The Big Hole – We briefly visited the #1 tourist attraction in the city of Kimberly between our stays at Mokala and Golden Gate Highlands National Parks. In the early 1870s diamonds were discovered in this part of the Northern Cape Province and thousands of prospectors started digging a large hole with picks and shovels in hopes of finding their fortune. The resulting 215 meter deep mine with a perimeter of 1.5 kilometers is reportedly the largest hand-dug hole in the world. Fourteen and a half million carats of diamonds were found in a vertical pipe formation, similar to the shape of other diamond discoveries in the province. Before diamond mining was halted here in 1914, the diamonds were transported through underground tunnels directly to the bank buildings to prevent theft. These buildings can be seen behind the hole in the photographs below. While at The Big Hole we skipped the cafe, shop, museum, plus old town and only spent time at the elevated viewing platform. The size of the mine is very impressive! Our pictures do not capture the magnitude of the 460 meter-wide excavation.

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Barberton Makhanjwa Geotrail – We spent one night in the town of Barberton in the Mpumalanga Province. And the next morning we explored the 20 kilometer road of the Geotrail which borders Swaziland.

Called the Greenstone Belt, the area includes may types of stone such as black chert, ironstone, lava, sandstone, and greenstone. The Geotrail consists of over 10 pullouts along the way with signs summarizing geological history plus identifying and explaining the ancient rock formations.

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As we travelled along the Geotrail from north to south we noticed many forest plantations and logging operations in progress. We were reminded of home as we watched the cutting, cable pulling on steep slopes, stacking, and loading of trees.

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An old cableway system paralleled some of our route. The signs at the most southern Geotrail pullout explained that cable cars carried 200 kilogram loads of asbestos from two mines in Swaziland northward to Barberton from the 1940s to about 2000.

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