The Virgin Fossicker’s
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| O'Briens Creek |
We are all really excited today, as we move into the Gulf Gemfields. We are heading for a little town called ‘Mt Surprise’. The surprise hopefully being, finding a bag of gems! Before we left we had to stop and fuel up, buy some more water, and empty the toilet cassette before going bush again. Scarlett upon finding her wallet decided an ice cream for morning tea was on the cards; well it was hot enough anyway.
It was about 90km’s of dual and single lane roads to get here, but with no road trains just the odd cattle on the road it was an easy drive. We were all really thankful that today wasn’t a big drive. I must admit inland Australia is very beautiful and we love the bush and wide open spaces, but are tiring of the long distance driving. It will be good to get to the coast and travel the smaller distances between stops again.
As we pulled into town, our first stop was the ‘Gem Den’ where we hoped to get all the good tips on where to go fossicking. Here we got a fossicking licence and a sieve; and Scarlett purchased some small specimen jars ready to display her finds.
O’Brien’s Creek Campground was 45km’s of dirt road out of town, and thankfully it was good road. We are camped on the side of a river and under some shady trees. There seems to be only one other family here, and it appears that we have defiantely missed the high season. After set up we downed some lunch, grabbed all our gear, and headed off fossicking.
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| Lunch with the birds (Yvonne you would have loved all the birds here!) |
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| Shane and Scarlett trying their luck |
We have a pretty good mud map from the guys at the ‘Gem Den’, but there were tracks leading off everywhere. It would be easy to get lost out here. We found a spot along the dry creek bed, and got out our sieve and started sifting through the sand and rocks.
Well let’s just say everything here looked to me like it could be a gem stone, and most of it was covered in dirt. Without any water to wash them, we really had no idea of what we were doing. It was getting really hot, so after an hour of sifting, we decided to go and relax in the air-conditioned van for a while and get some more advice.
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| O'Briens Creek Crossing |
Well the heat unfortunately didn’t relent, and Scarlett met some kids at the campground, so we decided to give it a miss today and try again tomorrow. The clouds were beginning to build up and you would'nt believe it's looking like it might even rain, hopefully it will cool things down so we can sleep.
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| Bush Sunset |
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