I’m not really a diamond person, but when we lived in Alice Springs I couldn’t help but notice the colored diamond rings and necklaces in the window of the jewelry shop in the mall by Coles. They were stunning! But I figured they were some sort of expensive ‘costume’ jewelry: diamonds are clear - aren’t they?
Well, no, they aren’t. Rio Tinto, a huge international mining company, owns 100% of Argyle Diamond Mines here in the Kimberley, and they have all sorts of diamonds: White, Champagne, Pink Champagne, Pink Rose, Pink, and Purple Pink. Imagine, even the diamonds in this country have a red hue!
Problem is, you can’t just drive up to the diamond mine gates and ask to have a look around, but they do have day tours. They’ll fly you there, or you can take a tour bus to enjoy a 2 ½hr/ day-tour of the mine. Tourism is a dollar for someone!
The site lays somewhere between here and Halls Creek: I must have passed the turn off on the road, but the lady at the jewelry shop said it wasn’t exactly marked. They don’t want people driving there on their own and just looking around.
Too bad.
If someone comes visit I would love to go for a tour! In the meantime, I am going to keep my eyes out in and around Wangkatjgunka.
Diamonds from the Argyle mine were apparently first discovered by a couple of women, which alerted geologists to investigate and start some serious explorations in 1976. The ‘pipe’ was discovered when they found a colored diamond in an anthill.
An open pit mine opened in December of 1985 and there are currently 500 people employed in relation to that operation. But things are changing and the mine is going underground. Hey, it would be a lot cooler!
I’m not really a ‘diamond’ person, but really, I wouldn’t say no to one of these lovely rocks! And, seriously, I am going to keep looking. There are all sorts of gems in the desert out here!
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