Most of the world’s gem-quality opal comes out of this one town in the South Australian desert, across more than 70 separate opal fields, and it started on 1 February 1915 when Willie Hutchison found the first stone. Miners followed from 1916 and then did the obvious thing about the heat: they moved underground. A standard three-bedroom dugout with lounge, kitchen and bathroom is cut straight into the rock for roughly what a surface house costs and holds a steady temperature with no air conditioning at all, so the town has underground homes, churches, shops and a hotel. About 1,437 people at the 2021 census. What makes it a prospector’s town rather than a company town is the claim law: 15.3 square metres each, deliberately small, which keeps the big operators out and leaves the ground to individuals. Roughly 95 percent of what comes up is low-value potch; the black opal is the reason anyone keeps digging. 846 km northwest of Adelaide on the Stuart Highway.
South Australia
See it on the map
