After you reach the Earth Spring in the Earth Temple, you return to Skyloft with the Amber Tablet and open the way to Lanayru Desert.

Prepare for the Desert

It is recommended to bring a Wooden Shield to the desert because the Iron Shield is vulnerable to the electric enemies in this area.

After you have gotten any upgrades you wish to get, put the Amber Tablet in place if you haven't already, then fly to the yellow light and dive down to reach Lanayru Mine.

Lanayru Mine

Go down the ladder and check the back of the tower to find one or more Sand Cicadas, which you can catch with your Bug Net.

There is a Goddess Cube behind the tower. It unlocks a chest in the northeast of the Sky, southeast of Beedle's island, where you will need to bomb a wall of rocks to reveal the Goddess Chest. It contains a Silver Rupee, worth 100 rupees.

Up ahead, you will find a mine cart that you have to push out of the way. Push it all the way off of the ledge, kill the Yellow Chuchus that appear (don't hit them when they're electrified) and move the cart to the end of the track so that you can run up the other side of the ledge and get to the top.

After going up, go to the left and you will find a crystal in the middle of the area. Hit it with the sword to activate it. The surrounding area will change, and if you talk to a robot, Fi will explain what happened.

If you see an Ancient Flower near the wall in this area, be sure to take it.

There is a mine cart near the crystal. Get into it to ride it to a room that has a chest that contains 20 rupees. Then ride the cart back outside. Check the area again in case an Ancient Flower has appeared, if there wasn't one before.

There is another mine cart that, if you didn't push it earlier, is just outside of the distortion field. Kill the Yellow Chuchus that appear when you approach it, then push it into the field to make it float. Then get in and it will go through the other door.

The mine cart will stop just before the edge of the distortion field. Throw a bomb into the basket that the statue is holding to make the statue fall down into the gap. Go through the passage.

After you kill the two Yellow Chuchus that attack, you will find quicksand, also known as sinksand, up ahead. You can run across it for a short distance, but it very quickly uses up your stamina, so you can't run very far at all. Run to the safe platform, then throw bombs into the statues to create platforms to stand on. One of the statues hides a tunnel that you can crawl through to reach a chest that contains 20 rupees. You can also find Lanayru Ants if you break the pots. You can catch these with the Bug Net.

After you bomb the rest of the statues, go northwest to the next area. Carefully make your way across the room, avoiding the Electro Spumes. Be sure to run straight for the platforms to avoid running out of stamina. If you run out of stamina while running through quicksand, you will sink down below and lose a heart.

At the northeast end of the room, more Yellow Chuchus will attack. Push the mine cart to the end of its track and then go up the slope to the next area.

Kill the Keese, then bomb the rocks on the mine cart track up ahead, then roll a bomb at the rocks in the narrow sand passage to the west. Roll some more bombs to reveal and then activate the crystal at the end of that passage. The quicksand will become grass and a Quadro Baba will appear on the ceiling. Kill it and go across.

Up ahead, there may be Gerudo Dragonflies that you can catch with the bug net.

Follow the path to reach the chest that you saw earlier in the big quicksand room but couldn't reach. It contains a random rare treasure item (Golden Skull, Goddess Plume, etc.)

Drop down onto the grass and go to the mine cart in the northeast corner of the room. If it isn't in the distortion field, push it into the distortion field. If you didn't bomb the rocks covering the track up ahead, do that. Then get into the mine cart to go through the door.

Lanayru Desert

You will reach Lanayru Desert.

Bomb the piles of rock near the mine cart to find another crystal. Activate it. The distortion field will extend slightly farther ahead, revealing some vines on the wall that you can climb.

Go up the vines and look for a narrow ledge along the wall to the east that you can run up and hold onto with your hands. Go along this ledge to the other side. Go down the ramp, and you will see a colorful wheel stuck in the rock. Ignore it for now and keep going down the ramp, where you can go through an arch in the south wall to reach a chest that contains a Blue Bird Feather.

