Our trip to the burg

We has quite a nice trip to the burg on tuesday. Ett had 2 days off work, and ladysmith isn't the most exciting place. Luckily the central drakensburg is not even an hours drive from our house. (Well, that's if you take the right road. ) We missed the turn-off and went via Winterton's farm roads. So it took us a little longer. It had been raining so we had fun navigatng these muddy roads. My love enjoyed his rally driving.

This place is called Thokozisa. its a touristy place really, with all the curio shops selling the typical african stuff. Its a beautiful place and we enjoyed just wondering around and seeing what there is to see.

We also went to Dragon Peaks resort, where the Drakensburg Boys choir is. We just had some lunch and walked aound a bit. The guy who owns the place has started a church on the estate. it's an NMCI church. Itcs held in that little hall on the island in the dam.

We had a fun day. We'll do it again sometime.

Ingula Pumped Storage Scheme (my work)

Well for anyone who doesn't know, im working for a Italian company which is in a joint venture with Eskom to build a power station, at the moment we're busy with the tunneling system which will house the turbines etc.



So without furhter ado, here are some pictures of where i work.This first one is the layout of our entire works area.





MAT

So this is the MAT (Main Access Tunnel).

We're about 20m out of 1500m done. They were busy charging the face of the tunnel here, which means that they had just inserted the dynamite and is now inserting the charges which ignites the dynamite, obviously...

Shotcrete

This process here is called Shotcreting, a high pressure hose applies shotcrete onto a surface that needs reinforcing. Shotcrete is the international primary support for tunneling systems, it's mixed design is quite differerent from concrete and must be quite exact and go through numerous chemical and strength testing before it will be approved for application. Every 3 metres or so we have to submit a core sample to the lab for analysis and testing.

Open Cut

This is the Open Cut, its like the drive way to the MAT, the previous picture was a wall of the Open Cut being shotcreted. This is not a recent picture though, quite a bit has changed sicnce this was taken.

Well that's it for now, next time i'll go through the CAT (Construction Access Tunnel)

Ciao for now.

This is our house in Ladysmith. It's a house that has been divided into three flats. Its situated in a lovely area and overlooks a game reserve. We have a little two bedroom flat (so you're welcome to come stay). At the moment I am being a real little housewife. Ett works and I stay at home and clean, cook and do washing and laze around. Its been quit nice to have a little holiday, but it gets quite boring. Luckily I'm gonna start working next year. I'll be teaching at a new school called Hamilton. I'll be teaching Grade 2, and I have 16 kids in my class next year. What a blessing!

These are my children in Swaziland. They are my Grade 2 class. For our outing we went to Maputo, Mocambique. Many of the children had never seen he sea before, (this sea was so calm it was nore like a lagoon) and they had so much fun swimming and collecting shells. Shame, I miss them.....

Our new family

These are our children, Hadassah and Luther. We smuggled them in from Swaziland. Hadassah is the oldest. I found her on the side of the road, and couldn't resist taking her, I felt sorry for her. She was alone and her mother had probably been killed. The people in Swaziland don't really look after animals well so I decided to take her home. It was a good decision. It gave Ett something to do. She is now a real Daddy's girl. Luther is my baba. I found him in a drain which was flooded the next day. He came to school with me each day and the kids loved him and he enjoyed them.