Day 92 Saturday 16th September

What an interesting day we’ve had today! We started off by joining a guided tour of Lightning Ridge in a small mini-bus. We were lucky as there was only Rob and I and another couple doing the tour. We were told about the history of Lightning Ridge and then taken to many different spots around the town. Our guide also explained about opals in general and the black opal that this area is famous for. One of our stops took us to a large underground opal mine where we were told about the history of the opal mining here and how mining is conducted now. We drove past many, many homes? shanties, shelters, caravans with sheds, tents etc. all built on the opal prospectors claim sites. We visited a quirky castle built out of rocks by a resident of the town. He now lives behind the castle and obviously is a collector of many things. From here we went to an opal shop in the main street of the town. A lady demonstrated the cleaning, cutting and finishing off of the opals using diamond spinning wheels. After lunch we went to see a magnificent mine called “The Chambers of the Black Hand Mine”. Many people we had met on our travels had told us that this was something not to be missed and we could see why! We went down 80 steps into the upper section of the mine. This section was originally used for mining opal but proved to be unproductive and the mine was dug deeper. The miner, in his spare time, started using this cave area to carve and sculpture things into the walls. It is too hard to describe the myriad of things this extremely talented man had sculptured so you will need to check the photos out! We will probably go back tomorrow to visit because we still have more to see. 































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