What's been happening the last couple of weeks - first things first and most importantly, Lyn is improving rapidly and getting stronger every day. She has been out to the miracle man again last weekend and he thinks she will be fine now but will be another couple of weeks before she is completely back to her old self. I had a good look at the stairs she fell down and it was amazing she didn't have more serious injuries, it was over 4 metres from top to bottom onto a cement floor. At the moment she is looking after that shop while the owners are away at a yearly conference for two weeks and they have barred her from going up those stairs - fat chance of that!

The mining has been progressing along as normal and from the photos you can see I have started the next run along the face. I got into nuts where I expected and they were dry for a bit longer than first thought but thankfully improved to the point where over about 3 days I was able to get some pretty reasonable colour even though the nuts stayed fairly dry. Normally the nuts harden up and are much more solid when colour starts to appear but not so much in this case. I think they will continue behind or back under the excavator as they were looking pretty good in the wall - won't find that out until next run in a month or two. It was great to get some rough to sell as my normal buyers at Yowah have been screaming for material and were very happy when I called them - they took the lot without hardly a glance at it as we have a very good understanding by now. The Yowah Opal Festival was held on the weekend so I was able to deliver the goods to them. It was a pretty hectic week last week because I wanted to cut a few stone as well to display and hopefully sell at the festival so it was mining during the day and cutting till midnight and then starting again about six am. for another couple of hours before back into the dirt. I was able to cut forty odd stones and a couple of specimens as well which always sell pretty easily. I haven't had to do hours like that since our old business days but no wonder I did it easily for 20 years because I enjoyed every minute of it.

The Yowah Opal Festival is held this time every year and the little mining town really comes alive. Miners from a fair area around turn up to display their opal ranging from very elaborate stands to the back of a ute - it is a typical market type atmosphere with all sorts of things on offer and food and bar all weekend with entertainment and a big feed on Sat night. It is a great time for miners to get together and show off what they have been getting and for a number of buyers from all over Australia to have a range of opal in one location to choose from. All miners know that no matter what you think your product is worth you only get what someone is willing to pay so there is plenty of dealing done before, during and after the festival. The old motto of " ask what you dare, take what you please " is part and parcel of selling opal and it all depends how desperate the miner is for cash flow as to whether he or she sells. As you can imagine most full time buyers can pick miners who need to sell and take full advantage of some situations. I had a pretty good day, selling a specimen and a few stones so came away happy. The big show at the Gold Coast is on in a weeks time and I will have all my stuff there with my selling partner so hope to sell a few better stones as more buyers will be there.

For the time being it is back to the grind but we have had a little rain and it also has been windy and cold so I have been catching up on the bookwork.

Images show the face tidied up for the next run, the start of the run, the festival at Yowah on the 2nd day when most were packing up and a specimen I cut and sold at the festival.

It has been nearly three weeks since my last post - I can not get over how quickly the year is going. I intended to post at least once a week when I started this blog site and will endeavour to get back to that from now on. The last couple of weeks has been a bit hectic because the boss had an accident at work in town and a nasty one at that. One of the places she works at has a storeroom on top of the shop and Lyn was going up to get a box when she missed the top step and handrail and took the express elevator to the cement floor three metres below landing on her side and getting a nasty bump on the head as well. Ambulance was called and he then called the fire brigade to help get her onto a back slab and to hospital for x-rays. Cunnamulla only has one doctor and being a Saturday morning he just happened to be having a coffee at the coffee shop just down the street and arrived to supervise the whole show so Lyn was very lucky there. X-rays showed no breaks thank goodness but she had three days in hospital and was in a lot of pain. Of course I was out at the mine when the fall happened and got the message when I came in for lunch so it was pack up and off to town to visit one very sore, distraught and doped up wife.

We have our resident " miracle man " here, a real bushie who studied acupressure techniques many moons ago and knows more about healing the human body naturally than anyone I have ever talked too. Lyn and I have been visiting him regularly over the years so as soon as she was out of hospital it was out to visit him. Lyn had a job to walk when she got out of the car but half an hour or so later she walked back out much straighter and stronger. Ian soon realised that a rib was out and the cartilage torn on the spine causing the grabbing pain and, using the acupressure put the rib back into place relieving a lot of pain almost immediately - it was amazing to see and a great relief for Lyn. The last ten days has seen her getting slowly better with me being chief cook and bottle washer and plenty of sympathy and tlc thrown in!! She finally got sick of me though and after another trip out to Ian she has now gone back to work and sent me back to the mine to find some opal. Torn rib cartilage takes some time to heal completely so she will be going a bit slower for a while but the old saying " you can't keep a good woman down " certainly applies here because the boss is back.

On the mining front I have gotten busy moving more dirt and have reached a very good level of stone as the photos above show. The level looks like a solid sheet of stone but is actually ironstone nuts packed tightly together - it comes out in a block but once hit with a hammer the nuts separate quite easily. This level so far has been a dry one with only the odd trace of colour right in the corner where the level is cut off by a fault line - you can see in the photos the level being split right in the corner. Another major fault cuts across the end of the level as well and this can be seen by the difference in the ground either side - the ground above the level is more tightly packed with clay looking much different to the blocky sandstone to the right of where the level ends. This side of the fault line is the better opal bearing ground and where I have found most of my opal so far but I can't help following that level just to keep an eye on it. Another major fault line running parallel with the way I am working could change things in a heartbeat - for the better I hope.

I said on my last post I would show some of my cut stones and the process of getting them to the finished product - with looking after Lyn the cutting got put on the back burner but with the first of the opal festivals coming up this month I have to get moving on it. I have a number of stones half done so will hope to show some over the next few weeks. The Yowah opal festival is on this month and plenty of buyers turn up there so I will be working on getting as many stones as possible cut and ready for sale.

The vege garden is going well as the photo shows and won't be long before we are eating home grown goodies.The other photos show the level discussed above and the side of the hole I am taking out at the present time.