Ocean Meadows

Chocolat Negro Underwater Photography

I Want To Ride My Bicycle

Come Rain or Shine

Come rain or shine some days are just the same.

A Small Time Capsule Of The Wankie National Park 1959

Time Capsule Rhodesia 1959 - A Pictorial Tour Of A Beautiful Country

Main Camp in the Wankie Game Reserve. This is a pet ground hornbill, much pampered by all visitors

About my love for old pictures and photographs, you know. My fascination of finding a timeline between a place, eternalised on pictures years ago and the reality of the same place today, I am sharing with you now.

In the beginning when I started this blog my vision was to create a time capsule for me and the ones I share and have shared my life with.  There was a moment when I realized I have lived so much already, have been given so much, received so much, experienced so much that I could fill ten adventure story books for boys and girls. This is a blessing of the highest kind. 

But to my great disgust and even greater fear I had to accept the fact that some memories were starting to fade, becoming not so clear anymore. The past is taken over by the future at a rapid pace. 

And life is still exciting ! Another great blessing. But what of all this would I like to remember ? And what would I like the others that come after me to remember ?

I want to remember pretty accurately everything I had in my life. 

Soon I realized others have been doing it all the time inconsciously. Small time capsules are everwhere, still vibrating with energy in some hidden places, waiting to be found just to be sent on a journey of spreading wisdom again. I see them everywhere, small time capsules created by writers, painters, publishing houses and individuals who have left their memories in written or pictorial form behind for the world to see. They are waiting to be released so that they can time travel again. The whole universe consists of traveling time capsules.

One of the few places where men and animals are friends Wankie Game Reserve 1959

So today I am sending a small African time capsule from 1959 in your direction. May it float across the vast cyber universe forever. May somebody find a liking to it. The time capsule has left a beautiful place named Zimbabwe, then called Rhodesia, many decades ago. What it had to say at the time was of greatest accuracy and importance. It is not anymore.

South of the Victoria Falls the road leads to the Wankie Game Reserve, fast becoming recognized as the best game reserve in Southern Africa and, for density and variety of animal life, comparable even to the great game reserves of East Africa. Wankie takes it's name in corrputed fashion from the chief Wange, who ruled over this wild stretch of countryside before the white man came with modern ideas of game conservation. Scenically and geologically, it is a projection of the Kalahari, and there is talk of great a companion reserve being developed one day in Betchuana, across the boundary line which marks the western limit of the Wankie Game Reserve. Such a development would turn the twin reserves into the greatest single area in all Africa for game conservation. ( Pictures, Text by Howard Timmins Cape Town, 1959)

The Wankie Game Reserve is called the Hwange National Park today.

The OK Beauty Salon

A visit is gonna make you feel really OK.

Swakopmund - Fishing From The Old Jetty

These old color prints show us what Swakopmund looked like in the 1950's before Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt made this town famous by awaiting the birth to their child there in a seaside resort close by. Swakopmund was just a sleepy, very misty little village situated at the rough Atlantic coast of Namibia, then still called SWA - South West Africa. The old jetty was the place to be for fishing, and probably still is. At the time the wooden boards had holes and at a later stage it was even difficult to get to the end of the jetty.

A bird's eye view of the town with the vast Namib desert in the background. Then and now one of the most fascinating places in the world.

Today the town has changed completely. It has grown enormously and has become a tourist haven. I have spent many holidays there but I found it difficult to recognise the old streets.

Death Is A Silent Hunter

Death is a silent hunter

with no shame at all

and who was to witness him when he came in the brightest of light
just the oldest one of trees 

And where there was great beauty once

there is now absolutely none !

And all their mighty 

strong and sharp claws

could not help them at all

escape their grim fate

when this creature's father came along.

Pale Dead Beautiful Crab By The Sea

A moment that I have captured during my last holiday at the sea. A pale dead and incredibly beautiful crab lying on the rocks.

Fragile and delicate like life is.

Botticellis's Clouds

I was very lucky to be in  the right place at the right time to see the clouds of Botticelli's paintings.A couple of days ago I saw them right in front of my eyes on a stormy African afternoon. I am a lucky soul because I love Botticelli and I love clouds.

This was a sky like in a picture book with a renaissance flair to it. Beauty overload. 

This photograph is not digitally enhanced. The curve of clouds had exactly the same orange fiery red color as in the photo.

You can buy my prints in my Etsy shop as well:   Chocolat Negro Recycled Design and Art