A sad old building

We don't always show the nicer side of Port Elizabeth and sometimes let the social conscience kick in.A sad relic from the past is the Victoria Hotel, an art decor style building that has been allowed to decay to such an extent that it has become an uninhabitable shell. Like most of the buildings in Victoria Street its doors have been bricked up to keep out the vagrants and squatters.Let's hope that its owner starts doing something about the urban…

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Shongololo millipede

There are various types of millipedes, but one I always like to find somewhere is the Shongololo millipede. These guys aren't little worms and can grow up to 20cm long. Around here they are a glossy black, but I see in my nature book that you also find some with alternating yellow and black bands. I also have not found that one so they probably occur somewhere else in the country. I've always wondered how many legs a millipede actually…

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Opening game skies

Last week Wednesday night I went to the opening game of the South Africa 2009 Pro20 cricket series with Hoender (Hoender is my brother and is Afrikaans for chicken. Since primary school his nickname was Hoender because he ran slightly funny. Didn't stop him from playing first team rugby and cricket as well as being a provincial athlete). As the sun went down the sky over the historic St Georges Park looked beautiful and I decided to get a couple…

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Looking down from the top of the cliff

This is White's Road, from the edge of the cliffs in Donkin Reserve, just before sunrise. The jungle -like gardens along the side of the road give it a wonderful mysterious quality (warning to potential tourists... do not do this without your can of pepper spray handy!)

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Elephant skin

Elephants are amazing animals and as a tourist guide I used to have so many facts to give the tourists that I could not always get to all of them. For today I will stick to a couple of skin facts. The thing I find most interesting about elephants' skin is that they don't have sweat glands to keep them cool. That is why they like to swim and throw (not blow, I'll explain at the end of the post)…

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Sulfurous skies….

The sky on Monday really fitted that cliche, there was a storm brewing, lots of noise and razzle dazzle, but very little in the way of decent precipitation. But it created that amazing yellow glow you sometimes see, and everything took on an orange tinge. This photo was taken from Benno Road in Charlo, by Sally Gush. (She is sadly leaving our shores soon, and will be greatly missed, as an aquarobics instructor, she is going to be a hard…

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Funny signs

Today I want to feature two signs that I photographed in Cape St Francis to the west of Port Elizabeth. This one was put up on the little dirt road leading to the Seal Point Lighthouse. It was put up by the Ajubatus Marine Rescue group who has their centre next to the lighthouse. Just for those who don't know Afrikaans, "gat" means hole. Kimberley se gat refers to the Big Hole diamond mine in the town of Kimberley in…

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Shark Rock Pier

Shark Rock Pier has featured in many of our posts, but it has many moods, so we never tire of photographing it. This shot was taken as the sun was making her presence felt and you can see her rays catching the top of the waves, from under the pier.

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Solar Eclipse

This morning we had the rare skyward event of a solar eclipse. It was something I've been looking forward to for a while, but when I got up this morning I was very disappointed to see that it was very misty. But I was hopeful. At its furthest we would have seen about a 64% eclipse and that was going to be at about 08:15. Just after eight I headed outside and the sun was starting to break through. Now…

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