@old-guy-photos
With various species of oak trees in South Africa our main one is the English Oak, most popular planted around Cape Town when settlers first arrived, so they are not indigenous trees.
Mighty Oak has sybolism, a much loved tree around the world, depicting stength, morale, resistance and knowledge. No wonder people go nuts about trees, they have reason, meaning and well this one has nuts called acorns.
Nothing is more enticing than walking along roads with oak trees standing guard on either side, the deep shade offered is welcoming, very international and loved, living from 300 to 600 years in some places.
Taken in Spring with fresh leaves starting to appear giving the soft green against dark limbs.
Nuts about trees, literally the oak tree needs to be 20 to 30 years old before producing acorns, under this tree they were plentiful as if it had just come into age of shedding it's load onto the ground.
Canon PowerShot HS730 SX
Autumn colours just starting to show turning gold from green a week or two later it would have been spectacular to see in change of season. Not a tree we have down on the coast, always enjoyed when inland.
Canon PowerShot HS730 SX
This is the tree standing a little further back, considering age, it is a young sprightly tree with many years of growth still in the roots.
Canon PowerShot HS730 SX
Out in the open enjoying big trees growing together each at different height and ages, making a small forest to walk through, we have seen small buck out here, one needs to be very quiet.
Canon PowerShot HS730 SX
Wherever I looked I noticed just how many trees are up in this region, there is a great story attached on how the two towns Himeville and Underberg reconciled their differences:-
Underberg is a small village in the Drakensberg foothills, with spectacular views of the mighty range. As you descend to the town, you’ll be welcomed by tree-lined streets against a backdrop of rugged peaks. Just five kilometres down the road, with a gorgeous row of oak trees leading up to it, is the even smaller town of Himeville, gateway to Sani Pass.
There are various versions to the history of these two picturesque towns, but the most popular is that Underberg grew around a store that was opened to serve the first settler farms in the frontier times of 1886. Although the town was well established, the government decided it wasn’t suitable to be the district centre because it was privately owned and was overlooked by a hill – making it defenseless if attacked.
Himeville was chosen and was granted a magistrate in 1902. Rivalry arose between the two villages, aggravated five years later when a railway was built that ended at Underberg, not reaching Himeville.
A row of oak trees next to the road connecting the two towns is what eventually healed the rift. The trees were planted by locals when residents Kenneth and Mona Lund offered to give one to anyone willing to plant one. Rivalries were soon forgotten. Soource
Canon PowerShot HS730 SX
Unusual how trees have been used for various reasons, wonderful the family thought to reconcile the towns sharing a dream of tree lined streets, most are the mighty Oak Tree.
How many stories have you from your region about trees being used as a meeting place by leaders, as a post office? The following are in or around Cape Town alone.
Here in South Africa we have van Riebeesk's hedge. Today one can find remnants of Van Riebeeck’s Hedge on a leafy ridge in Kirstenbosch National Botanic Garden. There, a plaque reads:
For many, this hedge marks the first step on the road to Apartheid and symbolizes how white South Africa cut itself off from the rest of Africa, dispossessed the indigenous people and kept the best of the resources for itself. Our challenge in South Africa today is to dismantle the barriers erected in the past, share the resources equally and build a home for all.
Palm Tree Mosque
In Islamic culture, palm trees are deeply symbolic: they appear around oases to signal water as a gift of Allah; they are said to grow in the Islamic paradise of Jannah; Muhammad built his home and the first ever mosque out of palm trees; the first muezzin would climb up palm trees to proclaim the call to prayer; and in the Quran (19:16–34), Jesus was born under a palm tree.
The Money Tree in Kalk Bay
From the late 1600s to 1850s, Kalk Bay — as its name would suggest — supported a lime industry burning locally abundant seashells in kilns. With the demise of that industry, fishing emerged as the village’s economic staple. After each day at sea, it was under the Money Tree, safe from driving rain or blistering heat, that fishing boat skippers would dispense wages to their crews. So too, traders known as ‘langgannas’ — a Malay word reflecting Capetonian ancestry — would gather around the Money Tree to purchase cartloads of fish. These they would lug some 30 km north to Table Bay, blowing traditional fish horns at way stations to announce the arrival of their commerce.
Thought for today: If your vision is for a year plant wheat, if you vision is for a decade plant trees, and if your vision is for a lifetime plant people. ~ African Proverb
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!steemitworldmap -29.7449 lat 29.5038 long Himeville, Kwazulu-Natal, South Africa D3SCR
