Rain in the outback South Australian town of Andamooka usually comes with the promise of rare opals washing up — prompting locals to walk the streets with buckets, in search of newly unveiled rock and stones.
Leila Day, chair of the Andamooka Opal Fields Tourism Association, stumbled across an opal find after this week's downpour.
Leila Day found this large opal after a recent downpour in Andamooka.(Supplied: Leila Day)
"I was lucky enough to find a painted lady ... a bit like a boulder opal, where the sedimentary rock and opal goes through the middle of that," she said. "That just happened to be nicely washed up on the opal fields; a bit of dust was knocked off it and there it was, waiting to be found."
Recent wet seasons in the usually dry town have seen more flood events than usual, including this month — which brought 80 per cent of Andamooka's annual rainfall in 10 days. "Most of that was just in the last three days; Sunday and Tuesday we had the most, 34 millimetres on Sunday and 25 millimetres on Tuesday, so it was quite a lot to come down in two days," Ms Day said. "That's pretty cool because it just means more opal could be washed down into the main street."
Cohan Fahey, owner and operator of the Andamooka Observatory, said thunderstorms and flash flooding help wash away dirt to unveil opal, as happened this week.
"The rain knocks all the dust off, moves the topsoil off itself and after a sunny day. I think we've got a week of 40 degrees with clear skies — you literally go picking up the shiny bits," he said. Mr Fahey was not surprised to see the downpour had unveiled many opals this week. "I've found a good chunk of what they call rainbow matrix; it's a product we treat with sugar and water ... it's probably worth $500-$600," he said. "You'll find something ... it's not rocket science; it's literally like being a magpie, going around picking up shiny things after the rain." Locals refer to opal hunting as "noodling" or "fossicking".
A tourist drawcard
Ms Day said tourists often travelled to Andamooka after rain to noodle for opal, including one lucky Victorian couple in 2022. "They were doing the normal tourist thing, having a look around after the rain for some opal, and this lady kind of almost slipped down the hill and almost did the splits," Ms Day said.
"She ended up slipping on a $5,000 opal, a hard matrix opal." Mr Fahey said locals weren't territorial when tourists discover valuable pieces. "There's plenty of opal to go around," he said.
"There are so many people that have had those life-changing experiences."And people are always looking on the ground up here; it's a cultural thing up here, you just look."
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-01-21/ ... /103369586