Grootfontein is a city in north eastern Namibia. It lies on the B8, a Namibian National Road that leads from Windhoek to the Caprivi Strip, in the Otavi triangle. In Afrikaans, its name means "Big Spring" - there is indeed a large hot spring near the town. Area is a physical quantity expressing the size of a part of a surface. ... Square kilometre (US spelling: Square kilometer), symbol km², is an SI unit of surface area. ... A square mile is an English unit of area equal to that of a square with sides each 1 statute mile (≈1,609 m) in length. ... A mayor (from the Latin māior, meaning larger, greater) is the modern title of the highest ranking municipal officer. ... A time zone is a region of the Earth that has adopted the same standard time, usually referred to as the local time. ... ... Windhoek, Namibia Windhoek (pronounced Vind hook or German «Windhuk») is the capital of Namibia. ... Location: Caprivi, Namibia Area: 19,532km (7,541 mi ) Population: 79,852 (2001), 90,422 (1991) Capital: Katima Mulilo Time Zone: South African Standard Time: UTC+1 Caprivi, sometimes called the Caprivi Strip or Caprivi Region and formally known as Itenge, is a narrow protrusion of Namibia eastwards about 450km... Look up Wiktionary:Swadesh lists for Afrikaans and Dutch in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Green Dragon Spring at Norris Geyser A hot spring is a place where warm or hot groundwater issues from the ground on a regular basis for at least a predictable part of the year, and is significantly above the ambient ground temperature (which is usually around 55~57 F or...

In 1885, 40 Boer families from the north-west of South Africa settled at Grootfontein. Part of the Dorstland Trekkers, they were heading towards Angola. When that territory fell under Portuguese control, they turned back and tried to establish the "Republic Upingtonia" at Grootfontein. Abandoned by 1887, it became the headquarters of the South West Africa Company in 1893. Boer is the Afrikaans (and Dutch) word for farmer which came to denote the descendants of the Afrikaans-speaking migrating farmers of the expanding eastern Cape frontier. ...

Like all the towns in the Otavi triangle, Grootfontein is very green in summer but drier in winter. In spring, jacaranda and flamboyant trees bloom in profusion. The town has an old German Schutztruppe fortress from the year 1896, which today houses a museum that expounds on the local history. The economic mainspring of the area were for many decades the Berg Aukas and Abenab mines to the north east of the town. These produced zinc and vanadium but have since closed. This is dolomite country and the carbonate deposits in the upper parts of the mine have yielded interesting fossils of simian or pongoid creatures that lived millions of years before modern humans evolved. Species See text Jacaranda is a genus of 49 species of flowering plants in the family Bignoniaceae, native to tropical and subtropical regions of South and Central America, Mexico, and the Caribbean. ... Flamboyant is the name given to a florid style of architecture in vogue in France during the 15th and 16th century. ... The Schutztruppe was the colonial armed force of Imperial Germany from the late 1800s to 1918 when Germany lost its colonies. ... The Louvre Museum in Paris, one of the largest and most famous museums in the world. ... General Name, Symbol, Number zinc, Zn, 30 Chemical series transition metals Group, Period, Block 12, 4, d Appearance bluish pale gray Atomic mass 65. ... General Name, Symbol, Number vanadium, V, 23 Chemical series transition metals Group, Period, Block 5, 4, d Appearance silver-grey metal Atomic mass 50. ... Dolomite crystals from Touissite, Morocco Dolomite is the name of both a carbonate rock and a mineral consisting of calcium magnesium carbonate (formula: CaMg(CO3)2) found in crystals. ... In inorganic chemistry, a carbonate is a salt of carbonic acid. ... An ammonite fossil Eocene fossil fish of the genus Knightia Petrified wood fossil formed through permineralization. ... Families Cebidae Aotidae Pitheciidae Atelidae Cercopithecidae Hylobatidae Hominidae The simians (infraorder Simiiformes) are the higher primates very common to most people: the monkeys and the apes, including humans. ...

Twenty four kilometres west of Grootfontein lies the huge Hoba meteorite. It is easily the largest known meteorite on Earth, as well as being the largest single mass of iron known to exist on or near the surface of the planet. The Hoba meteorite, also known as the Hoba West meteorite, is the largest known meteorite found on Earth, as well as the largest naturally-occurring mass of iron known to exist on the earth. ... Willamette Meteorite A meteorite is an extraterrestrial body that survives its impact with the Earths surface without being destroyed. ... Earth (IPA: , often referred to as the Earth, Terra, the World or Planet Earth) is the third planet in the solar system in terms of distance from the Sun, and the fifth largest. ...

Transport

Grootfontein is a railhead on TransNamib, the national railway and transport system. Grootfontein also has a military base which housed several units of the now defunct South African Defence Force. It has an airfield that can handle large transport carriers such as the Hercules C130, as well as commercial passenger aircraft. A Railhead is a terminus of a railway line that interfaces with another tranport mode, for example shipping. ... A TransNamib diesel engine south of Keetmanshoop TransNamib is the railway parastatal of Namibia. ... The South African Defence Force (SADF) were the South African armed forces from 1957 until 1994. ...

External links

• Maps and aerial photos Coordinates: -19.565° 18.104°
  • Mapping from Multimap or GlobalGuide or Google Maps
  • Aerial image from TerraServer
  • Satellite image from WikiMapia