The Face of God

The Silver Mine I was looking for turned out to be above a village called Pniel, an old village set up by freed slaves in the early 1830's; Pniel translates to 'The Face of God'. I was lucky enough to find a lady called Linda who agreed to arrange for a guide to take me to the old mine.The old plan showed two level tunnels and a vertical shaft but from the village there was nothing to be seen, largely because the mine was in the Simonsberg that seems to hang over the village. My guide turned out to be Jimmy, who had worked in Falkirk and Canada and knew the site well. We climbed up the steep side of the mountain through a wonderful selection of Cape Fine Bos to the entrance to what seemed to be the main access level, where I could look out over the Dwars River Valley. Dwars is the Afrikaans for dry but this was winter and there was snow in the top of the far hills. The view made it a fine picnic spot used often by the villagers from Pniel.

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