Tuesday 14 May 2019
As per the tour
itinerary, today the tourists were to cover the famous Cango Caves, the Ostrich
farm, Natural encounter with the Cheetah & visiting the Cango Wild life ranch.
After an early
breakfast the group duly seated in the coach settled down for a good drive to
the Famous Cango Caves. The limestone caves are situated near the town of
Oudtshoorn. While driving in the coach towards Cango Caves, Charl gave a brief
idea about what we would be experiencing. He explained about the cave being
several millions of years old and about the stalactities & stalagmites. We
also drove past some mountain ranges; Charl mentioning that amongst these
ranges were where a plane carrying Hanse Cronje crashed.
As some of the
group members were catching up with sleep, some lazily enjoying the scenery
outside as the coach rolled by smoothly - after a drive of about an hour and a
half, we reached the Cango caves. Dev wanted us to deboard from the coach as
quickly as possible as the road was a bit narrow & there were other
vehicles on the road proceeding towards the drop off area. Our guided tour of
the cave was scheduled for 1100 Hrs &
was expected to last about an hour. Since the members had free time of
around 20 minutes, many of us grabbed at the opportunity to look around &
educate ourselves to what we would be finding inside the cave. The seating block
near the cafeteria gave us a spectacular view of the mountainous area, though
it was beginning to get a bit hot.
As we entered
the cave at 1100 hrs with the guide, one could feel the drop in the
temperature. Immediately after the entrance a model household (of several
thousands of years back) was at display. A family of around 6 or 7 across 3
generations around a fire, probably cooking a meal.
As we entered the
first chamber / hall, one is amazed by the sheer size of this chamber.
Stalactites several thousands of years old festoon the limestone ceiling. However
since another group was starting its tour, almost with us, our guide led us to
the next chamber, wanting to cover the first chamber at the end of the tour.
The second chamber had 2 giant columns growing vertically almost like man made limestone
pillars & were almost touching the ceiling. Further into the caves we came
across a “throne”. In another chamber we were introduced to the “bridal chamber”
with a huge bridal bed. All along illumination was provided by white LED lights
placed strategically to highlight certain key areas. In another area the guide
showed how the caves & the formations would look if they were bathed in
lights of some other colour. At a throw of the switch the room was filled with
red & green lights, giving an eerie feel to the place. Before beginning our
return the chamber situated the farthest was what could be called a Drum Room.
Here we found a stretch which had a translucent formation, which when struck
gave a sound like a drum being played. We began our way back by returning to
the first huge chamber which our guide promised we would cover in the end. As
mentioned earlier this was the largest of the chambers. The guide also gave a
brief history of the cave & demonstrated how the person who discovered the
cave would have felt when he first entered, by switching off all the lights
except a tiny candle light. The guide also mentioned that in earlier periods
concerts used to be held here & that the acoustics here were so good that when
concerts were being held here, inside
the caves one could hear the music even at long distances. The author was handed
an opportunity to try this first hand!
After a well
appreciated tour of the cave that ended on a musical note, the members after
coming out on a bright & sunny south african noon boarded the coach to the
next destination which was the Ostrich farm..
At the ostrich
farm we had a brief introduction / orientation about the ostrich, which was
followed by interaction with ostrich including ostrich feeding, standing on
ostrich eggs (apparently to prove how
strong they are).
After a nice lunch,
we moved towards Cango wild life ranch, where we began with “natural interaction
with cheetah” This consisted of a group of 4 members entering a cheetah’s cage
with a team of 3 rangers & petting a cheetah for about a minute. This was
an unique experience for me as I had not interacted so closely with a wild
animal so far.
The wild life
ranch itself has a good collection of exotic animals, birds & other creatures.
Bats, a huge fish aquarium with thousands of fish, peacocks, mongoose,
vultures, storks, hippos, tortoises, crocodiles, lions, white tigers, and
several other species which I could not identify. It was a pleasant hour &
a half which the group spent in the wild life ranch enjoying the wildlife. This
included a walk across a small bridge over the crocodile enclosure which would
suddenly start vibrating and shaking vigorously for a few seconds when the
person at the other end switched on a specially designed contraption!
The day ended
with the coach returning to the Hotel Knysna Quays for an early dinner, the
next day promising to be more activity oriented, atleast for some of the
members, what with bungy jumping, bungy bridge walk and zip line in store.
At dinner time
Dev announced the next day morning’s timings as 6/7/8 as the bungy jumpers had
to report by 900 Hrs.
No comments:
Post a Comment