck parked by the Hacienda cottageat Lorne
I had a bit of a chat with one of the camper trailer men. He was rather into the “I am the greatest travel expert” mode – one of those who had to go one better than anything anyone else said. But credit where it was due, and he had been to some interesting and out of the way places, like Old Doomadgee and Massacre Inlet. I gained some street cred by even knowing where these were, and by having also been to Massacre Inlet and Old Doom. He didn’t have it all his own way!
John had flathead and fries for tea. I only had fries, because the label had come off the fish pack in the freezebox, and when I went to cook it, there was only one piece!
We sat around the campfire after tea, for a while. It was so pleasant not to have TV!
This Adventurous Age 