Hey Everyone!
Today was a rest day - no long drives for us. Sleeping in instead and I have to say that caves are awesome for sleeping in. No natural light to wake you up, it's so easy to roll over and go back to sleep in that dark. With free WiFi, old mobile phones and kid-sized headphones, I didn't get up until morning tea time, when the kids poked me to get them some food. They'd slept in too. Ah, cave life.
Cereal, chillin' out, then sandwiches and it was time to venture out from our mini hibernation. The bright sunshine sent us scurrying back underground. We explored the Umoona museum where we saw lots of opals, read about opal mining history in Coober Pedy and learnt about the sea creature fossils found in this desert that used to be an inland sea.
Our next stop was Tom's Working Mine - which my son Tom was excited to see. We took a self guided tour through the tunnels and used the UV torches to find lots of opal in the tunnel walls. We also had a go at "noodling" or fossicking for opal in the mullock heap near the carpark. We found a few little shards of rock with tiny bits of opal in them - enough for a memento but not enough to retire on.
I'll make sure I set an alarm to wake up in the morning or we'll never leave on time.
Today was a rest day - no long drives for us. Sleeping in instead and I have to say that caves are awesome for sleeping in. No natural light to wake you up, it's so easy to roll over and go back to sleep in that dark. With free WiFi, old mobile phones and kid-sized headphones, I didn't get up until morning tea time, when the kids poked me to get them some food. They'd slept in too. Ah, cave life.
Cereal, chillin' out, then sandwiches and it was time to venture out from our mini hibernation. The bright sunshine sent us scurrying back underground. We explored the Umoona museum where we saw lots of opals, read about opal mining history in Coober Pedy and learnt about the sea creature fossils found in this desert that used to be an inland sea.
Our next stop was Tom's Working Mine - which my son Tom was excited to see. We took a self guided tour through the tunnels and used the UV torches to find lots of opal in the tunnel walls. We also had a go at "noodling" or fossicking for opal in the mullock heap near the carpark. We found a few little shards of rock with tiny bits of opal in them - enough for a memento but not enough to retire on.
I'll make sure I set an alarm to wake up in the morning or we'll never leave on time.