Outback Opal Hunters TV Series

Filming is now taking place in the sunburnt deserts of Australia for a new Discovery TV series called Outback Opal Hunters. In the world famous opal fields of Australia the series will cover Boulder Opal mining in Queensland, Black Opal mining in Lightning Ride NSW and in the Desert town of Coober Pedy in South Australia. 

Filming is for the Discover channel which also has the popular Gold Rush series. Discovery channel is available in 409 million households worldwide, so it has a massive following for reality shows and opals might be one of the most popular series ever!

Discovery channel is available in Australia on Foxtel, Optus TV and Austar. In the US it is available on Cable and Satellite TV.

Filming is under way by an Australian production company Prospero Productions who also has the popular Outback Truckers, now in its 7th series. They have also worked on Outback Pilots and Wild Survivor on Geographic channel.

We are very excited to see their professional work and see results on opal mining in the major opal fields of Australia. They have created online shops for the trucker series which sells caps and cold beer holders, so we hope they have opal ones also.

This series will launch in early 2018

Outback Opal Hunters - Series 2

Series 2 of the popular TV show has completed filming and will air on the Discovery channel hopefully before Christmas. Series 2 continues on with the story and also introduces new people. Keep an eye out for some of the Opal Auctions crew who might feature on the show.

Opal Mining Equipment Seen On TV

There are so many unique and interesting machines used in Opal mining and thanks to the Outback opal Hunters TV show these machines have been shown to the world. Check out our article which explains what the different Opal machines do. 

Outback Opal Hunters

We completely agree with their introduction:

“The opal hunt is not for the faint hearted. The risks are very real, both financially and physically, but the chance to uncover a massive bounty is what keeps miners hooked,” said Jonathan Rudd, VP Programming and Production, Australia, New Zealand & Pacific Islands, Discovery Networks Asia-Pacific. “Outback Opal Hunters will take viewers on a rollercoaster ride of hope and heartbreak as our crews put everything on the line to strike it rich.”

Some of our verified sellers have met the filing crew at Lighting Ridge as they have been there 3 times. Keep an out for this series and you might be able to spot some of our sellers. We cannot indulge any information but we know some of the opal miners and it will be a super exciting series.

These are genuine family opal miners and we are excited to see their stories broadcast to the world. Opal Mining has been difficult in the last few years due to so many factors, and we notice when a buyer visits the outback mining towns they really appreciate how hard it is to find opals and to appreciate the rarity of this gemstone.

We hope millions of viewers will follow this series and fall in love with this majestic gemstone. Make sure you tell your friends to watch this Australian adventure series. So many people dream to be an opal miner and to experience the pleasure in finding opal that hasn’t been touched by man and has taken millions of years to year

Words cannot describe the over whelming feeling of appreciation for mother nature’s creations

Opalmania

The second episode of The Opal Hunters aired on the 15th Febuary 2018  on the discovery channel. The episode featured Col’s crew selling rough Australian opal to Phil in the Outback mining area called Opalton in Queensland (QLD). Phil was our partner years ago when we were initially setting up Opalmania to sell Australian opals online. He had a mine in Koroit and attended the Tucson Gem show for over 20 years selling his Australian boulder opals in the ‘Days Inn’. We mined boulder opals at Koroit and his residence was in the nearby town called Yowah.

Back in 2008 we used a satellite dish to access the internet which took over 3 minutes to upload one page, but now the technology is more advanced as it takes a few seconds to load.

Today Phil has an Opal shop in Winton QLD, which is 120 kilometres from Opalton. He is a prolific opal cutter and has been one of the opal industries’ top opal cutter.

Our Videos show Phil’s opal cutting workshop and cracking open boulder opal rocks in search of the elusive veins within the opal that show amazing colors.

You can now watch the amazing behind the scences of the opal industry by tuning online and watching the Outback Opal Hunters.

(Images below: Wayne opal mining at Phil’s mine in Koroit)

Opal Shells

The third episode of the Outback Opal Hunters showed the rookies searching for Opal in Coober Pedy. They got lucky in the end hitting a nice vein of opal that contained some precious Opal Shell fossils. These fossils are left over from the huge inland see that was present over much of Australia millions of years ago. Opal Shells are extremly rare especially when they have beautiful color.

SHOP FOR OPAL SHELLS

SHOP FOR OPALS

Black Opal

Boulder Opal

Andamooka Opal

Crystal Opal