Bultfontein Diamond Mine Tours
Visit of diamond mines over and under ground. Enquiries at the Visitors Reception Centre, Bultfontein Mine Gate, Molyneux Road. Tel (053) 842132I.

Oppenheimer
Memorial Gardens
Die Gärten mit dem "Diggers Fountain" im Mittelpunkt ehren den Diamantminen-Magnaten Sir Ernest Oppenheimer, der zugleich erster Bürgermeister von Kimberley war.

Tourist Information
Diamondveld Visitors Centre, 121 Bultfontein Road, Kimberley 8300, Tel: 053 832 7298.

Wildebeest Kuil
Rock Art Centre
To be found approx 15 km north-west of Kimberley on the road to Barkly West. At the visitors centre a 25-minute film introduces you to the site. Then choose to go on an audio tour of the site (you will receive a small portable audio player), and you will enjoy fascinating commentary at each of 10 marked "stations" along a 800 m pathway. Most of the rock art was made by Later Stone Age people, ancestors of the historical San (also known as Bushmen). People who called themselves /Xam San from the Karoo (who were interviewed in the 1870s) said their fathers made engravings of animals. Open daily. Tel (053) 8337069.

Kimberley
South Africa

Kimberley Mine Museum
Kimberley boasts numerous tourist attractions with the highlight being the Kimberley Mine Museum. It is an open-air museum, where the Kimberley of 1880, the time of the diamond rush, has been rebuilt authentically. One can see dwellings of the diggers, the Perilly tobacco shop and other stores, pubs, a ballhouse, Barnato's Boxing Academy, the old farmhouse of the DeBeers family and a lot more. The DeBeers Diamond Hall displays - amongst other things - the famous Eureka diamond, the first officially registered diamond in South Africa. And one has a stunning view of the Big Hole. It is 215 metres deep and has a diameter of 1,6 kilometres which makes it the largest man-dug hole in the world. In August 1914, this mine ceased operating. Altogether 2,722 kilos of diamonds have been mined in the Big Hole. The museum is open daily from 8:00 - 18:00. Tel. (053) 8331557.

A historical tram, the Kimberley Tram, travels daily from 09:00 to 16:15 between City Hall and Kimberley Mine Musuem resp. the Big Hole.

In the Civic Centre. The Art Gallery shows a considerable collection of paintings by Dutch masters from the 17th century and modern pieces of South African artists. Tel: (053) 8311724. Open mondays to saturdays: 10:00 - 13:00 and 14:00 - 17:00.

In Egerton Road. Exhibits indigenous cultures and lifestyles Impressive ethnographic collection of some 8000 photographs taken by Irishman AM Duggan Cronin between 1919 and 1939. Open Monday-Friday: 9h00-17h00, Saturday: 9:00-13:00 & 14:00-17:00, Sunday: 14:00-17:00. Tel: (053) 842 0099.

Kimberley South Africa

Kimberley
South Africa