HartbeeSpoortDam

I have no time to write my own words about the place scpecially that it needs days to explore it all, and i've been to one place , so I copied this from a website:

Hartbeespoort Dam, North West: Roughly 45 minutes’ drive from Johannesburg and Pretoria, surrounded by the beautiful Magaliesberg mountain range, Hartbeespoort dam, or Harties to locals, has become a hive of activity and is a very popular weekend getaway for the two cities. The beauty of Hartbeespoort Dam is what draws people here - the dam literally cradled in the lap of the mountains - and many regard this as a retreat from the concrete jungle of city living. The 1620 hectare Hartbeespoort dam functions both as a source of irrigation for farms in the area and as a resort, and the peace of the hills and valleys, the warmth even on winter days and the charm of the surrounding countryside, make this a place to restore the soul.

The Hartbeespoort dam offers an array of water sports, a local bird sanctuary, challenging hikes and gentle rambles. There is a collection of restaurants in Hartbeespoort that range from Tan’ Malie se Winkle, a local institution where you can eat to your heart’s content on traditional Afrikaans home-cooked meals, to the local Pick-a-Pancake, which takes pancakes into a new league. This restaurant lies literally in the heart of the Welwitschia Market - a range of African arts, crafts, novelties, curios and other at the fourway crossing at Hartbeespoort that makes a visit here imperative.

We were to a horse farm there in Hartbeespoort dam , we went Quad-biking , horse riding and paintball battles, what was so special about it , that it was in the nature , not a man-made roads or yards.  I enjoyed jumping with the quad-bike up in the air , the most.  An experience I know I would never ever get here in libya.

We had FUN!!

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RHINO and LION Park

RHINO & LION Park HomePage

Really , It's away different seeing wild animals on TV, from meeting them face to face, I was crazy enough to try to tease them , but they just don't care with the people arround

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The Wonder Cave

The Wonder Cave is an enormous cavern believed to be over two million years old and it’s the 3rd largest cavern in South Africa to be dazzled by up to 14 different cave formations of which 85% are still growing. The cave is still “alive” as almost the entire stalactite and stalagmite formations are still growing. The cave has the best example of a relatively young taluscone ( including plant, animal and other organic material that falls into a cave) Fossil remains of rodents, frogs, lizards, birds and small mammals have been found in the cave.

Location: 

The wonder cave is located in the internationally known valley of Kromdraai.  It is in Rhino and Lion Nature Reserve.

History:

They used to mine for gold down there in the late 19th, that’s how it was discovered, fortunately the mining didn’t ruin the formations there, but the explosions colored the top of the formations with dust. The mining stopped during the Second Boer War and never resumed again. The owner of the land where the cave exists changed three times without anyone knowing about it, until the 3rd owner who did open the cave, and announced its existence. It was officially opened to public since 1991.

Tours: 

Tours are conducted by guides; there are lit pathways, no climbing or crawling. Drinkin , eating or smoking not allowed Going down: It’s a must to visit if you went to Getung, we went down 87 steps and then further 18 meters by lift, it was romantically lighted that made the formations look wooow. There you start enjoying up to 15m high of decorative formations. 

Formations:

Rim stone pools, cave pearls, stalactites, stalagmites, popcorn formations, straw formations, mushroom formation (sometimes feel like it’s a jelly fish) , all these formation in the dard with the smooth lightning gives a romantic view. 

Check the photos ( the lightning in the pics because of the flash)

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The photo album for the gold mine adventure

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Gold Reef Themed Park City - The gold mine cave

This is the fun part of that visit, we went down into the mines. It felt weird.

First, we gathered around our guide in the meeting point. gave us a brief of what we'll see, then we got into a theater to watch a video about how gold has been discovered, and how  Johannesburg became a city.After the movie, we went to the elevator place to go down, they gave us helmets and lights.

we went down 250m , It was very dark and cold, we've been told that there is another gold reef (layer of earth where gold existed too), and that reef is more than 1000m, thank you Allah , we didn't go down that far.

We watched a demonstration about digging into the wall, as per the picture below, they asked us to close our ears but still the sound was horrible.

