Location: Soweto, South Africa Address:Klipspruit 318-Iq Date: Oct 2018 Website:www.gauteng.net
Two towers stand tall above anything else in the Soweto area of South Africa. The 33 storey tall Orlando Towers are the last remaining structures of a coal fired power station. The power station was built in 1935 and closed in 1998.
These days the towers are now completely painted with murals. These murals have changed through the years but when we visited one was sponsored by local brewing company Soweto Gold and the other by telecom company Vodacom. One tower states "We are in Soweto and Soweto is in us". The other is for empowering education.
Other cooling towers that we saw as we travelled stood out against the skyline, but they were just plain looking.
Some of these power plants were still in operation.
The towers are also famous for being the world's first bungee jump between two cooling towers. Brave souls can jump from a little bridge that spans the two towers. Between the artwork and the adventure it is safe to say that these are the most exciting cooling towers in all of South Africa, perhaps the world. Map of Our World Orlando Power Station Cooling Towers
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People born in the Year of the Pig are said to be thoughtful, polite, reliable, courageous and ready to help others. They can also be naive, and self-indulgent. 2019 is the Year of the Pig according to the Chinese zodiac. To celebrate here are 10 of our favourite swine encounters. Oink Oink.
1 )Hawaiian Pigs
Dan's Green House is located in the town of Lahaina, on the island of Maui, in Hawaii. They have exotic plants and rare birds as well as mini pigs. We got a chance to spend some time with these two little guys. Aren't they just the cutest?
2) Babirusa
Speaking of cute, we are sorry but babirusa are just the opposite. They have long legs, weird curvy tusks and look like all of their hair just fell out. They are only found on a few islands in Indonesia and are unforgettable. We saw this pair at the Toronto Zoo.
3) CNE Pigs
When the Canadian National Exhibition comes to Toronto at the end of each summer so does "The Farm". You can experience the sights and smells of livestock. There are always lots of pigs and usually one big sow who spends her day constantly feeding her litter of piglets.
4) Miss Piggy
In Queens, New York the Museum of the Moving Image has a Jim Henson Exhibition. Miss Piggy is one of our favourite Muppets and favourite pigs. Here she is in her wedding gown ready for her big day.
5) Miss Piggy
This Miss Piggy is a crashed freight plane. It can be found in Churchill, Manitoba still sitting where it crashed in 1979. Miss Piggy the Muppet made her debut in 1974. We have read that the plane is named after Miss Piggy because it was overloaded or it once carried a cargo of pigs.
We think it should be called Miss Piggy because of its flat snout.
By the way Miss Piggy, your engine is way over here. Also watch out for polar bears hiding amongst the rocks and wreckage.
6) Red River Hog
The red river hog is a colourful African pig. We like its whiskers and red coat. It turns out that we have a fondness for animals with red coloured fur.
7) Tamworth Pigs
Based on our previously professed love of red furred anuimals you can see why we like Tamworth pigs. They are one of the oldest breeds of pigs. You can also see the curly little tail in the photo above that makes pigs even more appealing. These pigs are from Toronto's Riverdale Farm.
8) Pig Pot at the ROM
This pig shaped vessel was at the Royal Ontario Museum. We imagine it could be filled with some sort of liquid which could then be poured out of the spout in the snout. We didn't make note of what was listed as its intended purpose and often the museum uncovers artifacts whose purpose is only assumed.
9 )Pigman at the Campbell House
We took this photo of the Campbell House Museum in Toronto. The Campbell House was built in 1822 and was actually moved to where it sits today. Looking at our photo later we noticed something odd.
There was a well dressed pig man on the grounds. We hope he was there for an event or promotion at the museum.
10 )Warthogs
We took a trip to Africa and encountered many wild warthogs. We watched them come and go at a waterhole in Greater Kruger in South Africa. We also watched them mow the lawn in Zimbabwe beside the mighty Zambezi River.
Because warthogs have such short necks they usually have to kneel down on their front legs to eat grass. In the video below, various African animals eat beside a waterhole until the warthogs come and take over.
That is our list of favourite pigs. We took part in some celebrations at the Scarborough Town Centre for the Chinese New Year. You can celebrate and enjoy pigs all year long.
Location: Middelburg, South Africa Address: N4, Alzu Petroport, Date: October 2018 Website: www.alzu.co.za
We left Johannesburg and we were headed towards Kruger National Park. We were still more than half way to our destination when our tour group stopped for refuelling at Alzu Petroport. So far we had not seen any large mammals on our trip and did not expect to see any until we were closer to the Kruger boundary. What awaited for us at the rest stop was very unexpected.
Behind the rest stop was a large watering hole surrounded by animals.
The closest animals to us was a group of southern white rhinoceros. Sadly all of these rhinos had been dehorned due to the poaching threat. Don't worry the horns will grow back in a few years.
The Petroport has a small museum set up explaining the plight of the rhino. In the photo above there is a hippo skull on the left and a rhino skull on the right.
Rhinos are hunted mainly for their horns. The horns are made of keratin like our toes and fingernails. Killing a rhino for their horn is like killing a person in order to clip their toenails.
The Petroport also has a lot of artwork around the grounds. There was a large rhinoceros sculpture outside.
On our way to the washrooms there was a beautiful rhino mosaic on the wall. This mosaic was sponsored by Nando's which was one of the restaurants in the Petroport.
After visiting the facilities we came outside again onto a balcony. Below us was a charging elephant bursting forth from the gift shop. From the balcony we could get a better view of the animals.
We could see cape buffalo as well as a group of eland (above).
Far back along the fence was a group of antelope called red hartebeest.
For some reason there was an emu. Emu are native to Australia. Emu are the second largest bird in the world after the African ostrich.
We also saw a few smaller birds like this cape sparrow which flew onto the fence.
Greater striped swallow swirled around above our heads.
As our tour group prepared to depart we had to leave these animals and the very entertaining Petroport behind. We spotted a triangular spotted pigeon up in the rafters as we left the balcony. Soon we would be spotting wildlife in the Greater Kruger area. We never did see any wild rhinos, but hope that there will still be some to see when we have a chance to return.
Orlando Power Station Cooling Towers
