So after a very peaceful night next to Pooles Grave we ventured back onto the Silver City Hwy-destination White Cliffs (232km). We stopped next to the airstrip/tool tree for breakfast before tackling the 120km of gravel.
Blue tree...not sure why
It wasn’t too bad except for a few patches of corrugations and dips. The landscape was familiar to what we have previously experienced but greened up on our approach to White Cliffs.
We visited here 20 or so years ago and it doesn’t seem to have changed much since then. This is an Opal mining town and the beauty is underground. The majority of the population live in their dugouts to survive the harsh weather in summer. There is even a hotel, which we stayed in last time.
In town we spotted the Stubbie House built from 60,000 stubbies (I wonder who drank those?).
The town is also known to have had the first Solar Thermal Power Station in Australia built in 1980. The 14 dishes made steam to drive an alternator to produce power for the town. It ceased operation in 2005
An unusual golf course on offer..
On this visit we park in a free area at Potch Gully (-30.839021, 143.091154) and Anybody’s Toilet (they have named the toilets).
The area was the first commercial opal field in Australia in 1890. At one stage there may have been up to 5000 people living here. Now it stands at around 100 to 200 with only Half a dozen full time miners. The majority of mining is conducted on the historical field known as the Lunar Landscape. There is still opal to be found at 30feet plus.Unique to White Cliffs are the opalises pineapples found at around 40feet.
As we walked around we noticed a few different ways used to remove the ‘dirt’ from their claim. The ‘self tipper’,
Oops! Didn’t hear a yell...
the ‘blower’ constructed from an old truck which produces a strong vacuum to suck out large rocks
and excavators used for open cut mining.
Images of White Cliffs...
Mud map approximately 
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