Western Cape Citichat 19 September 2008

CITICHAT 37/2008 - 19 September 2008


Western Cape

Quite a number of years ago my wife and I spent about ten days exploring west coast towns and villages such as Yzerfontein, Vredenburg, Paternoster, Velddrif, Lambert’s Bay, etc. This last week we did the same but in the Western Cape; Riebeek Kasteel, Gouda, Tulbagh, Prince Alfred Hamlet, McGregor. Bredasdorp, Napier, Bot River, etc as well as the larger and better known towns in-between. The weather was mainly awful, overcast, cold winds and rain with just one real Cape summer day and, of course, when we left this morning it was great! . But the scenery was amazing – we do live in a magnificent country and the Western Cape must have been in front of the queue when beauty was handed out.



It’s always interesting being a tourist in your own country and finding out what visitors to our shore experience. Because it is off-season we didn’t book anywhere but stopped at tourist/information bureaus in whatever place we decided to overnight. We found them all to be very efficient and able to provide us with the information we were looking for. This included details of self-catering establishments. We wanted basic accommodation with cooking facilities and here we experienced a vast range in standard, all at the same price. From places where cobwebs hung from ceilings and mattresses were thin and sheets grey to cottages superbly appointed with wonderful views. From rooms equipped with a microwave, fridge and knives, forks and spoons to kitchenettes with the full monty and then some. Some had tea, coffee and rusks whilst others were totally bare of refreshments. In one place we never saw a single person (even paid by electronic transfer) in others, friendly hosts would show concern as to our comfort. After a night in the ‘don’t care’ variety, a visitor to South Africa, must perceive the country as quite primitive whilst in the ‘full monty’, for the very same price, they would think that the country offers real luxury and warmth.



The provincial roads were almost all in great shape. Not so with all municipal roads - in a couple of places access clearly wasn’t a priority and roads were potholed and not in a good shape.



At the entrance to Riebeek Kasteel a large board proudly proclaims that the town was voted the cleanest in the country in 2006/7 and, in fact, every town and village of the between twenty and thirty we visited had noticeably clean streets and public environment. Yet some viewing sites on the edges of the many passes that we drove over to get from one place to another, are filthy. Foreign tourists? I doubt it.



One of the things that struck us in some of the bigger towns in particular, was the quite extreme mixture of buildings in the town centres. The older towns’ high streets had the most beautiful historic buildings rubbing cheek by jowl with hideous McDonald’s and ‘South African modern’ single storey retail stores interspersed with residential buildings of varying ages and condition. Eclectic? No, messy! Obviously absolutely no thought or direction given to developers who generally seem to take the attitude that ‘anything will do’ provided they pay the rates! Lack of sound planning can also be seen in the sprawl that has been allowed. As the town centre expands, mostly residentially, vineyards are being sacrificed on the periphery, which is rather like selling our crown jewels! We didn’t see any evidence of spatial integration – most places appeared to still have ‘white’ residential suburbs, or just extensions of the town centre, whilst other races are still located in the more distant townships. On the other hand we saw no informal traders, ‘stop street sellers, beggars or homeless people.



Back to the mill on Monday and back to talking about Joeys next Friday!



Ciao, neil