To Kalgoorlie and Back again (part two)

More than a month between updates is far too long and I apologise for my blog absence to those of you who read here regularly. There are lots of reasons for my neglect of the blog. Monty the super mischief pup is one of the main reasons I am not writing, as it is rare that I get to sit down for extended periods of time. On the upside I am getting fit and when I was in Sydney earlier this month  I was thankful for my Monty induced fitness as I traipsed all over the city with nary a puff.

Now back to the awesomeness that was Kalgoorlie.

I had booked a tour to Lake Ballard on my first day in Kalgoorlie but due to insufficient numbers the tour was cancelled, so I had a free day in the town with nothing planned.

Nicholas, the absolutely fabulous general manager of Rydges Kalgoorlie took me on a whirlwind tour of the town so that I could get my bearings.

The Super Pit, the open cut goldmine is huge, absolutely, awesomely huge and as I stood in the searing heat peering down into the mine I was astounded by the scale of the operation. We are an incredibly destructive species and this industrial scale destruction of the land just boggled my mind.

But even as I knew I was seeing our doom writ large in the rocks before me, I was totally captivated by the colour and layering of the mine face.

 

The colours  and textures of the super pit have started to appear in my post Kalgoorlie work.

Nicholas dropped me off back in the town and I organised to go on a two and a half hour bus tour of the mine later that day.

It was early still, only about ten am and the heat was already pretty fierce. I can see how people die in this country, it is a hard place with no water of its own, all the water for the town comes from Perth, 600 kilometres away.

I had a bit of a sightsee around the town but the heat had really nailed me and so I caught a cab back to the air conditioned comfort of the hotel. The cab drivers all had interesting stories to share and I met recent arrivals to this country who were doctors, engineers or IT specialists in their own countries, who were all driving cabs here in Australia while they re did their qualifications. All it seemed had come to the goldfields to seek their fortunes and ended up driving cabs.

That was my modus operandi for most of my stay in Kalgoorlie, as the heat made my dodgy leg swell up alarmingly. I would do some things, then cab back to Rydges, where I spent a bit of time in my room with my leg up on cushions, instagramming all the things I had seen.

This is the yarn bombing on Egan Street.

This is one of the many fascination buildings on the main street.

The people of Kalgoorlie were super friendly and an example was a lady I was chatting with in a coffee shop, who drove me to my hotel rather than letting me catch a cab. That sort of small town friendliness is lovely and reminded me very much of home.

The tour of the Super Pit was amazing and depressing at the same time. The potter in me just could not get enough of the colours of the dirt, so many shades of red and orange, such beautiful layering in the sides of the mine, such a massive industrialised destruction.

In this photo you can see the spot of emerald green down the bottom, that is water. Apparently it is the first time the mine has had water in it, as in January this year Kalgoorlie received a years supply of rain in one day.

This is one of the artworks in the Kalgoorlie-Boulder Art Prize. Ephemeral Prosperity by Patrica Rose.

I started to write this a fortnight ago and became distracted. I have lost my thread so I shall press publish and wander off back up to the studio in search of all the oranges and reds.