South Africa and Lesotho. Spring Break 2004
    
 
Having been outfitted, we are getting ready to plunge ~1 km into Bushveld Layered Mafic Intrusion, where the South Arficans are mining for Pt. At the end a a mining shaft, this miner is using a hydrolic drill to extract a seem of ore 5-50 cm thick. Notice the pistons to the the left and right. They are in place to holding up the ceiling... the shaft here is approximately 1 meter high.
 
                 
Alternating mafic (e.g. lots of dark minerals, in this case chromite) and felsic (the white horizons, anothosite) layers within the Bushveld. These were believed to form during crystal fractionation of a large magma chamber. They alternations represent new pulses of magma into the system, such as the vertical dike that cuts through the outcrop. We are still at about 1 km here. The miner shown above, most likely resides in this shanty town, located just beyond the mine. Bad conditions to say the least.
 
 
After entering Lesotho, the land-locked country within South Africa, we decided to stop here to buy a new spare time. I am eyeing this roasted corn.
             
  This outcrop, I am standing in front of, is at the Vrederfort Impact Crater. This ~3.2 Ba impact crater just south of Johannesburg was ~300 km across. Thats a big hole. What you see behind me is in the core of the dome, which is where the high pressure of the impact melted the crustal rocks, and caused this breccia... called a pseudotachylite. The black areas are melt, and the pink rock is are gneiss.        
Up, Up, Up, into the hills of Lesotho. We are probably passing ~2 km here. The layered hills are layers of flood basalts from when South Africa, Antarctica, and India rifted apart.

Again, at the top of Lesotho, and looking off in the distance. We are at ~3 km here. The biggest problem Lesotho has, besides having the lowest GDP of any country, is pervasive errosion caused by overgrazing.
 
Why were we in Lesotho, besides the awesome view? To see Kimberlite, at a non-De Beers diamond mine. We found no diamonds, but this is an awesome example of a mantle xenolith (lherzolite) within the brecciated kimberlie matrix. There was ~0.1 ct per 20 tons of rock at this mine, so we were less than likely to find a specimen.
     
  See South Africa in the disance... that is about 7000 feet below us... at the base of the flood basalts as we leave Lesotho. I felt very safe on this one lane, switch-back ridden, dirt road.
What are these? They are raw diamonds.... 73.34 ct worth from the Kimberlite mine in Lesotho. Nice party favors for having made such a long trip to see them. On our way north, through western South Aftica, we stopped to refill our water bottles in a drainage pond for a Fluorite Mine. However, the fluorite were mega-phenocrysts in an alkalic hematite-rich basaltic andesite. The tailings of which is dieing everything here rust red.
       
       
We are at Kruger National Wildlife Preserve.... and this is a Giraffe. Above is a Elephant walking towards us. And we had to slow down so we wouldn't dent our car from this guy (Rhino).
 
We are in another mine here.... I think a phlogopite mine, within a carbonitite scarn. Very odd.
And finally, as we left, we stopped at the outcrop of the Bushveld layered mafic intrusion. These black and white layers can be mapped for kilometers!