Go back through the arch and look down below. There is a crab-like creature called an Ampilus. Use a Shield Bash with a Wooden Shield to knock the Ampilus away, then hit it with the sword. (If you do not have a Wooden Shield, it is strongly recommended to return to Skyloft and get one.)

Go north and you will see a blue chest on a wall. You can run up the slope on the west side of this wall to reach the top, where you can open the chest to get a Tumbleweed. If you see an actual tumbleweed roll past as you walk through this area, you can catch it with the Bug Net.

Near the treasure chest, you will see some cages to the north. Jump on top of the nearest cage, then throw a bomb into the cage with the hole on top to reveal a crystal. Use another bomb to activate it.

Some Bokoblins will appear. They hold electric weapons and are called Technoblins. If you get close to the robot here, it will call out for help. The Technoblins are difficult to deal with because of their electric weapons. If you swing your sword and they block, you will get shocked. One option is to wait for them to swing their weapons and use a Shield Bash with the Wooden Shield to stun them. You can also stun them with the Slingshot. You can also use a Skyward Strike to hit them from afar. When they fall, use a Fatal Blow to kill them. Or, since they won't willingly go past the distortion field, you can lure them to the edge of the distortion field, then use the Beetle or throw a bomb behind them to trick them into running outside of the field, where they will turn back into skeletons.

Once the Technoblins are gone, the bars of the cages will go down. Talk to the robot, who will notice your Beetle, saying that it's an older Lanayru model. He will upgrade it into the Hook Beetle, adding pincers that can pick things up and also drop things while flying.

You can go back to Gondo in the Skyloft Bazaar to upgrade the Hook Beetle. The first upgrade will allow you to speed up the Beetle, and the second upgrade will increase its flight time.

To the west and southwest of the cages, there are bombs on the trees. If you make the Hook Beetle fly into the bomb, it will pick it up. You can press the indicated button to look down while flying, and press the indicated button combination to drop what the Hook Beetle is holding. Do this in the area with the three statues on the wall, to drop bombs into the statues' baskets, and also to drop a bomb on the Electro Spume in the sand. Then run from platform to platform to go west past the sinksand.

The birds up ahead, known as Hroks, will fly around and drop boulders on you. You can use the Hook Beetle to drop a bomb on them and get rid of them.

Go west and use the Hook Beetle to kill the Electro Spume in the sinksand. Then drop a bomb onto the nearest Ampilus. Its shell will fall into the sand. Run onto the shell before it disappears (if it does disappear, another Ampilus will crawl up from the sand), and stand on the shell until your stamina refills, then run onto the area with the Stamina Fruit on it.

From there, bomb the Ampilus between you and the Goddess Cube, and use its shell to go to the Goddess Cube. Don't return to the Sky yet (unless you are playing the Nintendo Switch version and have the Zelda and Loftwing amiibo) because there is a new Bird Statue nearby. This Goddess Cube unlocks a chest on an island just east of the yellow column in the Sky. The chest is on a ledge on the south side of the island. The chest contains the Heart Medal, which makes hearts appear more often if you have the medal in your pouch.

From where the Goddess Cube was, use another Ampilus to reach the archway to the west. Save at the Bird Statue and go up the nearby ledges to the south. Go to the end of the path and push the mine cart off of the edge to give yourself a shortcut.

Back at the Bird Statue, the sinksand nearby is flowing like water. When you kill the Ampiluses, the shells will move with the current. Use these to reach the archway to the north, but before you go through, you can go up the ledges to the west, then follow the path and jump across the platforms at the top of the sand waterfall, to reach a mine cart that you can push down to make another shortcut. Then go back around to the archway to the north and go through the cave entrance beyond it.

Desert Gorge

Save at the Bird Statue, then look up to see crystals on ledges. Use the Hook Beetle to activate the nearest one.

Kill the nearest Technoblin, or lure it close to the edge of the distortion field and scare it out of the field with the Hook Beetle or a bomb, then get into the mine cart and go to the other side.

