CITIES, TOWNS AND NEIGHBOURHOODS

Calvinia, founded in 1851 on the banks of the stunning Oorlogskloof River and named after religious reformer John Calvin, lies at the foot of the dolerite-topped Hantam Mountains (Hantam…

During the Anglo-Boer War the Boers used Concordia as their headquarters while Okiep was under siege. Some old Cornish style houses still remain as well as the original granery, used…

Named after a Scottish cleric and immigrant, Rev Colin Fraser, and a certain church elder, Meyburg, Fraserburg was founded in the West Nuweveld in 1851. In 1870 the first attorney, HWA Cooper…

In 1845, Garies sprang up on land given to the Dutch Reformed Church by the owner of the farm Goedeverwagting. Originally named after the farm, its present name, a Khoisan word…

Formerly a favoured holiday destination for farmers, fishermen and divers, Hondeklip Bay is separated from Springbok by 104km of gravel road, the Messelpad Pass and Soebatsfontein, a quaint village built…

South of Springbok, Kamieskroon is set among the granite rock formations of the Kamiesberg range. The town’s origins lie in the 1860s, 7km north of its present position. It t…

The Diamond Coast, as the area has become known, holds a beauty and mystique of its own with its cultural diversity and mineral mining. These two towns, and the diamond…

Said to have been named after a Jewish travelling salesman named Lurie or alternatively it could be named after the Loerie bird (Turacu corythaix).

North of Springbok, Nababeep’s name combines two Nama words, naba, meaning ‘hump of an animal’ and bib, meaning ‘small spring’. Mining began in the 1850s and, from 1876, ore was taken to …

Between 1700-1740, clashes between trekboers and indigenous people led trekboers to move to the top of the Bokveld escarpment. The town came into being in the late 1800s. On the…

Derived from the Nama word ‘U-gieb’, meaning ‘the great, brackish spring’, Okiep was, until production ceased in 1918, the world’s richest copper mine. Okiep is the oldest mining town in South Afr…

Farmers, realising the value of irrigating the area, bought 12 000ha of land from Edwells in 1916. In the same year, 63 plots were surveyed and taken up. A 10km canal serving 70 families…

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