GC3F2DV ZA Heritage 02: Shepstone Gardens (Traditional Cache) in Gauteng, South Africa created by GlobalRat

This cache has been archived.

Knagur Green: Due to no response from the CO after the request to maintain or replace the cache, I am archiving it to, stop it showing on the listings and/or to create place for the geocaching community.

The Geocache Maintenance guideline explains a CO's responsibility towards checking and maintaining the cache when problems are reported.

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Thank you for understanding

Knagur Green
Groundspeak Volunteer Reviewer

GC3F2DV ▼

A cache by GlobalRat Message this owner

Hidden : 3/21/2012

Difficulty:

Terrain:

Size: Size: micro (micro)

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Geocache Description:

A block in Hope Road, Mountain View, consists of a dozen rather wonderful stone houses, built 100 years ago using thousands of tons of rock quarried from the site.

Park on the LEFT when doing the cache.

The houses were built between 1902 and 1904 by unemployed Afrikaners returning from the Anglo Boer War, and commissioned by the Modderfontein Dynamite Company.

Some 1 000 tons of quartzite rocks were delivered to just one house in Hope Road, number 8, to create a fantasy of rock structures in what must be one of the most attractive houses in Johannesburg. It is believed to have been built for the chief engineer of the dynamite company. It is an extravaganza of stone walls, stone house, stone temples, stone walkways, even a stone garden shed, made from those 1 000 tons of rock.

A pioneer developer, Kallenbach bought and built in Mountain View and on the nearby Linksfield Ridge. He himself built the long, winding road that is today Sylvia’s Pass. At the top, Kallenbach Drive still runs through the suburb of Linksfield. Between 1909 and 1914, Gandhi stayed on and off with Kallenbach in The Tents, the encampment at the foot of the ridge, while the architect was building, and in his house in Grove Road.

A slow drive along Hope and Grove roads offers a glimpse of the old days, with their magnificent stone houses. And the view northwards from Sylvia’s Pass is spectacular.

You can get a closer look at the houses (but not inside them) on the Westcliff and Parktown Heritage Trust tour.

The tour starts at number 22A, down the road from number 8. The house has a pleasing feel to it, shaped as three attached rondavels with thatched roofs, stone walls and wooden windows, in an adaptation of the traditional indigenous thatched hut. One end of the circle has been cut off to give each rondavel a straight wall for easier living. Together with a well-developed garden with several fountains and ponds, and additions done with care and thought for maintaining the original stone feel of the house, it makes for a very attractive placeto live.

The next house down the road, number 18A, is a double-storey house with white plaster walls, wooden windows and a thatched roof. Several outbuildings are also built of stone. Part of one of the garden walls is a dry stone wall, with no plaster to hold the stones together, an unusual feature.

Further down is number 12, which, although the house is hardly visible at the top of the long stone stairway, has magnificent gardens.The stairway is decorated with large pots, and the garden tumbles with delicious monsters, huge palms, a large jacaranda tree, tall conifers and beds of lavender, agapanthus, and a breathtaking bed of peach-coloured roses. Each level of the garden has a pathway of crunchy gravel, making the garden a visual and tactile delight.

Additional Hints (Decrypt)

Qba'g qb nalguvat vyyrtny

Decryption Key

A|B|C|D|E|F|G|H|I|J|K|L|M
-------------------------
N|O|P|Q|R|S|T|U|V|W|X|Y|Z

(letter above equals below, and vice versa)

This cache has been archived.

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ZA Heritage 02: Shepstone Gardens Traditional Geocache

This cache has been archived.

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