Trike City Brakpan to Vaaldam - An early morning flight
By Wouter Havenga
Pics by Wouter and Neil
17.04.2025
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At last, the weather allowed us to go for a flight! The plan was to do a Vaaldam wall inspection now that some of the sluices have been opened.
Me, Marius Dreyer and Neil de Lange agreed to meet on 9 April at 05.45 at Trike City FABB Brakapan Airfield where we all hangar. At 06:20 we took oof for our flight that took us over the Suikerbosrand Nature Reserve and onwards to the Dam where we hoped to see the spectacular sight as tons and tons of water spilling through the open sluices.
Conditions were ideal for Microlight flying and we reached the northern shore of the dam that has surface area of about 320 square kilometres and is 47 meters deep and has a capacity of 2,609,799,000 cubic metres. On 4 May 1948 BOAC introduced Short Solent flying boats on the UK (Southampton) to South Africa route where they landed on the waters of the dam.
Having reached the North Shore, we flew all the way along the wall. Landing was no option as the continued rain left the ground completely saturated, and turning streams into rivers.
After having criss-crossed some of the dam and wall we started our way home flying northwards for a while down the raging Vaal River. Just south of Kliprivier we turned east and then north at Suikersbosrand from where we set course back to Brakpan.
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