Day 41: Trennerys (Qolora Mouth) to Rhodes

We weren't sure what day it was, it turns out it's Monday.  We left Trennerys at 9:30 for the 290 km trip to Rhodes in the Eastern Cape. We passed through Centane, a bustling Dutywa and took the R408 to Ngcobo and onto Elliot. At this stage we ascended steeply into the mountains of the south east Drakensberg. 

We took the turn off to Barkly East and headed over the first of the 8 passes in the area, Barkly Pass. It was a picturesque tarred pass and an easy drive. The area is extremely beautiful with magnificent rock formations. 

We then took the R393, an 80 km trip on gravel roads to Rhodes.  This area is a well kept secret, if people knew how beautiful it was, we would have come across at least one car along this stretch. It hosts some of the most magnificent farmlands I have seen. I guess the area could be reminiscent of Scotland and the names on the gateposts of the farms echo this; Kilcullen,  Ravenscrag, Glen Garry, Buttermead, Farnham and so on.

Agricultural developments in this area in the 1860’s  led to the building of a church. The village was then founded on the farm Tintern belonging to Jim Vorster, he sold his farm in plots and parts were given as commonage to the village, on condition it was named after Cecil John Rhodes, who was then Prime minister of the Cape. The population grew to nearly 300 people by 1892. The old school building was allegedly designed by Sir Herbert Baker and had 112 pupils in 1928.  Rhodes became a ‘hippy colony’ during the 70’s and early 80’s. in 1997 it was proclaimed a Conservation Area.

Today the town has 23 permanent residents, the hotel closed 3 years ago and the school closed last year. It is seen as a tourist destination and there are a number of old cottages for hire (some are 100 years old). We are staying in one such cottage called Cyriacus, at the end of Naude Street.  Cyriacus  is a 4 bedroom, old house with self catering. We are really going to rattle around here.

 

While unpacking Sean De Wet, one of the locals arrived with a gift, of a packet of home grown vegetables for us. 

 It's that sort of old school town, frozen in time, with quaint and charming examples of Victorian Architecture. I guess it is a remote village because of its inaccessibility.  We took a drive around town this afternoon, it took 5 minutes.

Map of Rhodes Village

We thought we might have to defrost some of the meat we have been lugging around in our freezer but on our drive we stumbled upon Walkerbout’s Inn, on the outskirts of the town and found out they do pizzas, so we decided to go there for dinner.

Like oupa and ouma we sat on the stoep watching the one horse in the town amble past, then as the last of the suns rays disappeared over the mountains I headed in to light the fire and dig out my winter clothes. I think we are in for cold nights here. 

The night was cold, the pizza was good and we had some interesting company as a bonus. One of the local farmers, a lady and two men who are working on the aviation radar systems in the area.