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Heading further east today, we stopped in the small town of Coolgardie, once a big gold mining town and the third largest town in WA (after Perth and Fremantle). In its heyday it had a population of over 5,000 people and 700 registered mining companies. Today Coolgardie is mainly a tourist town, with well maintained and beautiful historic buildings a central focus of the town.
Next we drove to our destination of Kalgoorlie, where we arrived mid afternoon, first checking out nearby Lake Sampson as you can camp near the lake, however we decided to stay at the 24 hour free camp in town.
We unhooked the caravan and headed straight to the impressive Fimiston Open Pit (known as the Super Pit), Australia's largest open cut gold mine at 570 metres deep, 3.5km long and 1.5km long.
The mine, managed by KCMG, produces 28 tonne of gold a year employing around 550 people. Using drill and blast mining with huge face shovels and dump trucks, the mine operates 24 hours a day.
We spent a long time looking at the vastness of the mine, watching the dump trucks in operation driving up and down the open cut mine and reading the display boards about its history, management (including environmental strategies) and operational details and stats, giving great insight into this massive industry.
Just before sunset we drove to the lookout at nearby Mount Charlotte, where we were able to read about the importance of the water pipeline (which comes all the way from Mundaring Weir in the Perth Hills all the way to Kalgoorlie along the Great Eastern Highway. Here we were treated to a sensational sunset, with hues of glittering gold and deep red fire lighting up the horizon for a spectacular display welcoming us to Kalgoorlie.
On the way back to our caravan we stopped briefly at the supermarket before heading back and enjoying an easy dinner of roast BBQ chicken and salad before we settled in to watch part two of Roots on SBS.
Night night from the goldfields xx
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