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- Kevin Hean |
Wits Mineral Club Outing - Moepe Mine - Pilanesburg
We met at the Bakabung entrance to the Park. The group consisted of: Allan Fraser,
Kevin Hean, Hans and Malene Wassenbach, Nick and Pat Keenan, Johan Cloete and
his daughter Tracy and Jan Eklund. The weather was magnificent, clear skies and
a slight chill in the air. We proceeded in convoy to the mine site and waited
there for the game warden to arrive. As you may know if one stops in a game
park everybody else stops to see what you have spotted. We had to keep telling
the park visitors we were here for the rocks and not the animals, strange looks
we did get! The warden was fashionably late and Allan had to drive off to see
if he could get a cell signal (no signal in a volcano crater). After phoning,
the wardens must have sent a radio message stating that there was a mob of
impatient hammer wielding rock-hounds at the mine, because within the space of
five minutes we saw as many Park Officials. Our warden, Mark, arrived, sporting
a rifle. He meant business! He told us to look ahead of us for predators and we
said that we couldn’t do that because we have to look on the ground for rocks.
After Mark gave us a briefing on what to do in case we came across a lion,
rhino or elephant, we set off by foot keeping our eyes trained to the ground.
The site is a short
distance from the road on the side of a hill. On the way up we passed the mine
entrance, which is sealed off. A number of stockpiles of material had been
dumped at the entrance to the mine some years back. Apparently it was not a
very economical mine. [Editor’s note: according to my source, the owner of the mine
discontinued operations because as mining continued the Fluorite grade dropped
and it would have been an expensive venture to do borehole explorations].
Everybody found lovely specimens of the ‘Herring Bone’ Fluorite. The cutters
among us could not resist taking a few lumps of this purple ore to see how it
cuts or even to try and make a sphere. After an hour we had completely
forgotten that we were in a game park. Thank Heavens Mark had been keeping
watch or one of us could have been a tasty snack for the resident Leopard
rumored to be living near the mine!
After refreshments at
the Pilansberg Centre, we made our way to the Lenong View site. The view was
breathtaking and one could clearly see the prominent ridges of this volcanic
intrusion. At around 2 PM we decided to ‘call it a day’. But the animals had
other ideas, on the way they almost seemed to line the road on purpose, zebra,
giraffe, rhino, elephant, hippo, and near Bakabung gate a warthog ran across
the road. (No lion were seen; they were still around the old mine.)
A thank you and congratulations to Allan
Fraser for organising a really great outing.
