Many people dream about leaving behind their humdrum lives amidst traffic deadlock and exorbitant rents and house prices and heading to the Outback to try their luck, gold-panning, opal mining, sheep-shearing or working as a jackaroo or jillaroo on a cattle station. All of these options are available within cooee of the town of Lightning Ridge.
No, this is not an elaborate dunny but a cap on an underground opal mine shaft.
Fortunately, I visited this site in mid-winter, when the temperature was a pleasant 21 degrees Celsius. In mid-summer, the temperature can rise as high as 48 degrees Celsius - and stay there.
Is opal mining for everyone? Probably not. It requires a degree of luck, lots of patience (mostly used to sift through the gems of wisdom from old-timers, of whom there are many), and an ability to multi-task, i.e. swill pints and swat flies.
Other attributes that may come in handy are the ability to subsist on a limited income in an off-grid experience. Fortunately, there is a municipal swimming pool.
This gem of a town is located approximately 9 hours east of Coolangatta Airport.
