Africa Wild

Orpen Dam Lookout and Picnic Spot

JH Orpen, a surveyor and member of the National Parks Board helped sponsor boreholes for the park. His wife Eileen bought up seven farms immediately to the west of Rabelais gate during the 1930s and 1940s and donated them to the Park, thereby extending the total area by almost 24 500 hectares.
The dam is named after Eileen Orpen.



Orpen Dam is on the N'Waswitsonto River. The lookout point is situated on the S32 gravel loop road near Tshokwane picnic site.
The resting area has a great panomaric view over the dam. There are some chairs and tables for picnic and a toilet.

The view








A lot of green Pistia stratiotes (Water lettuce), a declared weed in South Africa.
The introduction of a biological control agent (Neohydronomus affinis) removes it, but it comes back when the water weevils die when food source declines.

Some birds are always around:


Greater Blue-eared Starling


Jameson´s Firefinch


Yellow-bellied Greenbul

Some views from 2012, the dam is almost clean






Euphorbia cooperi

A boomslang by Vinkie at the car park, 2013!







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Walking from the shaded parking to the lookout lapa:

Bushcraft 2016:

Richprins wrote: ↑Tue Jul 24, 2018 10:19 am A boomslang by Vinkie at the car park, 2013!

It's a Spotted Bush Snake. Greens snake in picnis spots or camps are usually Spotted Bush Snakes, they are very good climbers and often found on the walls and ceilings of buildings.

We haven’t been to this place for a very long time

Klippies!