Copper, lead, zinc and silver

The first impression of Mount Isa can easily be a slap in the face: In a typical German town centre you’d find the marketplace with the church, town hall nearby, perhaps a museum. The whole town is arranged around these fix-points that represent our cultural values. Mount Isa is a mining town — and there is no doubt about it!

Mount Isa Mines, hard to miss — even without binoculars

We drive through undulating landscape with impressive rock formations before we eventually cross a crest into town. The next moment all we see is Mount Isa mine, light-lit, huge, dominant. Only slowly do we realise that there are other buildings arranged around this centre of gravity: supermarkets, service stations, residential areas in the far distance. Mount Isa, population 12,000, is by far the biggest town on our way west. A huge proportion of this country’s wealth is based on mining and exporting natural resources, and it’s interesting to be that close to one of the pace-makers of Australia’s economy. Yet after a good night’s rest we decide to leave and head further west where we soon leave Queensland and enter the Northern Territory.

Bye-bye Queensland!

[Mount Isa, 13.-14. August]