Broken Hill to Silverton and back
12-8-08
Since I have a fairly fast connection here I will post quite a few photos I took today. I am hearing from some that my pages are not coming up and I imagine it is because I am making too large of a page. Well, I am sorry but I am doing the best I can do out here with the time I have. If you are having trouble go to town and look at it on a fast connection at the library or somewhere. Sorry but I am having enough trouble riding along upside down and on the left side so hang in there with me please.
Last night we got on the roof to admire the sunset here at the hostel. These are three Austrian girls that are out on an adventure for six months. They are 18-19 years old and having a great time. I like the idea of sending the kids off on a world adventure before they have to settle down and make something of themselves.
I made a trip out of town to go to a little town of Silverton that is about 25 klicks away. At the edge of town was a sign pointing to this lilttle museum so I like mining and had to go inside. A little lady gave me a tour along with historical video. Broken Hill is or was a major silver, lead and zink producing area starting in the 1880’s. There was a lot of money made here and they proclaim it to be one of the richest strikes ever. Still producing I guess. siverton is where a movie called 'Mad Max' was filmed or i guess the second of three cd's or so the girl at the video store said. i rented the first one to check it out. they didnt have the second one in stock at this time. i have heard about that movie before so it will be a quick look tonight.
A model of how they mine here. They use the rubble to back fill where they have mined to make a new floor. In the early days they would just dump the crushed waste down and the dust was lethal. The workers would start working at 14 and most would be dead from miners lung by the time they were 32. Some not to see their 20th birthday. The miners formed unions and had many a vicious fight with the mine owners over many years. I think it was in the 20’s before the unions got control and conditions improved. Now they use a slurry to put the waste back in the hole. She also said that now they use remote controlled machinery. I asked how much they made and she said somewhere around $50-100 an hour. No wonder prices seem high here. I don’t know what regular people make but it seems like they must make more than we do in the USA.
This little rock of lead/sliver ore wighs forty something kilos or over 80 pounds. It was a two handed lift for sure. Amazing how heavy that stuff was to load in an ore cart. The ore is bright shinny black.
The place was packed with old mine stuff that was much like
thre mine stuff in Nevada used.
The womans husband that used to be a miner makes these pictures from rock from the mines. He has made maybe a hundred that were on display here.
I took this photo the other day and forgot to post it. This is a power pole and they use only one wire and not two like we use. Not sure how that works but it just has to be about half the cost to run a power line. They use these concrete posts too and they are spaces .4 kilometers apart, or about twice as far as we put them.
Here I am on the way out to Silverton.
Off to the side of the road was this guy that was giving camel rides. A young girls decided to take a ride while I was there.
I thought it was interesting how they control that big beast. Just a little string in the nose. I guess I would be controlled the same way or at least until I could get to my pocket knife.
It didn’t look like such an interesting ride to be led around a little path.
This is the Goal sign. Goal is a prison or jail. More on the insides down below.
There were some very nice buildings being restored around town. I really like this one.
This one too.
Outside of the cabin above is this rail motorcycle….. actually an artist construction of the mind.
The birds around here are a noisy bunch. I have to take out my hearing aids sometimes as they get really loud.
A more serious camel dude.
I have to throw this in here form downtown Broken Hill where they have these historical signs all over town.
I have to put this in here for Steamboat Jack. Jack workes with the Virginia City, Nevada volunteer fire dept. He is a wagon restore specialist and did a wonderful job on the steam pumper that they have. I really like the brass helmets that the guys wore.
Fore my music friends…..
Very cool pedal power generator. Not much new is there in this world.
Notice the size of the war shield. They must have been accurate to protect themselves from an arrow or spear with that little thing.
This is a pump type washing machine. Pump up and down on the handle and a funnel on the bottom of the rod forces water though the clothes. I had a hand operated one in Nevada but not as nice as this one.
An Icyball refrigerator. I have seen just the balls before but never did understad how they worked. I hope you can read the directions below.
The toilet room at the Goal.
I had to take this one for Craig Whitley. Amigo Bob, please send a link to this page for Craig. He will like this steam powered trip hammer. The sign on it says not to talk to the operator while he it is in use.
Dingo traps
A dead eagle story.
OK, these are for my buddy Pete Clark who is a VW nut. Not sure why they are painted like this but they belong to an art gallery near by.
They sure did nice work back in 1880
There are stil quite a few of these old hotel bars left. I think someone said there are 14 of them. The beer drinkers do a pub crawl and see if they can do them all.
Grand places still today.
The town hall.
During the heat of the day those verandas over the side walk sure are nice.
This is the Trades hall. It sure says something about the power that the unions finally have.