These red lines are painted by the engineers to tell the workers, the boundaries and where to dig, and where are the targets

Here are where they used to store the dynamite, they keep it in a wooden box because it is not a conducting material.

when using the explosives, the rocks fall down through wooden tunnel, and fill a metal wagen waiting down, and when it's filled it's pushed by men on the railroad, I can not imagine how they can push a ton of rocks till the exit and pull it up .

This is the supervisor desk, he counts how many worker entered the mine , and how many got out, every man who enter the mine give the supervisor a stone, when they inted to make an explosion, and they all have to get out, every worker take a stone from the supervisor and go up or far away, if there are any stones left, it means someone is still inside, and not safe to fire the explosives. you can see some flyers on the wall, it's saftey warnings.

After the boooom, they wait untill the dust setlle down, and they makes it wet, because that dust is not good if breathing it , causes diseases.

usually if they make the explosion in a level they collect the rocks in a lower level, they throw the rocks though a wooden tunnel to fill the wagen in the picture on the left.

The wooden board, the guide is holding, is full of holes, and using a strip, connected to it a wooden stick that fits into the holes, when ever a wagon is full and ready to go, they move the stick to the next hole, by that they count how many wagons is filled that day, which is equal almost to one ton.

From the rocks in this wagon , they get 4 grams of gold only, that's why gold is expensive!!

This is first aid room , if someone is hurt, it will take long time and effort that he can not give to go up to the surface, this is their local clinic.
 

This the EMERGENCY EXIT sign, and they took us through it , because if the power went off, we will use this exit to go up to the surface.

Don't wonder, what is this? , this is the emergency exit, when the guide told us about the emergency exit I was shocked, he told us that they had to use it the week before, I spent the rest of the time praying to Allah to keep the power on for the elevator.

It's about 1400 stairs, and takes 2 hours to get to the surface, lol , It would take me more than that.

It was a once in life experience, I enjoyed it

Gold Reef Themed City - the park area

The internet is back , so I am. :) to finish the Gold Reef Story.

we arrived there late, and the Apartheid Museum took so much time , the reason we went there is Gold mine tour, so went searching for the place to book.

Booking for the tour and the park entrance costs 170Rand which is about 23USD, not too much I think, any way the tour was at 3 and we had to spend 45 minutes walking around the park taking photos, there was no time for playing so we just watched, and had ice cream ( a girl has to eat, lol ).It was nice, nothing special, but nice, (the park not the ice cream), the warm feeling you got through the walk is what you feel everywhere in south Africa because of the beautiful nature.

Here are some photos, with my comment:

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The next post is the interesting part, the GOLD MINE

My First Weekend - Part I

My first weekend in South Africa , we went to Gold Reef Theme Park City , this city is 3 parts, the Apartheid museum, the park and the Gold Reef cave.
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we went as a group, me and my brother, my college ushas (Indian), our neighbor Yaco (Dutch), Eugene and Taras (Russian). The first place we went to, is the Apartheid museum.


The Apartheid Museum is one of Johannesburg’s leading tourist attractions.
It takes you through a journey through the history of SA, and how it was during the apartheid (separation in life between black & white people and race classification), and how all that changed.

The museum consists of photographs, videos and borders.
What i didn't like in the museum, that they included the Lesbian & Gay right to get married in the struggle story. and there is a section where they put the photos of the homosexual weddings, I'm not discussing my opinion here, I'm just wondering why to include this in the story of their fight against race classification.
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La Chaumiere, The Country House I'm Staying in

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Trip to South Africa

Hi every body, did you miss me !!

I miss you all , my trip to London was not that good, it was a garbage plane ( not expected from the britich airways). the nice about it , i love London from up the sky, it was just a transit so i didn't get out of the airport terminal.

the flight to Johannesburg was about 10:45 hours, can you imagine!! I slept, i watched 2 movies and i got board, i couldn't sleep again. the passport control in the airport was horrible , i still standing for 2 hours waiting.

The really special thing, is the place i'm staying in , i wouldn't wish for more , alhamdulellah.
I started my course today, it's good so far. the bad news is: I'll have a test at the end of each week.

I'll post pics for the heaven I live in as soon as I'm able to move the photos to the laptop.