Travel
A visit to the quirky, underground town of Coober Pedy, the opal capital of the world
Triangular mounds of desert dirt are the first sign of something different. I then spot old trucks rusting beneath strange elevated barrels and unusual entrances for underground dwellings. It’s the kind of scene one might expect in a post-apocalyptic sci-fi movie, especially when you spot the grounded spaceship. Welcome to South Australia’s Coober Pedy, the world’s opal mining capital. Trust me, there’s nowhere else on the planet quite like it.
In 1915, a teenage boy was searching for gold with his father in the Australian outback. Scouting the moonscape that sits halfway between Alice Springs and Adelaide, neither could know that an inland sea once drained water and minerals through this vast expanse of silica, creating ideal conditions to produce a precious gemstone. Rainbow-coloured opal has been prized for millennia as an alluring gem renowned for its beauty and rarity. Gold might have been the goal, but the teenage boy unearthed a rich prize of opal instead.
Within months of his discovery, hundreds of prospectors arrived to stake their claim around a new settlement. Aboriginal Australians called it “kupa peti”, a phrase meaning ‘white man in a hole.’ More than a century later, the dusty town of Coober Pedy produces about 70 per cent of the world’s opal. Mining Australia’s national gemstone generates tens of millions of dollars annually.
These days, Coober Pedy also attracts curious outback road-trippers with its miner-owned opal shops, mine tours, an opal museum, and the opportunity to sleep in an underground hotel. Fifty per cent of the local population live underground in roomy ‘dugouts’, which provide shelter from the searing heat, strong desert wind, and evening cold. These constant and comfortable interior temperatures also mean low energy bills, with an added opportunity to strike it rich during household renovations. The town of Coober Pedy prohibits mining within its borders, but if you’re expanding your dugout, blast out a wall and happen to hit a vein of opal, well, it’s yours to keep.
Inside the town’s museum, a local guide explains this odd municipal quirk, which fits nicely in a town known for its eccentric characters living in dark, cool, windowless caves. “Hang on a second. Does that make you troglodytes (a human cave dweller)?” I ask, inadvertently causing offence.
“We are not living in caves; we are living in dugouts,” responds the annoyed guide. It’s a fair dinkum point that caves don’t have satellite television, modern bathrooms, or kitchens. Some of these hillside dugouts are mansion-sized, linked by tunnels, and large enough to function as hotels. The interior walls might be painted, but most maintain their sandstone patina, finished with wood glue to stop the dust.
I learned how water is piped into town from artesian wells via a desalination plant 24 kilometres away. The outback town is surprisingly sustainable, with 70 per cent of its energy needs met by solar and wind power and the rest by battery. I also discover the hefty price difference between solid, doublet and triplet opals, with black opal being the most prized and expensive.
As for the strange trucks with those elevated barrels, they’re called blowers and used to remove sand excavated by explosives and tunnelling machines. Gone are the days when miners would fossick (an Aussie term for scrounge or rummage) with a chisel and hammer. Visitors can still give it a jolly good go at an area called the Jewel Box on the edge of town. If you do happen to hit opal, it’s finders’ keepers. I’m told visiting tourists have chiselled out opals worth thousands of dollars.
“It’s very much a game of luck,” regales an old Greek miner on a public opal mining tour. Inches of dirt might separate a rich vein of black opal from bare dirt, and don’t be fooled by the sparkling ‘potch’ (worthless and colourless opal that nevertheless makes up to 95 per cent of the opal found in Coober Pedy). Miners are not required to clear away their failed digs, resulting in the triangular mounds of dirt surrounding the town, some of which date back over a century.
After a fabulous lunch of grilled lamb in one of the underground restaurants, I climb a nearby hill to get a better view of the dugouts. Immediately, I spot a spaceship in need of repair. It turns out to be a prop from the 2000 Vin Diesel sci-fi movie Pitch Black. 1985’s Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome, 2000’s Red Planet and 2021’s Mortal Kombat were also filmed here since landscape artists don’t have to work hard to create the perfect alien planet. Being in a sprawling, remote and hostile desert also means expensive props and equipment can simply be discarded, along with the tools, equipment and junk of opal miners. Film buffs might want to check into the White Cliffs Underground Motel, which features in the classic film Priscilla, Queen of the Desert.
There’s rusted gear everywhere you look, the legacy of miners who busted out, along with the roughly 10 per cent who actually hit it big. Coober Pedy has no shortage of oversized personalities that testify to both groups. Opposite the museum, I’m drawn to a shop with a big sign out front promising Waffles & Gems, appealing to those with a sweet, expensive tooth. Here, I meet a large man in a kilt named Jimmy, who arrived from Edinburgh to find his fortune four decades ago. Still an active miner, Jimmy proudly points out that his opal jewellery is priced better than anything we’ll find across the street.
In Coober Pedy, box office bombs were once at risk of being actually bombed. The town’s drive-in once ran a clip asking the audience not to light dynamite while the picture played. Unfortunately, a big storm in 2023 shuttered South Australia’s last working drive-in. Visitors can, however, pop into the Serbian Orthodox Church, an impressive cavern with intricate statues carved into solid rock walls. There’s also a dusty 18-hole golf course, where players carry their artificial turf for tee-offs. Remarkably, the Coober Pedy Opal Fields Golf Club shares a reciprocal membership agreement with St. Andrews in Scotland, which is more than can be said for my local course in Vancouver.
Eight hundred forty-six kilometres north of Adelaide on the Stuart Highway, Coober Pedy is strange, eccentric, remote, and completely memorable. Suppose you find yourself exploring Australia by road or rail (the town is a day excursion on The Ghan railway between Darwin and Adelaide). In that case, it’s worth digging into this curious gem of a bucket list destination.
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