Use the Hook Beetle to catch a bomb from this side and kill the other Technoblin if you didn't get rid of it before. Then use the Hook Beetle to get another bomb and drop it into top of the tree trunk to the left. Then use the beetle again to take a bomb into the area under the trunk and bomb the Deku Baba, and use the Hook Beetle again to hit the pink switch near where the Deku Baba was. Then get into the mine cart to reach the other side.

Gorko the Goron is up ahead. Talk to him and he will tell you about the roadblock.

There are some tall rock spires nearby. Some of them have rocks on top. Use your Hook Beetle to bomb the northernmost pile of rocks, revealing a crystal just above the mine cart. Activate the crystal, and drop bombs on the Technoblins. Then talk to the robot next to the mine cart and it will update your map.

Get into the cart to ride it past where the robot was. Then look in the wall to see a crystal there. Activate it with the Hook Beetle. This will cause the rail to go up to the Goddess Cube. Get into the cart, turn to face the direction of the Goddess Cube, and charge up a Skyward Strike so you can hit the cube while riding in the cart. It unlocks a chest on top of Beedle's island that contains a Piece of Heart.

After you go past the Goddess Cube, go through the cave entrance up ahead.

Run across the quicksand to the nearest stone platform. Use the Hook Beetle to pick up a bomb and drop it on the Hrok. Then make your way to the next stone platform to the northeast and you will notice that you are not sinking. Fi will tell you to check the map to find areas of submerged stone that are safe to walk on in the sinksand. You can place beacons to mark the safe paths that you can run across. Fi adds more beacons to your map for you to place.

Go southeast along the submerged path to a slope that you can run up to reach the top of the wall. Go north from there to where you find some old robots. Save the game at the Bird Statue to the north.

Use bombs on the piles of rocks nearby, then while standing near the Bird Statue, hit the crystal that was revealed. Drop bombs on the Technoblins, or lure them to the edge of the field and use the Hook Beetle or bombs to scare them out, then talk to the robot. To activate the generator, you must first turn three dials that are hidden around the desert. Fi will add the dials as dowsing targets.

You can use the Hook Beetle to pick up an Ancient Flower in the grassy area below. Or if you dropped down below to get it, you run to the nearby submerged walkway (check your map) to avoid sinking in the sand.

Find the Electricity Dial

One of the dials is in a cave to the north. Use dowsing to find a crack in the north wall. Bomb it open and go inside.

You can't use dowsing in this area.

Bomb the pile of rocks in the center of this area to reveal a crystal. Activate it, and it will affect the entire area. The other piles of rocks have rupees under them, and the soft soil has rupees and hearts in them.

There are two small chests on the lower level. One contains a red rupee and the other contains a blue rupee.

The Ampiluses have turned into Ampilus Eggs. They generate electricity occasionally. You can use the Hook Beetle to pick them up and fly them around.

On the far wall, there is a device that Fi says can be activated with a source of electricity. Drop an Ampilus Egg on the switch on the device, then stand on the switch to open the small gap on the back side. When the Ampilus Egg is not electrified, use your sword to knock it into the slot on the front of the device.

Beyond the bars, you will find a dial. To turn it, use a forward thrust attack to put your sword into the slot. Rotate the sword to the left until the dial clicks. Then press the indicated button to push the dial in, turning it on. A lightning bolt symbol will appear on the top.

Before you leave the area near the dial, look for the treasure chest on top of a cube in the corner. Stand near it, then use the Hook Beetle to hit the crystal back in the other room, then quickly run onto the platform with the treasure chest. Open it to get a Blue Bird Feather. Then run across to the platform in the opposite corner to get a Goddess Plume. Then carefully send the Hook Beetle through the small gap to the previous room to hit the crystal. Now go back outside to the desert.

