Breathing New Life Into Old Treasures
West Coast Fossil Park: Fossils are the starting point of understanding our human existence. At West Coast Fossil Park, research and fossils are beautifully depicted through various art forms.
With local tourism on the rise again, the CWBR are working alongside Western Cape Biospheres Reserves to create a Biosphere-to-Biosphere Reserves tourism route. The route will link all five Biosphere Reserves and aims to raise awareness of these sites and showcase their lesser-known treasures. To gain a greater understanding of these unique features the CWBR Youth Board along with the CWBR team, will be embarking on trips to each Biosphere Reserve to experience them first-hand. Last week we embarked on our first trip up the ruggedly beautiful West Coast, where we were left in awe of one particular local tourist attraction: The West Coast Fossil Park. Declared a National Heritage Site in 2014, the park carries great palaeontological significance and is particularly revered for its exceptionally well-preserved fossil faunal remains. Although garnering local and international recognition among scientific communities the park offers great opportunities for tourism too.
Located 150km outside Cape Town, the park can sometimes be overlooked for the excitement and scenic beauty on offer in nearby Langebaan. Moreover, similar institutions like museums have a reputation of failing to inspire much excitement in tourists. After all, the notion of spending hours traipsing around an old building looking at dead things, having to read long paragraphs of information can seem more work than fun. In an age where information is just one click away, why visit these places? Well, from our own experience we can tell you, you will learn far more and leave with an incredibly memorable experience, particularly when interpreted by a professional guide.
As is the case, with any historical site, the way to engage with tourists and spark interest is to bring the past to life. The Fossil Park uses a combination of nature, art, technology and science to do just this and successfully recreates the evolution of the West Coast over millions of years, to the present day. Before entering the Exhibition Hall, one passes by the Pliocene Garden Amphitheatre and is immediately transported back millions of years ago. One will be amazed to find the area was once dominated by forest and grassland biomes as evidenced by fossil pollens found at the site. Are we experiencing similar phenomena today with climate change?
Particularly impressive in the Interpretive Exhibition Hall is the Sivathere Hall, which houses a family of life-size wooden sculptures of extinct long horned, short necked giraffes. Like something out of Avatar, these structures offer an ingenious way of visualising prehistoric animals found at the park. A level below, takes you down into the depths of the Subterranean Display, where you will be transported to the underground world of today, filled with giant termites, snakes and pangolins, made entirely from recyclable materials. Perhaps the most popular section of the park is the Dig Site, an active excavation site, one of few in the world that remains open to the public. Observe fossils currently studied by scientists and palaeontologists, still trapped in bedrock and grab the opportunity to hunt for tiny fossils in sifting trays as you enter.
Rhinoceros fossil alongside modern bones of the species
Recycled plastic bottles become termites
To further enhance your experience of the park, we suggest you get yourself a great guide. We were privileged enough to be taken on a private tour by Pippa Haarhoff, the park’s Director who was instrumental in formally establishing it back in 1998. Needless to say, Pippa knows the place inside and out and shared some interesting insights with us. She believes the park holds special significance due to its “immense diversity in terms of species number and quantity of material… you've got marine, terrestrial and freshwater animals all in one area, which you don’t often find.” Greater than that, she hopes the park will inspire curiosity and make people think about not only the separate evolutionary paths of people, animals, plants and their environment, but also the co-evolution of all of these factors and how they interact and change one another.
Pippa explains the process of identifying fossil fragments
Even the tiniest of fossils are important in understanding the immense biodiversity of the past.
This got us thinking: Children continue to be enamoured by Disney movies like the Lion King and each year millions of tourists flock to Addo Elephant National Park to observe the Big Five. However, how few of us stop to think about how these charismatic animals, whom we have come to love, came to be this way? Most tourists stand in awe of African elephants but how about their four tusked elephant extinct cousins - possibly even more fascinating. Places like the Fossil Park allow us to study our planet’s ancestry and how and why it has changed. Perhaps inspiring this kind of curiosity within our tourists will impart a greater message of environmental stewardship that they will be able to take home.
Our vision for the tourism route is to create greater awareness of the importance of man’s role in nature, hereby converting the average tourist into an environmental ambassador. Stay tuned for our next trip where we scout out some more hidden gems in our local Biosphere Reserves.