Outback Opal Hunters

Both my wife and I enjoy following the ups but mostly downs of the various groups of miners. Naturally some you get to like and wish goodluck others the opposite.

The guys have chosen a tough road for themselves but with the odd exception , face the many failures with fortitude.

The buying agents naturally seem not to reward the miners efforts too well but trade on the fact that most miners are desperate for a few dollars to buy food or diesel. All human life is thus on display.

Wow, cannot believe how dumb these people can be. Most wear no safety glasses/goggles. They dig out under overhangs inviting collapse and drive into obvious bad road situations.. Avg IQ must be in the 50 range.

Interesting subject, but way too americanized and overdramatic show. Ridiculous narrator and music, who tries to make everything sound dramatic as F.

Having spent some time down a few holes in opal mines, I can tell you that the vast majority of those who go chasing opals are nowhere near as lucky as the mob portrayed in this series. Funny that every team that ventured down in search of opal found it! If it happened to be as easy as that to find opal, the stone would be worthless.

Talk about manufactured garbage for the mass, dumb market ... this stuff is just about as believable as the television show "Married at First Sight" and the movie "The Blue Lightning".

Sad to see all these people spend their life doing ...nothing.

Although they produce quite a lot of blood (sometimes), sweat (buckets) and tears (at the end of the day) most of them never get any richer, either physically, metaphorically, intellectually or morally.

Unfortunately an image of scurrying rodents comes to mind when I see them digging in the dirt, breaking every Little Rock into even smaller pieces. Makes you wonder how many of these people commit suicide, become alcoholics or get addicted to drugs.

Like with all similar setups, the real money is made by the dealers and buyers of the Opal, who pay the diggers a pittance and sell the stuff for a fortune. Having lived in Sierra Leone almost thirty years ago and having seen what so-called 'blood diamond' does to a society I am truly appalled by this series.