Lightning Ridge, Inland, NSW

Lightning Ridge, Coober Pedy, White Cliffs, Yowah, there’s something about opal mining that screams quirkiness. Lightning Ridge though must be the quirkiest of them all. There is so much to see and do in this town.The Opal Caravan Park is excellent and a pleasant park just to kick back and relax, you need to allow yourself plenty of time here. When you’re ready to explore, there are the car door tours where you follow painted car doors to the sights in each part of town, the best of which is Amigo’s Castle. For a completely different experience Chambers of the Black Hand is a mine that has become an art gallery thanks to its talented owner who has carved some beautiful works from the stone walls. Dotted around town and in his gallery, you’ll see the unmistakable paintings by outback artist John Murray. And when you’re done with sightseeing there’s always a relaxing soak to be had in the hot spring bore just up the road from the Opal Caravan Park.

Do yourself a favour and set aside a day to drive out to the ‘3 Pubs in the Scrub’ out at the Grawin Opal Fields. This is an experience like no other, so I’ll include my original story of the place:

Two out of three ain’t bad. There’s another opal field about 60kms from The Ridge and it is home to 3 iconic pubs. We set off in a convoy of 3 cars down a good bitumen road to the tiny town of Cumborah. A little further on we turn onto an appalling dirt road that our mate VeeWee rates as worse than the Birdsville Track. Outback Jack (Woody) is in the back seat thanking God that VeeWee has offered to take us in her car!

We bump along swearing and cursing the road and the dust and reading car door signs hanging from trees that extol the virtues of the three pubs. First is the Grawin Club in the Scrub and another car door reminds us that we are driving on a golf course and should watch for balls. Mulga scrub and bare dirt don’t usually conjure up visions of a golf club, but now I know better. With eyes peeled we find a flag and a rough wooden shelter. Upon entering the ramshackle (this is the only word that describes the whole district) pub we are greeted by a cheery barmaid and the place is cosy and inviting. There’s even a library room. An old miner with hair and whiskers that could house a family of birds sells us raffle tickets for the local Men’s Shed. We thank him even though we know that we’ll never win yet alone want to trek out here to collect the prize. The barmaid generously gives us a third mud map of the area which helps to make sense of the others that we’ve already gathered.

Bouncing off down the road we find the Noodling Dumps. Noodling Dumps? This is where the miners dump their unwanted rock and unlicensed prospectors like us can fossick for opal that the experts have missed. We later learn that this rock is cast off until they find a seam of potch usually forty or so feet down. Thus, we’d be pretty lucky to find anything! But trudge off up the mountain of blinding white clay and rock we go, and fossick about and find some pretty rocks and fossils. We’re easily pleased.

Next stop is Glengarry and a charming couple. He is a miner, and she runs a craft ‘cottage’. They’re from Canberra and spend the winter up here. I’m sure most Australians would say that they too would prefer living in a mullock heap to the Nation’s Capital any day. The Glengarry Hilton is a collection of sheds with a shipping container for a kitchen. This isn’t a building, just a collection of mismatched structures that have settled into several inches of talcum like white dust. It rises as you walk through it making you feel as though you are Neil Armstrong on the moon. The open air ‘dining’ area has a piece of carpet laid across the bare ground. Naturally it is permeated with dust. To be kind, the barmaid is a surly lass. The food though is plentiful and delicious. The smallest member of our group Tillie, is not allowed onto the ‘premises’ though we find out later that there are tight restrictions on dogs on the opal fields but I’m sure that applies to guard dogs not toy poodles. In any case Tillie probably would have suffocated in the thick white dust.

On again past corrugated iron masquerading as houses, hulks that were once cars and hundreds more mine shafts with little plastic pipes sticking out of the ground for air circulation. The Sheepyard Inn jumps out at us beside the sign that says ‘cars with brakes give way’. A friendly lot this mob are. It is part pub, general store and war memorial and this barmaid shows the boys how to don a male chastity belt. What a nice lass. A bunch of miners sit watching TV and cracking one-liners. Now this is a pub.

If it is hard to describe Lightning Ridge then Grawin Opal Fields are nigh on impossible to explain. Quirky, crazy, rusting machinery in a sea of white dust. This place has to be seen to be believed and definitely not to be missed. Each, and every pub is quite different and there is something for everyone.

The return drive sees golfers and even a golf cart belting through the scrub at the Club in the Scrub and sheep, cattle, goats and kangaroos have taken ownership of the bitumen road.

Now that you’re so close to the Qld border, the pubs of Hebel and Nindigully can’t be missed, but we’ll talk about those later.