You have to drive a long way to get there but its a hole in the middle of a city.

Well actually a city has sprung up around the hole. The city of Kimberley.

Before diamonds were discovered in Kimberley and the surrounding areas they were previously only found in rivers and mined alluvialy.

It was not known where they came from and how these extremely hard and brilliant minerals originated. Hence their top position as the rares and most expensive of gemstones.

At Kimberley they were found on a little hill which was soon completely flattened and the miners discovered to their delight that the diamondiferous area continued underground.

They followed it as far as they could with pick and shovel.

The end product is the largest human dug hole on the planet and it was all dug in pursuit of very hard, little pieces of Carbon.

One can get an idea of the size of the big hole by comparing the size of the city buildings, seen standing next to the big hole, at the surface and the full sized trees now growing on the inner slopes.

This is just the one half... the other is just as expansive.

To think that this was done with pick and shovel. Each bucketful sifted and sorted by hand by hopeful mines lured by the possibility of the next spadeful yielding a fortune. Most of the diggers were disappointed as is usual in most gold, diamond and other rushes.