Ocean Wide River Deep Traditional Cache

This cache has been archived.

Shaka & Shakespeare: We have moved out of the area and are no longer able to maintain this cache. Fun whilst it lasted.

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Hidden : 9/4/2009
Difficulty:
2 out of 5
Terrain:
1.5 out of 5

Size: Size: regular (regular)

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Geocache Description:


This cache will bring you to Umkomaas, with its spectacular sea views. The town is situated on a hill crowning the river's southern bank and was formed when a harbour was built in 1861, to export sugar, on the mouth of the navigable Mkhomazi River.

With the successful dredging of Durban harbour's sandbar and the arrival of the railway, the town suffered and like Port Shepstone the harbour fell into disuse.

A large number of whales once used the estuary as a nursery, giving birth in the shallows. The Zulus named the river after this spectacle (uMkhomazi means the place of cow whales). The settlement was originally known as South Barrow, with its suburb known today as Ilfracombe then called North Barrow.

Five kilometres offshore from Umkomaas lies the internationally-renowned Aliwal Shoal - a fossilised sand dune of sponges, soft and hard coral.

It was first spotted in 1849 but not adequately highlighted until after it sank the steamer Nebo in 1884. This wreck was joined almost a century later by that of the Produce, and together they add a significantly interesting dimension to this kilometre-long underwater wonderland.

Aliwal Shoal attracts not only a wide variety of warm and cold water fish, but also many Ragged-Tooth sharks. There has not been a single recorded shark attack on a scuba diver here.

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