August 25-27 time to head for home

 We travelled home along roads edged in gold listening to Simon Winchester reading one of his publications - ‘Land’. It was brilliant. And we arrived home, after a night settling the van to wait until we take to the roads again, to a glorious display of pale golden orchids. The garden survived!

August 23-24 more of the same!

 

The sludge from the 'aggies'

The search for 'colour' as the water and rocks spill is fast and furious

These are the 'aggies' which wash the clay and dirt off mine tailing 

The opal fields are peppered with old trucks and parts

We were in the field most of the day on Friday with a visit to an old open cut mine which had been operating since 1911 - fascinating stuff. That was followed by a visit to a tail-out where they wash the opal dirt which they dig out of the mines looking for precious pieces (we get the remnants of these tailings to sort through for fossils). We had a little time before lunch so visited a tertiary gravel pit near Cumborah where we specked for quartz ‘jellybeans’, topaz, jasper - and basically anything we could find that took our eye. 

After lunch we headed out to join the group headed by palaeontologist Prof Michael Archer. Mike who was in the field with a group of graduate and undergraduate students. 

Opal mud

The day finished with an hilarious trivia quiz night. 
By Saturday morning I was pooped but we start again this morning with a walk into the building site of the new AOC home.

This 2 storey cathedral-like building will be magnificent. It will be mostly below ground, up to the top of the tunnel (centre pic) which is where people will enter.

And so the ‘dig’ ended, for us at least, with quite a collection from bones, mollusc and plant fossils to fossilised dung and worm tubes. They all add tiny pieces to the jigsaw picture of life 100 million years ago. We celebrated with opal cakes (and a farewell dinner). But we’ll be back early next year for the opening of Stage 1 of the Australian Opal Centre. It will be spectacular. 

This remarkable building emerging from the ground and insulated by the earth, will collect rainwater, generate power and be filled with light and fresh air. It will eventually house the world's greatest public collection of priceless opal and opalised fossils from the Age of Dinosaurs - it will be unique and special.

August 20-22 delving into mines, specking in the field and time in ‘the shed’

 We’ve been so occupied over the last couple of days that the days have simply flown by. As well as sifting through opal dirty, we’ve been treated to some great talks that have taken us back in time to the Cretaceous-Jurassic period and earlier. Lectures set the scene and getting to look at and handle some beautiful samples of opalised fossils has guided us on what to look for in our search for fragments. Already our small band of ‘diggers’ has found some terrific things - between us we have found a pieces of opalised turtle shell, fossilised molluscs and lots of other things including bones and plant matter. Quite a few yabby buttons have been found. For those who may not know these are fossilised calcium deposits from yabbies (they accumulate minerals internally to rebuild their shells after they moult). It’s another world entirely we’re learning about. 

We’ve spent many hours at ‘the Shed’ sifting through tailings but also visited a mine where we descended to the Opal level which is 20 odd metres below ground level - lots of panting coming back up those dastardly steps. After we’d caught our breaths, it was back again to sifting through more tailings looking for fossil fragments. That’s why we’re here - to find fossils. 

A lovely bit of colour - perhaps fossilise plant

A treat for me and Lindsay was a visit from Dr Elizabeth Smith (palaeontologist) who we met in April. She gave us a marvellous talk/‘show and tell’ on mammalian fossils which are extremely rare and very precious. Very exciting stuff and internationally significant (we’re a part of it!).  Elizabeth is a co-founder and driver of the new Australian Opal Centre. This innovative project currently under construction, is the biggest community project in Australia. It’s a big project because the story of opal in Australia is big. Opal carries mighty stories from deep time. It tells us about the evolution of plants and animals here and right across the southern hemisphere, about our inland sea and its shores 100 million years ago, and about the enormous changes between then and now.

Platypus skulls - L: ancient, R: modern. Little pressure to change

That afternoon we went out ‘specking’ in the field to a stunning remote spot where we scrabbled through the dirt on our hands and knees.  Later that day we discovered pains in places we’d forgotten about nevertheless it was a great experience looking for plant fossils. Despite all the warnings moi got a Hudson Pear multiple spike in the shoe. Totally nasty things but Lindsay had packed the pliers in the car and managed to get it all out of my shoe – before standing on one himself! 

An expan

A curio

Flowers and lichen surviving among the trailings 

Deliciously remote.

We were pretty pooped but a shower rallied us a little so we headed out pre-dinner lecture presented by palaeontologist Prof Michael Archer from the School of Biological, Earth & Environmental Sciences at the Uni of NSW.  Fantastic, riveting inspiring lecture. Had he been one of my lecturers I would have become a palaeontologist rather than a neuroscientist Isuspect.

Lightning Ridge August 16 -27

 The ‘Dig’ is just about to kick off out at ‘the shed’ beside Lunatic mine and the new AOC building.

Day 1. It was a time of calibration, to get our eyes in. A marvelous day the start winding up into more exciting things.

A tiny toe bone. We are sifting for tiny fragments like this a few mm in length.

Always exciting to see a little colour - it's like magic captured

These are what I found at the 'dig' 2022

The day ended spectacularly out at the 'first shaft' watching the sun set from the escarpment. Out on the ridge there was an aboriginal ceremony taking place; the smoke against the sunset sky was quite evocative. As the sun set the moon rose. Quite splendid casting light across the sky burnishing the clouds with silver.

More anon .....