Posted 06/30/2011 02:34 am
I live in Sydney, but I visited the Perth Mint a couple of years ago. Travelling from Sydney to Perth is a bit like from New York to San Francisco.
I made the trip by rail, and it took 3 days. Crossing the Nullabor desert Plain is a weird. The rail track has the longest section of straight in the World. You go to sleep in the evening whilst on the move, with the scenery dead flat, with the highest piece of vegetation (dead) no more than 6" high. In the morning, the scenery in exactly the same.
The Perth Mint has a demonstration gold bar pouring. There is also a 400 ounce pure gold bar which you can handle. I have a one ounce platinum Koala bullion coin. It is the only bullion coin in my collecttion.
The Super Pit is in Kalgoorlie, about 600 klm East of Perth. It is an open cut gold mine, and has been in continuous operation 24/7 for over 100 years. I visited it at midnight, on a stinking hot night. It uses some of the largest dump trucks in the World, and they look as small as ants from the edge of the Pit. You have to be there to appreciate the scale of the operations.
I made the trip by rail, and it took 3 days. Crossing the Nullabor desert Plain is a weird. The rail track has the longest section of straight in the World. You go to sleep in the evening whilst on the move, with the scenery dead flat, with the highest piece of vegetation (dead) no more than 6" high. In the morning, the scenery in exactly the same.
The Perth Mint has a demonstration gold bar pouring. There is also a 400 ounce pure gold bar which you can handle. I have a one ounce platinum Koala bullion coin. It is the only bullion coin in my collecttion.
The Super Pit is in Kalgoorlie, about 600 klm East of Perth. It is an open cut gold mine, and has been in continuous operation 24/7 for over 100 years. I visited it at midnight, on a stinking hot night. It uses some of the largest dump trucks in the World, and they look as small as ants from the edge of the Pit. You have to be there to appreciate the scale of the operations.
