Maximum temperature in the Charente today 13C, minimum 11C. 16 mm of rain measured this morning, to end a very wet, wild and windy week!! Roadside ditches and fields are flooded, and today, 40km/h westerly winds with gusts up to 88 km/h!!
Nieu Bethesda is a small town far off the beaten track, on the edge of the Karoo and today suffering from a five-year drought. Brave were the Afrikaans settlers who came here in the 19th century and very resilient is the small population which still remains in the parched dusty landscape! It appears that I have taken no photos of the town, other than the church (!), but our main interest was the local fossils and the paintings.
We stayed at Ganora Guest Farm run by Hester and JP and this photo was taken during the interesting evening talk by JP about fossils, most of which had been found on the farm during his ownership.
Nieu Bethesda is a small town far off the beaten track, on the edge of the Karoo and today suffering from a five-year drought. Brave were the Afrikaans settlers who came here in the 19th century and very resilient is the small population which still remains in the parched dusty landscape! It appears that I have taken no photos of the town, other than the church (!), but our main interest was the local fossils and the paintings.
The Dutch Reformed Church which was completed in 1905
A fossilised fish.
A bit of fossilised spinal column.
Various fossilised bits and shells. He has a whole room dedicated to his fossil collection!
Poster depicting the development of local prehistoric species over millennia.
We then went to see the museum in the town - see info from the above, below...
Another one that hopefully you can read about below, a Dicynodon...
Other fossils found in the rock strata, now being slowly uncovered and revealed by weathering of the surface.
After viewing the museum, we were taken by the museum guide out to the dry river bed. The plaster model on the right is based on the configuration of the actual fossil on the left, still embedded in the rock of the shale river bed. There were several more, but different examples to be seen, many too large to be excavated easily. Fascinating!
We also were shown these bushman paintings, a visit which entailed a 10-minute walk across a field! They had been made on a wall under an overhanging rock outcrop, the small site overlooking a deep rocky river valley. Some paintings go back as far as 5000 years, though these are probably much more recent.
Finally, the Ganora farm was a working farm, and of course, while we were there it was spring in South Africa, so the lambs were in abundance!
I saw this beetle on my walk around the farm.
Thank you Joan for the ID it is a Ten Spotted Ground beetle (Thermophilum decemguttatum) family Carabidae.
See also my updated Bird blog at
