We have been to Lightning Ridge, N.S.W. once before. We decided to stay in the same caravan park as we did once before - The Lightning Ridge Outback Resort and Caravan Park. We were down the back this time, which was much better.
The caravan park has motel rooms and cabins on site, as well as a pub and restaurant. There is a small pool and the park is walking distance to town cafés and attractions. We like this park, and the pay for 3 nights stay 4 is pretty good.
Lightning Ridge is also famous for its car door tours. We bought a $2 information leaflet front the information centre last time we were here, so this time we did it ourselves.
We drove past 'castles', weird signs, houses made of bottles, a Cactus Garden, many, many mine shafts, and Opal signs everywhere.
The Walk in Mine is worth a visit. Last time we were here we did the self guided tour. The owners, we discovered after a while chatting in the Opal shop, use to live in our house in Brisbane. Talk about a small world!!
Jonnie enjoyed the fossicking for opals, and found a couple with small Opal looking parts of the rock. Peter and I had no idea what to look for, but Jonnie enjoyed it.
This church was built for a movie 'Goddess of '67'. Still an interesting site to visit - and this is where Jonnie has been most successful.
The hot artesian spa pools are free in Lightning Ridge. The artesian pool is very warm and beside the spa pool is a regular pool that is cold compared to the hot one. Many tourists and locals visit at the end of the day to relax in the thermal waters.
The Australian Great Artesian Basin is the largest in the world, covering over 1 711 000 square kilometres and was formed between 100 and 250 million years ago.
One of the many beautiful sunsets.
Lightning Ridge is the birthplace of Paul Hogan - I didn't know that, and the town has nothing to acknowledge this. Lightning Ridge has a very low annual rainfall, as indicated by this sign in the pub.
Well guess what ..... it rained while we were there.
We didn't mind the rain, it is really needed here.
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