20 July 2016: Mines … lots of them

The Cobar Motor Motel is a typical motel. In some ways it’s even similar to the Miners Retreat Motel at Ballarat, it’s just not as scary. Outside nearly every room was parked a ute whose owner was clearly a serious dude doing all sorts of stuff we never think about. It was quieter than I thought it would be. By the time we surfaced for breakfast the drivers (possibly even owners) of these utes had long gone.

A sachet of peanut butter.
The packaging reads "Allergen
statement: contains peanuts".
How surprising!

Breakfast, of course, offered those little packets of cereal that I referred to at Tanwarra Lodge. I have already explained that these things remind me of inedible stuff. I had forgotten, however, that among the things I listed in my 17 July 2016 post I should have added that having the television on at breakfast is abhorrent. There are many things that drive me wild but that is certainly one of them. That notwithstanding, I enjoyed a breakfast of bacon and poached eggs and fruit juice (which was not proper fruit juice as it came out a carton probably had reconstituted juice in it somewhere).

The Cobar Weekly: the
source of all truth

I am concerned, Gentle Reader, that you think I am a whinger. Well, frankly, I am a whinger and I am proud of it. There are some things that one likes to be just so and, as one gets older, there are just more of things that are not just so. That’s the way it is. And I will not forbear from protesting vigorously when I am unhappy with something. So there!

The day had dawned grey and miserable. A light rain was falling but it was at least warm. We learned later from The Cobar Weekly, that pinnacle of journalistic endeavour, that Cobar has had nearly its annual rainfall already. That about sums up the news in The Cobar Weekly but the newspaper represents a dollar well spent.

The centre of the town is not unlike many other small country towns. There are several interesting buildings. 

Old stores in the town

There is still a butcher in this building

The Western Hotel - it stretches from here to there

Colouring-in in Cobar - an adult occupation, Whatever do they colour?

We decided that we would go to the Great Cobar Heritage Centre. Its website says that “the Great Cobar Heritage Centre is the former Administration Building (circa 1910) of the Great Cobar Copper Mine. The centre captures the essence of Cobar, housing an outstanding collection of exhibits which date from the early 1870s to the present day. Inside the amazing collection of artefacts reveal the extraordinary diverse range of local heritage”. For once, the description of something was pretty accurate. It was fascinating.

In particular there was a reference to a book called "Men and how to manage them: A book for Australian wives and mothers" by a Mrs Wicken published in 1885. I shall read this.

The centre is housed in a building that was completed in 1910 by the Great Cobar Copper Mining Company Limited. The company had been established in 1878 and was no doubt proud of its new Mines Offices. It lasted seven years. The museum indicated that price fixing by the French (who else) had led to a slump in copper process and the Great Cobar Copper Mining Company shut down in 1917. A plaque at the entrance to the museum said that it had been sold to the Council “for a consideration of a dollar”.

These steam boilers must have been fearsome beasts in their day

There were old mine workings at the back of the Heritage Centre. The water is green because of the copper. There's an old rusty piece of equipment in the centre picture. The contrast between the colours of the rock (right) is remarkable.

The old Mines Offices were a handsome building and the Heritage Centre therein provides an exhibition that The G and I found fascinating. Some history of Cobar might help. The name Cobar is derived from the Aboriginal Ngiyampaa word for copper but may also represents an Aboriginal attempt to pronounce the word “copper”. Copper was discovered at Cobar in 1869. According to the Heritage Centre this was more by luck than judgement. Three men (described in one leaflet as “tank sinkers”, named Charles Campbell, Thomas Hartman and George Gibb) had given up on gold mining and for some reason (I could not discern what reason) were travelling around the area with two Aboriginal guides (Boney and Frank). As they camped, they noticed the unusual colour of the water and took some ore samples. They didn’t know what they were but later showed them to the publican at the Gilgunnia pub. The wife of the publican was a Cornish woman who (being from Cornwall where they know about these things) said “that be copper”. And that was when it all started. The NSW Department of Primary Industries publishes a useful history of mining in the area. The area is Cobar Shire which I learn has an area equal to that of Denmark. How I have lived my life without knowing this important fact is quite beyond me.

