Wednesday 27th April 2012 - Undara Lava Tubes

It lightly sprinkled overnight and was still sprinkling as we packed up. We got on the road and drove into the Kalkani Crater where it wasn't raining and we could enjoy a leisurely breakie. After breakie we took off to explore the crater. It was a short 600m walk up to the top of the crater flooded by a 1.5km loop walk around the crater rim. It offered amazing views of the countryside and you could see some of the Lava Tubes from up there.

A view from the crater 

We were tempted to do our own exploring, however we didn't. We ended up on a tour just after lunch for 2 hours. On the tour we found out that it was a $7000 fine for going into the caves without permission and that recently someone had done it and required medical assistance after the cave was full of CO2! Phew thank god we didn't! The price was a bit steep - $150 for a 2 hour tour for the family. The lava tubes we amazing to see - but it wasn't worth that price!

This was the first tube we went into. I can't quite remember but there is (I think) over 70 tubes, however many have collapsed over time.

The lava tubes were far bigger than I had imagined. We went into 3 tubes. Some of the colours were beautiful - our camera's didn't pic up how beautiful they really were. We saw bats and moths and spiders as well. The tubes were formed millions of years ago when the whole area was full of volcanos.  There is volcanic rock all over the area and the lava flows must have been huge to form these tubes. It is quite spectacular to see.

The kids walking down into a lava tube

Afterwards we got into the car and drove as far as the Oasis Roadhouse. It was $15 to camp there and we had warm showers. Nice! After the kids had gone to bed I enjoyed an ice-cream from the shop! (Don't tell the kids!)