July 2021

Hello all,

These have been trying times for all, It has been very sad to see the effects of Covid 19 across the globe with many meeting an untimely death.

It is a good wake up call for all as to the brevity of life and the importance of contemplating eternal issues. God is good and has provided  redemption through our Lord Jesus Christ who gave himself a sacrifice for our sins. To receive eternal life all we need to do is acknowledge we are sinners in God’s sight(accepting God’s assessment of us “for all have sinned”) and accept the fact Lord Jesus (the Christ) as our saviour. He alone has suffered in our stead “bearing our sins in his own body on the tree”(cross). Rising again the third day for our justification. We can not work for our salvation, salvation is through God’s grace alone.

If you would like a bible we can send you one free of charge.

Covid 19 is not only a wakeup call, it has also affected a great number of people in the way they obtain an income. Many of our valued clients have had to close their shops, others, international wholesalers are grounded.  This has made it very difficult to figure out where the next sale will come from.

For us the situation is forcing us into the realm of social media, something we never envisaged needing to do.

For 25 years we have been happy to quietly trade along in the back ground dealing personally with each of our valued clients seeking to supply them with quality cut opal to meet each individual need.

Times are changing, we have very limited time to spend in the social medial realm. It would be very difficult for us to sell all our products retail on line and its not something we have the time to pursue.

Much of Liz and my time is spent mining and cutting the opal we find, sometimes it’s gem opal other times it is mostly commercial opal we find. We also buy rough when the mine is not producing enough good opal.

We always have inexpensive lower grade rough material for sale, including 20 Litre buckets of off-cuts from $55 per bucket and better rough from $220 and upwards.  These are pick up only and are available from our Ipswich facility.

Currently we have about 10 x 200 litre drums of low grade rough at the mine for $550 per drum (rough

If you are a manufacturing Jeweller, Wholesaler, collector or just someone who wants a good deal on boulder opal we are here to do our best to meet your requirements.

Kindest regards from Ken Willis

October 2016

Hi all,

It has been difficult to find time for news letters with our busy mining and cutting operations over the years, I apologise for my slackness.

This year has been a little different with unprecedented wet weather out at the mines, thus hampering our mining program. The property owners are excited about the rain and the country is looking the best I have ever seen it in 30 years. Rain up to 114mm fell over two weeks when I was last at the mine, water had made its way into our open pit and made it unworkable. I was also stranded for 2 weeks, plenty of emergency stores kept me going.

I took the opportunity to undertake further prospecting and digging some test holes to 18 feet in 3 different spots on our current project. I found encouraging results in 1 of the 3 holes dug, two more deposits were found on this lease, one deposit in the side of an old cut, also a top gem green ,orange vein was found in a boulder at the surface beside an old shallow bulldozer cut. We now have 3 more prospective deposits to work this year.

Sometimes when digging near the surface dust and dirt can conceal boulders amongst the hard surface sandstone, this last discovery is one such deposit that was missed. The rain had exposed these boulders. Very excited by this one and plan to develop the deposit next trip and alter my pit to include this area.

Opal has been mined from this deposit for the last 3 years with boulder containing opal found from the just under the surface down to about 30 feet, generally there are 3 undulating patchy levels to follow, after this depth the boulders have seen little opalization.

It is my intention to sell more rough through this site in the next few months.

All the opal needs to be faced down to expose the opal prior to sale. Most of the boulder opal from this mine is found in a boulder that contains a horizontal “slip” line. The resulting cavities can contain opal but it is not possible to see the opal without some processing.

Lower grades of opal are sold per 20 litre bucket and are priced from $50 per bucket, these pieces are suitable for cheap opals and some specimens, any thing else you may find in them would be purely speculative.

Please feel free to make inquiries for rough or cut boulder opals.