The population of Cobar is about 4,800 with an overall catchment of 7,000. At its peak in the early 20^th century its population reached 10,000. The railway reached Cobar in 1892. The Heritage Centre gave us what it calls a “Cobar Mud Map” which contains a chronology of events in Cobar. These make fascinating reading and they include, for example:

• Cobar’s first hotel opens (the Cobar Hotel, 1873)
• rioting in Cobar over work conditions and lynching threatened (also 1873, I wonder if the men were fortified by the product sin offer at the Cobar Hotel)
• the first car in Cobar (1903, that’s surprisingly early. I wonder how it got here; presumably by rail as I doubt if the roads were passable)
• electricity arrived (1910)
• the CSA Mine catches fire underground (1920, the fire burned for 16 years)
• the Barrier Highway is completely sealed (1963)
• the water pipeline from Nyngan is commissioned (1965, before that water would come by train)
• the CSA mine reopens after 46 years (1966)
• the CSA mine closes putting 500 out of work and then reopens a year later (1998), and
• The G and I visit Cobar (2016)

After visiting the Heritage Centre we repaired to Gumnut, a café in the town. There we partook of soup and some very acceptable coffee before headed up the road to the Peak Gold Mine which is a handful of kilometres from town. We had lost Terry and Enid but found them at the mine. In fact, it’s not really “at the mine” but there is a viewing platform from which you can see the mine and which shows the sheer scale of the operation. The mine is an opencast mine, except there seems to be a tunnel at the bottom from which there emerged a steady stream of vehicles. The pictures might speak of the scale better than I can. It is awe-insiring, and worrying, how much impact humans can make on the planet.

The is an open-cast mine: I reckon it was 60 or 70 metres deep.  The whitish seam of quartz running down the centre is the Great Chesney Fault. You can also make out late 19th century entrances at the top level and the third level down.

You could do some serious hill-climbing up these roads

You can make out the mine entrance at the bottom

Further up the road to Hillston we were promised a gold trail at another Newgold mine. As it turned out this was disappointing except for some 100 years-old heavy machinery lying around.

Make sure you fill up

Some serious gold crushing equipment built in 1874 but not installed here till 1910

A scam merchant might think he had died and gone to heaven. Where are you Steptoe?

We couldn't work out the economics here. At today's prices the gold is worth about $1.6m and the silver about $600K. Over nearly 60 years that doesn't speak viability to me

We took a wander around some of Cobar's heritage trail where we passed the Catholic church (which we noted was considerably larger than the Anglican church.

The Catholic Church

The Anglican church is a much more moderate affair than the Catholic church

Aspire to inspire before you expire: the new Catholic doctrine fresh, no doubt, from Rome

A Cobar chicken

We returned to the motel for a rest before dinner which we are to take at the Empire Hotel. There is cattle country around so I am anticipating a piece of something dead and succulent. And it was indeed succulent. I had a large organic Angus steak with chips and salad (what else) which I washed down with a schooner of Coopers. I feel well replete and ready for bed.

While at the Empire we fell into brief conversation with a South African man at the next table. Our brief conversation with him was a lesson in the vicissitudes of the mining industry and perhaps a metaphor for the fortunes of Cobar. Aged about 40 he had been in gold mining all his working life but, having been made redundant 3 times in recent years, he had decided to switch to copper in the expectation that it would provide more stability than gold.

A look at the 10-year figures for the price of each metal does at least show that both metals are risky. I saw in one article that "after a multi-year hiatus, resumption in the compound annual growth of global mine production starting in 2012 has the market for refined copper poised to enter into surplus supply." I hope that our man does well: he was a friendly soul.

Charts to show the fluctuation in gold prices (left) and copper proces (right) over the last ten years

Indeed, Cobar seems a friendly place in spite of its ups and downs. As we walked back to the motel after dinner people we passed in the street all greeted us and wished us a good night.

Steak and chips at the Empire Hotel