Find the Water Dial

Dowsing will show you that there is another dial on the west side of the big circle in the sand. There is a crack in the tall rock wall on the west side of the circle. Walk along the submerged walkways (check your map) to get there. Bomb the crack in the west wall to reveal a crystal, but before you activate it, throw a bomb into the statues' baskets to make them fall. Then activate the crystal, and then go through the door that was behind one of the statues, and turn the dial like you did the other one: do a forward thrust attack to put your sword into the slot, rotate the dial to the left, then press the indicated button to push the dial in and activate it. A water drop symbol will appear at the top.

Go Toward the Third Dial

The third dial is to the southeast. To get there, go east along the submerged pathway until you reach the slope leading up to the wall to the north. Go up that slope and make your way clockwise along the top of the innermost wall until you can hop down to the northern area, near the building where you activated the lightning dial.

If you go southeast of the building where you activated the lightning dial, there are several Electro Spumes and a boulder-dropping Hrok. Use the Hook Beetle to drop bombs to get rid of them, then use the submerged pathways to go southeast until you can go along the northeast path that leads to a crack in the cliff wall. Bomb it and enter the tunnel, killing Yellow Chuchus that attack along the way. Open the chest at the end to get a Piece of Heart.

Then go back through the tunnel, and go to the end of the submerged path, then run south to reach the solid ground nearby.

Find the Fire Dial

From here, make your way south to the building that the dowsing signal is pointing to. Before you go into the building, look for the bars in the wall southwest of the building. Run up the wall to where there is a red bar. You will automatically grab the red bar and pull it down. This opens up the bars, giving you a shortcut to the first area of the desert.

Save at the Bird Statue and go into the building.

As before, there is a crystal in the center of the area under some rocks. Bomb the rocks and activate the crystal. Go around killing the Technoblins. There are two small chests on the lower level that both contain five rupees.

To reach the far side, though, you need to deactivate the crystal. When the crystal is deactivated, kill the nearby Ampilus (use a Skyward Strike if it's too far to hit while standing on safe ground) and run onto its shell. You can ride the shell to the north side of the room on the flowing sand. If the shell gets stuck behind something, you will have to wait for it to disappear, which will make a new Ampilus come up from the sand, and you can try again.

Once you reach the north side of the room, climb up the box on the west side of the room, and walk along the ledge, killing the Yellow Chuchu. Open the chest to get Eldin Ore.

Then use the Beetle to activate the crystal. After that, push the orange box down to the lower level. This gives you a shortcut to the south side of the room.

Use the Beetle to catch an Ampilus Egg and fly it to the north side of the room, and try to drop it onto the switch in front of the device on the wall. Then stand on the switch in front of the device and wait for the Ampilus Egg to stop giving off electricity, then hit it with your sword to knock it into the slot on the front of the device.

Go through the door that opened, and open the chests to get a blue rupee and a Monster Horn. Go to the dial and do a forward thrust with the sword, then rotate the dial to the left, then press the indicated button to push it in. A fire symbol will appear on the top.

Activate the Generator

Go south to leave the building. Then go north from the building you just came out of, until you can run up the slope to the innermost circle of the wall. Go counterclockwise until you can go north, and from there, go up the slope to the wall that has the Bird Statue on it. Then you can walk to the generator from there. If the crystal in front of the generator isn't active, activate it, and get rid of the two Technoblins.

To turn on the generator, you need to turn each of the three dials and push them in at the proper places on the dial.

To figure out the correct positions for the dials, look at your map. The big circle of sand corresponds to the generator itself. The spokes of the circle in the map correspond to the spots on the generator that you can turn the dials to.

The water dial is to the west, the fire dial is to the southeast, and the electricity dial is to the north. The first dial that you push will be the water one, so turn the dial so that the water symbol is pointing west on the dial. The next one is the fire symbol, so turn that to the southeast on the dial. Finally, turn the electricity symbol to the north on the dial.

If you do it correctly, a tower will appear in the center of the circle. Save at the Bird Statue, then go down below to the area north of the tower. From there, you can go south to go up the stairs to the tower. There may be a chest on top of the tower that contains a random treasure item, but the chest is not guaranteed to be there.

Go into the structure to enter the Lanayru Mining Facility.