We pulled into Kalgoorlie after a mammoth 1026km day - and a rest day was very much in order. There was a 24 hour limit on our free camp in town, so we packed up, and treated ourselves to breakfast a the historic Dome cafe in town. Suitably refreshed, we wandered down to the Visitor Information Centre. Armed with all the latest information, we booked in for two nights at a local caravan park. We quickly set up camp, put three huge loads of washing on, and had a nice shower (oh bliss). It was then time to head back into town and checked out the sights.
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| They even make roofs of gold here! The old Post Office / Court House clock tower sports a gold leaf roof! |
Everything in Western Australia is big. Big distances between towns, big farms ploughed and harvested by big machinery, all costing big dollars - but sometimes you see something that is absolutely massive. Yes, we went to the Super-Pit. A vision of Allan Bond, the SuperPit brought the amalgamation of several mining leases, in order to extract the gold ore using open cut mining techniques. Whilst Allan Bond never achieved his objective - he went bust before pulling it off, he is credited with the idea that created the largest open cut gold mine in the world.
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| The buckets used to load the trucks are huge - holding about 35 tonnes of ore. |
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| Looking into the huge cut - massive 793C ore trucks look like matchbox cars |
After standing on the edge of this massive monument to mankind's obsession with gold (over 70 percent of which is used for jewellery), we ventured into town and checked out the Goldfields Museum in the main street. This housed a collection of unique and historic buildings, some incredible artefacts such as a hand built wooden bicycle, and some incredibly detailed and fragile union flag banners.
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| It would have been a slow trip to the Goldfields on this bike - but I guess it beat walking! |
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| Checking out the banners |
But checking out pretty flags is not something that interests most boys. No it is trucks, the bigger the better as far as the Little Helper is concerned. We were fortunate that the following morning at the Boulder Markets, free tours of the SuperPit were running... and we found ourselves at the front of the queue to get on that bus!
The tour took us up close and personal with the huge machinery and workshops that maintain it. We also drove past he processing refinery - just dwarfed by the scale of it all. A fascinating glimpse into modern gold mining operations. What was amazing that for every seven trucks coming out of the pit, only one carries gold in its 240 tonne load. And at around 2 ounces of gold per tonne of ore, that gold would be about the size of a golf ball. It is all just mind boggling.
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| A 793C waiting for some maintenance in the yard |
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| The safety message at the front gate to the mine. Apparently the driver hardly felt a bump. Thankfully it was just an exercise and no one was inside the ute when it was driven over. |
It is one thing to see the massive machinery close up. It is another altogether to get inside the cab of a $4 million 793C dump truck, so we went to Hanan's North Tourist Mine for a tour of a very real and very large 793C dump truck.
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| Yes - the real deal. A retired 793C - perfect addition to sand pits if you have enough space! |
The boys (all three of us) were dwarfed by this massive machine - but I tell you what, we had to wrestle Mum out of the driver's seat! It was a real highlight to get to clamber over one of these massive trucks, so much so, The Little Helper declared he wanted to drive these for a living when he grows up.
Of course Mum took a slightly different view:
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| And the verdict was rather comfortable! |
The Hanans North Mine used to allow underground tours, and unfortunately the site is a little run down. Apparently it had something to do with a very expensive Miners Hall of Fame being constructed and sending the whole operation bust. That said, we thoroughly enjoyed our time in the facility. This is kind of like a much smaller Sovereign Hill, but is set at a real mine site, not recreated. In fact because it was so quiet, we really enjoyed wandering around the site - and were pleased to add to our little vial of gold specks won from the pan in the alluvial gravel.
The twin cities of Kalgoorlie and Boulder have often been competing with each other for glory - and none is more apparent than in the respective town halls of both towns. Whilst Boulder has the gold, its main street is a shadow of the grander Kalgoorlie. Unfortunately many of the old street frontages were damaged in an earthquake in 2010, and are still being rebuilt, however one of the most impressive sights awaited us in the Boulder Town Hall.
A painted Philip Goatcher curtain, painted over 100 years ago hangs in full glory in the magnificent town hall. Goatcher was attracted to the gold fields like thousands of others, spending time digging in Victoria, California and Western Australia, before his talent was nurtured and became his career. The detail in this beautiful curtain has to be seen to be believed. It was all lost on the kids of course - but they were distracted by the local art group's children's table, so were busy drawing recreations of 793C dump trucks.
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| The Goacher Curtain - Boulder Town Hall |
We had come to Kalgoorlie-Boulder on a whim - but could have stayed a lot longer. There is literally months one could spend here checking out the Goldfields history - perhaps even do some prospecting too. It is a magnificent part of the world to explore and we could have spent a lot longer here. That said, the main excitement for the kids was sitting in the dump truck. It was time to move on - to surf an ancient wave.
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