With just the 5 of us left, breakfast went quickly and we were on the road by 6.

Today we leave the Northern Territories and enter South Australia. An hour into our 5 hour drive to Coober Pedy we cross the border signified by a white line painted on the road way and a rest area packed with overnight campers.

Our drive took us thru miles & miles of flat scrub land as far as the eye could see dotted with microwave towers every 20 miles and the odd cattle carcass by the side of the road.

We arrived at Coober Pedy just in time to take a pleasant stroll thru town after checking out our accommodation for the night. It’s an underground hostel. After storing our gear and checking out the town, we stop for lunch at a cute Jewelry and Bavarian Waffle store.

After having lunch we go on a tour of an opal mine. What a way to earn a living. Temps vary from 0 to 50 C so most miners lived in the same tunnels they worked. The museum was an actual mine that was worked by a family for 44 years. No one knows how much Opal they found but I’m guessing it was a lot.

We also visit an underground house – very nice actually. The temperature stays constant underground so residents save money in heating and air conditioning costs. A bit claustrophobic without many windows.

For our last stop of the day we visited a kangaroo rescue facility, the only one in all of Southern Australia. We learn Australia  has a kangaroo population estimated at 60 million.

At the combined rescue and aboriginal art center were 5 very cute baby kangaroos, one wombat which we were not able to see, and 5 adult kangaroos that we were able to hand feed and pet but not on the head. We feel a little guilty eating kangaroo on our pizza at dinner.