Western Cape Archives - TRAVELBUCKET

LAINGSBURG

If you have travelled along the N1 from Cape Town to Johannesburg you probably passed through the Karoo town of Laingsburg, previously known as Nassau. Normally all are in hurry and do not spend a lot of time intown apart from filling up on fuel, visit the loo and get something cold for the road. With the sharp hike in the fuel prices, we started to explore closer to home. The road took as to Laingsburg and Matjiesfontein.The most famous happening that put the town on the map and earned a place in history was probably the disastrous flood on 25 January 1981. With an annual rainfall of only 175 mm per year a flood was for sure not on the minds of this Karoo town when it started raining on 24 January 1981. The Buffalo River burst its bank and with the confluence of the Wilgehout, Baviaans and Buffalo… Read more >

PRINCE ALBERT: A GEM BETWEEN HARD ROCKS

by Inge Triegaardt The Great Karoo with its vast openness and many tumbleweeds, offers beautiful gems in between the hard rocks and dry veld. Prince Albert is certainly one of these diamonds in the making. Prince Albert was established in 1842 with town layout on the De Queekvaleij farm. The farm was granted to Zacharias de Beer as a loan farm and the town was initially called Albertsbrug. It was renamed in 1845 to its current name of prince Albert, after the husband of Queen Victoria. Spending a weekend in the town at the foot of the Heritage Site, which is the Swartberg Mountains, recharges the soul. The many accommodation options, such as Skrywerskop, offer a country feel stay and the opportunity to stroll through the town from wherever you lay your head down at night. Nothing is too far from the main road in this little town. Referring to… Read more >

ZIP IT IN A (ZIBI) BLIK

Who of you still remember the Zip it in a Zibi drive way back when we were all still young? On our recent visit to Prince Albert we noticed these beautiful bins dotted all over town and we wanted to find out the story about it, because this is not just ordinary bins; it is designer bins with a message. We tracked the master behind it down in the name of local artist Kevin de Klerk who hand paint it with care and precision. Kevin tells us that there are a total of 33 bins in the village and some of them has the most interesting stories behind it. There is the cat sterilization awareness bin with, of course, a beautiful cat on its side. We all know that cat numbers can multiply astonishingly quickly if you do not keep a finger on it. So, this one goes towards cat… Read more >

VLEESBAAI 4X4 DUNE ROUTE

We have been to the Vleesbaai 4×4 route many, many times in the past, but each and every time that we go it is something special as the dunes constantly shift and change its look with the seasons. It is time for sun, sea and sand and happy holidays again. Vleesbaai 4×4 route is the perfect destination for those windy and cloudy days when the weather does not want to play along for a beach visit. Early morning when you are first on the route you will encounter many fresh spoor – some very cat-like (I was thinking in the direction of a vaalbos kat), small antelope, mice and birds. As they say the early bird catches the worm or is it spoor in this case? The interesting thing about this route is that it changes according to the time of day that you visit. Early morning the sand… Read more >

PAYING HOMAGE TO HEROES

2018 marks the 70 year celebrations world wide of the icon Land Rover brand. Now the mere words “Land Rover” is a bone of contention, because it stir up opposite emotions – love or hate. The word “hate” sounds a bit harsh so I will rather refer to it as a “no love for a Land Rover”. At the celebrations held at the southern tip of Africa it was only love for Landies that was going around the whole weekend. Everyone was discussing and checking out other Land Rovers, smiling and waving the Landy wave to your fellow stalwarts. Make no mistake there were also the “no lover of Land Rovers” that were curious (and maybe envious) who made their way to the festival to have a look at the goings and doings of the Landy lovers. What an iconic weekend it was! Sharing your story (everyone who drives a… Read more >

MALGAS PONTOON – THE LAST HAND OPERATED PONTOON

A pontoon is a simple floating barge designed to get vehicles across a river, and the word is often shortened to pont. If you like to explore the back roads of South Africa the route through the Overberg that will take you to the pont at Malgas across the Breede River is a worthwhile, one of a kind experience. What makes the Malgas pont rather special? It is the only remaining hand-drawn pont of its kind in the country. There are at least two other pontoons that comes to mind when writing about this topic, but they are not hand-drawn – the one over the Kei River in the Eastern Cape and the one at Sendelingsdrift in the Richtersveld crossing the Orange River in the Northern Cape but it is not the same as the hand-drawn one at Malgas. I am adding these two pontoon crossing to Wallace’s travel list! The… Read more >

STINGRAYS IN STRUISBAAI

What an amazing experience we had when we visited the famous stingrays in Struisbaai harbour! I was absolutely mesmerized by them and took a zillion pictures ….. Parrie is not just another stingray. He or she (I do not know how you distinguish between them) has been featured on local television in recent years. Stingrays and manta rays (there is a difference) are cartilaginous fishes. So, what is the difference between them? Stingray is a group of rays with about 100 species while there are only two species of manta rays. Manta ray is much larger and heavier than stingrays. Stingray has barbed stings, but not manta ray Stingray could be harmful for humans, but there are no accidental attacks on divers from manta rays Manta rays are found mostly around tropical waters and barely in subtropics, whereas stingrays inhabit tropical, subtropical, and occasionally temperate marine waters Manta rays get… Read more >

Tag Archive: Western Cape