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Category: On The Marc

Review: The Shed Restaurant, Litchi Orchard, Salt Rock

I don’t often do that many restaurant reviews on this blog, but I definitely want to try and do a few more, especially of places in my area. There are so many cool places opening lately so it’s always worth giving them a shoutout!

Recently a new place opened in the area and is becoming a fast family favorite. It’s called The Shed and it’s situated in the awesome Litchi Orchard in Salt Rock. Many people may know the Litchi Orchard for their markets, but having this new spot makes it even better. The is also ample place for the kids to run around and explore, in fact we hardly even see the kids when we go there!

The Shed offers a variety of food & drink options in a great setting. It is set inside a wooden shed structure and also offers a cool outside area with bonfires. The food varies from Burgers, to Wood fired Pizza, to Flatbreads, fresh fish and even awesome tasting steaks. A little bit of something for everyone! Every time we have been with friends someone has tried something different, and everyone has been really happy with their food.

We have been a couple of times as a family and I really enjoy the burgers, while the kids love the pizzas. They also have a couple of local craft beers (Poison City Larger FTW) on tap as well as Gin & Tonic on tap, which is delicious. They also do these awesome gourmet milkshakes (Milo & Cookie Dough is to die for!!)

If you ever in the area looking for a spot to chill out, especially on a Sunday afternoon when they have live music, this is the place. I could easily spend a couple of hours here with the family.

Contact Details

w: theshedsaltrock.co.za
t: 032 8150516

Disclaimer: I was not asked to write this post. I love supporting new businesses in the area, so will probably start doing a few more of these :)

September 9, 2016
How to get a 360 degree Panoramic Photo to show in Facebook
Warning: This is a bit of a geeky post, so if Pano photography isn’t your thing you probably won’t enjoy this post as much as I do :)

Earlier this month Facebook announced the support of 360 degree Panoramic photos to show on your timeline. While 360 cameras are still fairly new tech, Facebook have enabled the tech to allow you to post normal Pano Photos from your iPhone or Samsung to show up as 360 photos in Facebook.

Earlier this week I made a Pano Photo in Photoshop & PTGui from a number of stitched images that I had taken with the DJI Phantom 4. Unfortunately when I uploaded it to Facebook it didn’t see it as a Pano picture, so I had to do a bit of digging around to get it to work.

Here are a couple of “tips & tricks” I found to get your Pano to show in Facebook
- Standard iPhone (4s and up) Pano photos should work as long as they cover at least 100 degrees of view horizontally. You simply upload your Pano using the Facebook app on your iOS device and it should pick it up automatically. If it doesn’t it means that the image is probably too small
- Images should be in a 2:1 ratio format, with the maximum size of 6000px x 3000px. Facebook seems to be quite sticky about this. If it is larger than that it doesn’t seem to upload without a bit of tweaking
- If you edit this in Photoshop you may have to “inject” specific Metadata (EXIF) data into the image.
  To inject EXIF data, I would recommend using the exif.er tool. You will need to change the following criteria. This should trigger Facebooks 360 processing when uploading
  - Make: RICOH
  - Model: RICOH THETA S
- You can also add Make: “Apple” & Model: “iPhone 6s” if you have an image which is not 360
- Use the awesome tool PTGui to stitch images that you have taken into a Pano or 360 “sphere”
- You can also use the Google Streetview iOS app to take Spherical Photos which you can then upload to Facebook. Simply take the 360 pic with the built in camera and upload to FB using the FB app
Check out this really comprehensive post from Facebook about editing & injecting MetaData into 360 photos. Also, this post gives some insight into what you can and can’t do with 360 FB Photos.

This is really exciting tech and the advent of 360 cameras will def be one of the “next big things”, interested to see how this pans out :) Now if only Facebook will allow us to embed these Panos…
June 21, 2016
Uber South Africa launches Cash Payment Options

Earlier this week Uber South Africa launched cash payments for rides as an option. In a country where the majority of people don’t have credit cards, or cards which can be used for online purchases, cash still plays a vital role in day to day life.

So after rolling out cash payments in a number of countries before this, including Kenya, Singapore & India, Uber South Africa have launched cash payments in South Africa. This now means that when you complete your trip, you pay the driver in cash after the fare is calculated and there is no need for cards.

Anyone can use this option and all you need to sign up for an Uber account is a valid South African Mobile number. To use the cash option you can simply follow the below steps:

Don’t forget that if you are a first time rider, you can use my Uber Promo Code “uberiguyza” and get R100 off your first trip!

For more info and the complete ins & outs of Uber Cash, check out the official blogpost

May 27, 2016
Back after a Malware Hack

If you subscribe to my RSS feed or Feedburner newsletter, I have to apologise for some of the dodgy posts you may have seen in the last couple of days.

It turns out, WordPress sometimes isn’t as great as it sounds, and malware attacks are a real threat. Added to that, somehow the hackers had the ability to post rubbish articles, which in turn made Google unhappy and they blocked the site.

I am however glad to say, that after hours of trying to decipher where the issue lay, and reading loads of articles I finally managed to get rid of the insane JS:MW22 jquery malware that was planted in my theme code.

So back to regular programming coming soon!!!

May 19, 2016
King Price Insurance – The “King’s Car” Insurance

A year ago I decided to sell my old Yaris as it was collecting dust while I was commuting to Jozi every 2^nd week. Due to a few changes, I had the opportunity to purchase a car towards the end of last year.

One of the biggest “missions” with buying a new car is getting insurance sorted before you can take delivery of the car. I hate shopping around and really just want to go with the easiest option out there, and of course the most affordable.

Some of these insurance companies offer all sorts of deals to help you get cheaper monthly payments. “Drive slower and we’ll give you points cause you healthy”, “Call us in 4 years’ time and we will pay a bonus, but ONLY if you don’t claim”.

But then I came across the rather interesting offer from King Price Insurance. After doing some digging, I found out they actually end up decreasing your premiums every single month you are insured with them! That’s correct, as an example, every month your insurance premium decreases by R8 a month.

But if you do the math its:

Month 1: R8

Month 2: R8 + R8

Month 3: R8 + R8 + R8

The calculation is roughly multiplying the first decrease by 72 to get the total savings per year. Times that by 4 and you will see how it compares to an outbonus for example – but you can’t lose it.
(The R8 per month is an example based on the value of your premiums)

If you in the market for car insurance (and I know of a few people reading this who are buying new cars soon :)) I would highly recommend taking a look at King Price!!

March 11, 2016