Today just took it easy. Keith had decided he wanted to visit the local golf course so we headed up to the Old Timers Mine. $10 to play and you get your own piece of fake grass to tee off on and three battered golf balls. The course itself is pretty rough and ready and there are rocks and dirt fairways and your ball bounces off rocks and lands where it will. The browns are sandscrapes and pretty rough at that. Keith lost 2 balls on the first three holes and his clubs were taking a beating so we put it down to an experience.
After golf we drove up to the high part of town to this little chinese guys house directing us 'lookout very nice scenery take photo' so we did and he preceeded to try and sell us his opals asking us "where you from" and he said "I'm from Hong Kong I been here since the 70's." His garden was full of really quirky things including some of the set from a Mad Max movie and various bits of old junk and opal leavings. We ended up buying a small piece of opal leavings for $2 from him.
We proceeded to a dugout home which is open to the public called 'Fayes Underground Home'. The house is amazing so is Faye Nayler by the sounds of it. Faye no longer lives in Coober Pedy but has left her house as a museum still as it was in the 70's. Faye was a very industrious women carving out her home from the cliffs with nothing but a pick and shovel. After building two big rooms two girlfriends of Fayes arrived and helped her carve out the rest of the house which includes a big annex with an indoor swimming pool which stays at a constant 20deg, pretty bracing for a swim. Faye has been a well known face in the town over the years building the first cafe which then became the Opal Den complete with lodgings and she had her own Opal Mine. She was also instrumental on the local council getting many things done for the town. The house is open for tours $5 each and the people currently running the tours know everything there is to know about the house and are very informative. Well worth the money.
View of the town of Coober Pedy from chinese mans house
Fayes Underground home top- Entrance, Middle - Dining Room, Bottom - Annex and swimming pool
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