Coober Pedy

Back onto the Stuart Highway and another long drive through a mainly featureless desert. After several hundred km, the first town you come to, heading south, is Coober Pedy. However, all you can see is a landscape of spoil mounds and notices about taking care not to fall backwards into deep holes. There’s a lot of junk around and no people about; that’s because Coober Pedy to the indigenous people means ‘white man in a hole’.

Coober Pedy is where 85% of the world’s opal is mined. The residents live in homes dug into the hillsides so they can cope with the extreme heat (commonly 50C in the summer).

We went on a tour of an old mine and learnt how it all started and how the mining techniques have changed over the years. We also went into a typical  underground home. I have to say, it looked very cosy and at a constant 25C was much better than being outside!