We had a great nights sleep, I think we have both slipped into holiday mode very easily.
We were out on the road around 8:30 on our way to The Broken Hill Sculpture Symposium and Living Desert Sanctuary, about 9km out of town. The Sculpture Symposium is a placement of 12 sandstone sculptures on the top of a flat topped hill, that was put in place in early 1993. Each of the sculptures were done by a different artist. It reminded us of another sculpture installation we saw north of Kalgoorlie at Lake Ballard, but we both thought Lake Ballard was better (even if it was a 200km drive into the middle of nowhere).
The Living Desert Sanctuary was a bit of a surprise, the entire area seemed to be enclosed by a pretty serious fence that was electrified. We spent about 30 mins walking around the Flora Trail. The area was typical of the local landscape, harsh, rocky and dry, but in its own way it was very peaceful and had a wonderful natural beauty to it. There was a Cultural/Fauna Walk attached to the Flora Reserve, but we decided to give it a miss this time.
We drove to Silverton, Mad Max country, about 25km away. It is an old silver, lead and zinc mining town (1880’s), established before the Broken Hill ore body was discovered. And unfortunately for it, its reserves proved secondary to Broken Hill and it went into decline as Broken Hill took off. All that remains there now is a scattering of old buildings, with all local life seemingly centred around the last remaining pub, the town used to have 10! It’s now a tourist town centred on The Mad Max movies and a few artist galleries. We drove through town and went to the Mundi Mundi Lookout. It looks out into the outback, and the vastness of our country, breath taking and it’s meant to be even better at sunset! Back in town we walked around and had a look in a couple of galleries, the Mad Max Museum was closed and the pub wasn’t anything special. There are lots of beautiful old buildings around town and most are being looked after pretty well and maintain their old world charm and character. The town really does milk the Mad Max thing for all its worth, with replica cars and other related stuff scattered all over town.
After lunch back at the van, we had an afternoon of galleries and taking in the town. We went to the Pro Hart Gallery, the Jack Absolum Gallery and the Silver City Art Centre and Mint. At Pro Harts Gallery we saw his Rolls Royce and Daimler Cars (all 4), one of which he had painted himself!. He was a prolific artist and dabbled in many art forms, and was no slouch at any of them. It was good to see his old art studio that appeared to be in the condition he left it just before his death. The Absolum Gallery displayed his Australian landscapes beautifully, the depth and colour he got into many of his works was amazing. At the Silver City Art Centre and Mint is the world’s largest painting on canvas. The work is 100m long and 12m high, all hand painted by the one artist, Peter Andrew, in 2 years . It is a landscape painting of the natural features and manmade landmarks within 300km of Broken Hill. The painting is presented in a diorama format, stretched around a curved wall with landscape materials in front of it to help give it depth. It is a work in progress, with the artist still adding new features to the works over the years since he first “finished” it.
After all that hard touristy work it was time to relax, so we headed off to Bells Milk Bar for a milkshake. It’s like stepping back in time as you pass through the front doors of this fine establishment. You land somewhere around the 1960’s early 70’s. The milkshakes were amazing. I had a Jaffa shake and Deb had a Strawberry. I couldn’t believe Deb had never heard of a Jaffa Milkshake before, and after she tried it she, although at first dubious, liked it, even saying it was better than hers!
After all that we decided to head back to the van for a bit of a relax, and I could watch a bit of the Bathurst Race and the SANFL Grand Final while Deb read the paper then later I went for a run.
(Deb here!! About an hour or so ago our power has gone out(240V keeps tripping out), so instead of stopping overnight on the road somewhere on the way to Dubbo we are going to leave early and drive straight though, we looked on the net and there is a caravan place there that we hope might have a look at the electrics for us, have sent them an email letting them know we are coming!! So fingers crossed this time tomorrow we will be all sorted!!)
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