(Including Delportshoop and Ulco)

(Including Delportshoop and Ulco)

Barkly West, situated on the northern banks of the Vaal River, had it’s origins as a small mission station called Pniel (‘in the face of God’), established on the southern side of the river in 1849. The mission was located at a busy fording place over the Vaal known as Klipdrift (‘rocky ford’). In 1869 a group of prospectors led by one Captain Loftus Rolleston discovered alluvial diamonds at Canteen Koppie, leading to a feverish diamond rush to the area. In the ensuing years various parties tried to lay claim to the area including the Koranna chief Jan Bloem, both the Tswana and Griqua tribes, the Boer republics of the Transvaal and the Orange Free State and finally the British. President MW Pretorius of the Transvaal Republic himself visited here. The diggers themselves opposed these efforts vigorously and in July 1870 proclaimed the independent Republic of Klipdrift under leadership of Stafford Parker. The republic was eventually dissolved towards the end of 1870 when ownership of the land were awarded to the Griqua people, who in turn was persuaded by the British to sell it to the Cape Colony. In 1873 the town was given it’s present name in honour of Sir Henry Barkly, the governor of the Cape Colony at the time. Evidence of the feverish mining activities of that era can still be seen today.

Delportshoop

Is located some 27 km northwest of Barkly West and lies at the confluence of the Vaal and Harts Rivers. The town had it’s origins as a mining camp during the early diamond rush (1870’s). A short distance from Delportshoop is the modern mining village of Ulco, well known for it’s cement factory and the mining of lime.

GENERAL INFORMATION

How to get there

Bloemfontein 212 km, Kimberley 32 km

Altitude – 1766 m above sea level

Rivers – Vaal

Banks

FNB (ATM), Standard (ATM)

NATURE

Game Camp with A frame hut, sleeping ten. Camping also allowed.

ATTRACTIONS

Ammasol Recreation Club

Mine Tours

Mineral Collection

BLACK ROCK

Twenty five kilometers from Hotazel, Black Rock is Assmang’s underground manganese mining venture, offering sporting facilities and a chance to view a worked out manganese mine. The mine has it’s own landing strip. Time charts it’s slow passage over the face of our land. And from it’s passing we have learnt that it is a country forged in fire and ice. More than 1500 million years ago, a flood of molten Precamrian lava spilled across the basalt rock of what is today the Northern Cape. Great bodies of water cooled the newborn earth to stone and laid huge sediments across it. Raging winds, successive ice ages and the inexorable march of time saw erosion begin to eat away at the great landmass. Later, the earth erupted in fire. Great extrusions of molten lava pierced the earth’s crust, creating massive dykes and sills. Gigantic disturbances threw up jagged hills and mountains and, for most living species, the world ended. Since the cataclysmic days of creation, the ebb and flow of ice sheets have scoured the massive edifice of our earth, leaving in their wake a barren landscape punctuated by eroded hills, great, open plains and vast tracts of desert. Beneath the rim of the uncluttered horizon and the Kalahari’s great blanket of red and white sands, hides a treasure trove of iron, manganese, lime and other precious minerals. In 1935, Assmang began mining manganese at Beeshoek. In 1940, the company bought property surrounding a manganese outcrop known as Black Rock. Today, the Black Rock area has one of the largest and richest manganese deposits in the world. Samancor’s Mamatwan and Wessels open cast manganese mines (north of Kuruman) are awe inspiring examples of man’s ability to exploit the riches of the earth. Great trenches plunge into it’s crust, cutting through the desert floor as though waiting to channel the waters of a Biblical Flood.

GENERAL INFORMATION

How to get there

Hotazel 25 km, Kuruman 86 km, Van Zylsrus 130 km

ATTRACTIONS

Manganese Mineral Collection – Assmang Geology Office

Mine Tour

Tour the spectacular tunnels and rock formations of Black Rock’s worked out manganese mine. Reservations restricted to 20 people booked a week in advance.

Accommodation in and around Barkly West