Cobar NSW
Copper was discovered here in 1870 by 3 men who were camped by a waterhole while working in the area . They noticed the colour of the water in some parts, so took samples of rock from the water to a lady who used to work in England sorting copper ore. She said this is copper !!  
  By 1912 Cobar had over 2000 mine workers and had the largest copper mine in Australia.
1919 brought about the decline in copper prices after World war 1. so people were left with nothing and with no work. One mine closed in 1920 due to an under ground fire that lasted 16 years.
In 1934 Gold was mined in Cobar, this closed in 1950s, but in 1982 the Endeaver mine opened 45 km from Cobar producing, Silver, gold, lead and zinc.

The Peak gold mine we went to opened in 1992 mining gold. You can walk around old machinery but can not get anywhere close to any gold, not even a look at it as a lump in stone, not a peak. 
 
We went to the top of a hill to Fort Bourke lookout, which gives views across the open cut mine with 150mt to the bottom entrance to underground chambers.This was all fenced too , you think with all the tourists here they would have some sort of display, no ,too busy mining making a mess and money .
The heritage centre did have more of a display but wanted to charge more than our budget would allow to see old falling apart machinery and some ore samples.
There is a weather station here that allows visitors and explains what happens there but they are only open on Mondays and Wednesday.

As you have guessed by now we like walking looking at flora and fauna, so we went for a walk around a 7km walking track past some old buildings and the Rugby ground with its camel mascot. Yes the rugby team is the Cobar Camels. The walk takes you round Cobar's newest water dam/ tank [ here a dam is called a tank ]. The water here is piped in form elsewhere as they have no underground water and very little rain to collect. The dam / tank has only been there a couple of years, it is a birdlife heaven.

This town has funny feeling about it , the people seem friendly enough but you walk around and not many houses have even a looked after look about them they seem unloved. I suppose thats because there has been hard times and most of the workers come to the mines for a year or two make as much money as possible and leave again.

We moved on heading for Bourke, stopping on the way at Curraweena rest area for the night. You can see in the photo the colour of the dirt. We have seen some goats, emus and kangaroos on the road but by far the most prevalent are the Kites and eagles soaring overhead. They are very hard to photograph, so far away ,but we try one day we will fluke a really good shot.