Today I'm supposed to talk about something I never would have seen if I had stayed home.  I have been having trouble with this - there are thousands of things I never would have seen!  Even if I had visited Australia on a holiday, there are so many experiences that you just wouldn't get on a trip, even an extended one.  After thinking long and hard, getting annoyed, giving up, revisiting it and repeating the whole cycle again I have finally decided on the following:

I admit that the pictures don't look very impressive.  I wish I had taken better ones under the circumstances.  These pictures are from June 2013, when Jeremy and I took our trusty Subaru Outback down the Oodnadatta Track and then drove back from Uluru, NT to Adelaide via Coober Pedy.  I was totally excited to stay in an underground hotel and see what the town was like.  After we checked in, we went wandering outside, looking for somewhere to eat.  Of course, wanting the full experience, I insisted that we go to an underground restaurant.  There are two underground restaurants in town...and neither one was open (sidenote: returned to Coober Pedy in Dec 2013 and the same thing occurred - I think I'll have to let that particular dream go).

One of the restaurants had the gate shut, but there was a man walking around on the other side and we called out to him to find out if the restaurant was going to be opening later in the evening.  Sadly, it was not, but we started talking.  This gentleman was friends with the owner of the restaurant (who was out touring some Dutch backpackers around the area).  He told us that he had just bought the building beside the restaurant and invited us to come have a look.  Turns out it was an giant underground area sectioned into rooms and he was planning at some stage to turn it into an art gallery.  We went underground and saw the space and were suitably impressed.  We were then invited to the man's dugout house for a drink with himself and some friends and the aforementioned Dutch backpacker girls.

First, we needed to continue our quest for food but we wrote down his address and phone number and said that we might stop by.  We found the best Greek restaurant in all of Australia (to my limited knowledge) and had a fantastic dinner and then returned to our hotel.  We debated what to do - we were tired, had just done a long day of driving, and had 10 more hours to look forward to the next day.  There was every reason not to go, but in the end the adventurous spirit won out (when would we ever get this chance again?!?) and we went out in search of the house.  We had a pleasant hour or so sitting and chatting, getting a tour, and the man even gave me a small opal! (Post edited to include picture of opal with pendant that he gave me as well.  I think I will get the opal put in a ring setting).  The pictures are of the inside of the underground/dugout house (it was huge underneath - had about 6 bedrooms!)  I think I can safely say that this is something that I never would have seen if I had stayed home!