Seru Sami
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In November 2012 we went looking for Indian sites in the niches of the Seru Sami. From the road to Bullenbaai several niches can be seen under the top of this mountain. But last time we were unable to continue our search because of aggressive bees in the first niche that we visited from the West side. So this time we decided to attack the mountain from the North. A steeper slope on this side but still rather easy to climb. Soon we reached the first niche on this side. It was a rather deep niche and inside we found the remains of a large old goat with large horns. I brought the skull outside for the others to see.
Santa Krus - area opposite Hofi Mango
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On Thursday June 18, 2015 the Archaeology sleuths gathered at Hofi Mango. We parked our cars there with permission from Alex and Ria Ooms and went to the other side of the road to start our hike. Our goal for this day where two nameless hills on that side of the road. Opposite Hofi Mango a dirt road, constructed by Aqualectra to maintain the power lines, starts. We followed that road to the top of a first hill with a height of 61.6 meters. From there we had a nice view on Hofi Mango with the sugar mill. The road was well-maintained so we had an easy hike. But from that first top the dirt road disappeared. We followed the power lines till we reached a point where it seemed to be easier to go directly to the top of the second hill. That hill is 121.8 meters high. On that top a triangulation point from Kadaster is positioned.
Cas Abou - Indigo tank system
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After our find of the border gate between Cas Abou and San Juan I had posted a picture of this gate in the Facebook group "You know you've lived in Curaçao ...". This is a FB-group with a common interest in Curaçao and especially the Curaçao of the past. My question to this group was if someone knew what was in the picture and where it was taken. As a response I got two old maps of the area of San Juan. The first one was posted by Rico van Bemmel and was created to document a dispute about a well. The second map was posted by Helma Molhuijzen and came from the WIC archive. Very interesting was that on the first map the indigo tank system of Cas Abou was mentioned and drawn. Close inspection of the WIC-map showed that also on this map the indigo tank system was drawn although not mentioned in the legenda. On both maps the indigo tank systems was drawn close to a well.
After close inspection of both maps we had a pretty good idea where we had to expect the indigo tank system. So we went back to Cas Abou on Thursday June 11, 2015 to search for this indigo tank system.
Roi Tabak
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On Thursday June 4 2015 the archaeology sleuths went to an area that borders on San Juan. In the past this area was part of the plantation San Juan, but in 1941 this areas was purchased by the grandfather of Chris Winkel, dr Pieter Hendrik "Gungu" Maal. François, Fred and I went to this area in 2010; there should be a vehicle from the second world war parked there. And indeed we found the remnants of a Cletrac (Cleveland tractor) there, parked in a shed next to a house.
There was a chance that there would be more vehicles from WWII but the problem is that this area is densely overgrown. François contacted Jacco Steffens of Skyworks, a company that owns a drone for surveys. Jacco and his partner Sabine Berger were willing to fly the drone over the area that we wanted to investigate. On the HD-film that was made during that survey several interesting structures were found. That made it possible for us to choose a route through this area that would lead us to the interesting places.
For this visit we were the guest of Chris Winkel as one of the current owners of this area for a renewed visit.
Cas Abou - border with San Juan
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On Thursday May 28 the archaeology sleuths went to Cas Abou. We parked our cars next to the plantation house. Of course also this time we asked permission to enter the plantation and we got the permission from APC (Algemeen Pensioenfonds Curaça).
I made a quick tour around the plantation house to take pictures. The house is uninhabited but in rather good condition. Next to the plantation house is the magazina. This looks as a rather modern part; completely different from other magazinas near plantation houses. It is currently divided in multiple storage units each with its own door.
When everybody was present, a small group and one guest, Chris Winkel, we went in the direction of the salt pans. We tried to follow an old dirt road that is present on the Werbata map, but we couldn't find it in the vegetation, so we just went via a roi in a more or less straight line to the salt pans. The vegetation was rather open although we encountered a lot of Prickly pear cacti. Never fun to walk through.
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