Coober Pedy - In the Haze of Opals (The Ghan Part 3)

On the morning, we arrived at Manguri station, although the term 'station' is somewhat misleading. There was a sign with the name and a few wooden benches. Otherwise, there was nothing to be seen except for desert...

We then took a bus for about an hour to Cooper Pedy, a mining town with around 1800 inhabitants. Since opals were found in the area in 1915, a settlement has been created in the Outback, where fortune seekers from all over the world sought wealth in the ground. Nowadays, 49 different nationalities live in this place in the middle of nowhere.

Since temperatures in summer can reach up to 60 degrees Celsius and cool down to freezing point in winter, many houses have been built at least partially underground by carving rooms into the rock. Even today, most residents of Cooper Pedy have their living spaces underground. This ensures a constant temperature of 20-25 degrees Celsius.

During a guided tour, we saw former living spaces and a former opal mine.

Opal vein

We also had our lunch 15 meters underground, where we were safe from heat and sandstorms.

We made a brief stop at a desert golf course, which is completely devoid of grassy areas. Instead, there are stones that need to be raked neatly after the game.

Cooper Pedy has several underground churches. We visited the Serbian Orthodox Church, which was built by volunteers with the help of donations in the 1990s.

Our excursion ended with a visit to the 'Breakaways,' a national park with colorful hills and fantastic rock formations.

There, at one of the lookout points, we enjoyed a glass of wine or champagne in the afternoon before returning to the train.

The bus took a slight detour so that we could see the entire Ghan once again.

And so our journey on the Ghan came to an end. The next morning, we arrived in Adelaide, where we moved from the train compartment to a hotel room.