Today we went to the
Big Hole right smack in the middle of downtown Kimberley. The Big Hole is supposedly the largest/deepest man dug whole in the world! They were digging so much because the Big Hole is the site of the discovery of diamonds in a volcanic pipe. The source of diamonds was previously known, hence the name:
Kimberlite (a type of volcanic rock that sometimes contains diamonds. The volcanic pipes that contain this type of rock and the possibility of diamonds are also named after Kimberley: Kimberlite Pipes.
Here we are on a map:
The hole has a surface of 42 acres and is 463 meters wide. It was excavated to 240 meters at one point but later filled in. It has been underground mined to a depth of 1,097 meters. Here is a picture Gpop took:
The Big Hole is the location of an awesome museum/tourist spot with informational movies and displays as well as a full-scale mockup of what a the old mining town used to look like during the days of the big rush.
The discovery of diamonds in Kimberley in 1866 dictated the history of this town. Read
Wiki if your interested. To sum it up:
De Beers was founded here,
Cecil Rhodes (Oxford's Rhodes Scholar ring a bell?) made his fortune here, and it became the Northern Cape Province capital.
Regardless, we had a great time and learned a lot. After we finished exploring Kimberly, we made our way to Jo-burg.
Check out the video:
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