Stumble it!Welcome to Australia Trekking Guide
Australia Extreme Travel Agencies Article
For a permanent link to this article about Trekking Australia, or to bookmark this page, click here.
White Cliffs An Oasis In The Outback
from: Oze ParrotWhite Cliffs is an opal mining town, situated in a desert area of far north western, New South Wales. Opals where first discovered in the area in 1884 and the town was founded in about 1889. With the discovery of some valuable stones, the town began to rapidly grow and by about 1900 there were over 1,000 resident miners. Miners continued to flock to the area, increasing the population to about four thousand, until about 1914 when the first world war broke out and Australian citizens were called for military service.
Over the years the population of White Cliffs has fluctuated between a handful and a few hundred, with the pub and general store being kept in business by the patronage of local station hands. These days, the value of opal production is in excess of $1,000,000 per year, as miners use bulldozers and modern mining methods in their search for the precious gemstones.
White Cliffs, is an extraordinary place that is hard to comprehend at first glance. Over 50,000 holes have been dug in, and around White Cliffs giving it the appearance of a lunar landscape. The surrounding area is a barren plain infested with clumps of spinifex grass that includes a series of large parabolic dishes, facing towards the heavens, tracking the sun's daily journey across the sky. This indeed, could be a movie set for a sci-fi motion picture.
It is quite apparent that there has been absolutely no town planning, as the town spreads aimlessly from the hotel and general store, heading in all directions along dusty, unsealed roads. Civic pride has obviously been forsaken by the local population, in order to fully concentrate on extracting the precious stones from their underground refuge.
Nevertheless, when a traveller comes upon White Cliffs it is akin to reaching a desert oasis. The nearest town is about 90 kilometers away, the nearest city is Broken Hill, almost 300 kilometers away and it's about 900 kilometers to Adelaide, the nearest capital city. During the day, the tourist will find the town apparently deserted, although he will be made welcome at the pub and the servo. On doing a brief inspection of the town a tourist will discover only about 20 dwellings, most of which, will be vacant.
Most of the townsfolk work in their opal mines and reside underground.
The daytime temperature at White cliffs rises to fifty degrees Celsius during the summer and the evening temperature can fall to below zero degrees C. in the winter. Underground temperature is a constant twenty two degrees C., so most residents choose to live underground in dugouts. These dwellings can be made quite luxurious with ducted ventilation systems, solar lighting and absolute privacy. The local motel that boasts thirty guest rooms, a restaurant, bistro and conference rooms is entirely underground, apart from the swimming pool, which has been built at ground level.
White Cliffs can be accessed by road in a regular sedan as the roads leading from Wilcannia and Broken Hill are bitumen sealed. The town also boasts a modern airstrip that has a sealed tarmac and av gas is available. White Cliffs is an extraordinary place with many points of interest including the Solar Power Station, opal mine workings art galleries and a museum. Most services are available, post office, fuel, food and accommodation.
Oze Parrot is an author, publisher and Internet marketing consultant.
Formerly a tourist operator and real estate business marketing consultant
Location: Queensland, Australia.
You may republish this article as long as you include the name of the author and provide an active link to: http://travelhunter.erlypro.com/australia/
Watch the video
 |
Central Australia Trek Posted by: ishmael354
Video duration: 332 seconds Global video hits: 154 |
Australia Extreme Travel Agencies Specific links
Blinkx Video Search
- World's largest video search engine. Over 26 million hours of video.
-- http://www.blinkx.com/
EBAUMS World
- Cippi, the farting chipmunk - A snake gets iced in Cippi's latest adventure!
-- http://www.ebaumsworld.com/
Entertainment News
- Breaking headlines and Hollywood gossip. Free entertainment videos and clips!
-- http://www.ivillage.com/
Free Online Kids Games
- Hundreds of fun free online games for kids.
-- http://www.alfy.com/
Atom Comedy: Great Moments In Human Interaction
- There are a small handful of moments in human life that are so perfect, so wonderful, so priceless that we strive to capture them forever on film. These are definitely not those moments...
-- http://www.atom.com/
Australia Extreme Travel Agencies News
Nov 23 - Nov 29 (214) - Andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com
November 16, 2008 - November 22, 2008 | Main Friday, November 28, 2008 28 Nov 2008 05:21 pm The Flex-Fuel Debacle Plumer explains : The story goes like this: Back in 1992, Congress passed a law requiring all federal agencies to buy ...
Read more...Africa: Avoiding Another Food Price Bubble - AllAfrica.com
Johannesburg — In another 12 years, 16 million more children could be malnourished at a time when even fewer people will be able to afford staple cereals like maize, rice and wheat, which would cost between 13 percent and 27 percent more. This is ...
Read more...Surveillance State - CNET News
The MySpace suicide case concluded last week, with the jury finding Lori Drew guilty of three misdemeanor counts of gaining unauthorized access to the popular social-networking site. While most of the press attention has been focused on the specifics ...
Read more...House Race Update: Ohio Sup. Ct. to Rule on Franklin County Votes - ABC News Blogs
ABC News' Teddy Davis and Arnab Datta Report: A federal appeals court ruled Tuesday that the Ohio Supreme Court -- and not a federal district court -- is the proper forum to decide how approximately 1,000 challenged provisional votes should be ...
Read more...Butt ready to travel to India to ease BCCI's security concerns - Hindustan Times
Desperate to host Mahendra Singh Dhoni's men next year, PCB chairman Ejaz Butt says he is willing to travel to India to ease the security concerns of the BCCI and the Indian government. Butt insisted that the PCB has no plans to shift the series to a ...
Read more...