The place is called Marble Bar cos they thought it was. It ain’t. It’s jasper….
Marble Bar is supposedly Australias’ hottest town. It is winter here and the temperature for the 3 days we were here exceeded 33′. It is bloody hot – and dry and dusty but it is a nice little place. The caravan park is pretty basic though. Sunday afternoon saw us on a wildflower tour with a local who cares about such things. He knew all the botanical names and we can remember none of them but it was enlightening…..
Dunno what they are but pretty aren’t they? And the seeds lay dormant for many years, in this case exposed after the overlying spinifex got burnt out.
The Comet Mine, dating back to about 1936 is one of few deserted mine sites that still looks like it could be back in business tomorrow…
but Occ Health and Safety says you can’t go in cos its ‘unsafe’. An ol guy we talked to is actually restoring the old generators with a view to facilitating site tours in due course. If memory serves the mine closed in the 70’s but it looks like it is still all there although the caretaker told us that the hill behind is a honeycomb of tunnels and is probably actually unsafe. Another wonderful piece of history though.
Another surprise is the “secret” airport. About 35 k out of town the allies put in a field to accommodate Liberator bombers in about 1943 and quite a few bombing missions were carried out over Java – a flight time of some 14 hours. About the only thing left these days are the runways and a few concrete slabs….
I’ve just uploaded Windows 10 and its giving me shit. I’ve lost my photo editing file and now can’t upload pics. I’ll have to close and publish this short update whilst I sort out the mess
One Response
Fair Dinkum Bazza, next time ask me if you should upload windows 10 while you are in the middle of nowhere and on 3G / 4G internent access!
I watched a 4×4 show on TV today and the guy was in the pilbara region, and there is so much to see!
Regards,
g@z.