2/26/02 In The Caravan, OZ (Kelly)
Picture the Gold Rush Era...everyone bent down in the river bed waters fossicking away trying to find precious metals. Instead of fossicking for gold Phillip and I tried our hands in striking it rich with sapphires. It was quite interesting to see how his town survives. We took a short 20 minute or so tour in an under ground mine at Mining Heritage before buying our bucket of wash (dirt.) We literally sieved through an entire bucket of rocks and sand. Fortunately, we did find a tiny hand full of sapphires, 2 which had the standards of being cut and set but we opted not to do this because of the cost. We are bringing them home, though; they are all bagged up!
After we left Rubyvale, which wasn't hard, blink and it's gone, we headed to Mackay (pronounced Machigh), which was a short 4 hour drive. You know, I just learned a couple of days ago that Australia
's total population is 19 million. Texas alone has more people than this. Take into account that Australia
is slightly bigger (land wise) than the US. There was literally nothing between Rubyvale and Mackay, not a gas station, nothing! I see where "The Outback " gets it's name from :-)