Small Towns

First Trip to Parys – There and Back in a Day

Founder — Tue, 26 Oct 2010 05:00:59 +0000

Recent circumstances in the family necessitated a day trip to Parys in the Free State. Just on the other side of the Vaal and only an hours or so drive a way, Parys is one of those small town thats you can visit in a day for a cuppa and cake if you so desired. With a number of coffee shops, dinners, art galleries and gift shops there is certainly not a shortage of things to see there.

Due to the limited time we had – and the fact that it was a Monday when many stores are closed – this is not a full review of the town and we certainly will be heading back.

Below however is a map of where we took photographs (the great thing about the Sony Cybershot HX5 is that built in GPS) and you are welcome to click on it to link to our Picasa Web Album with map.

Wanting to Eat Up Stellenbosch

LuvSA — Sat, 14 Aug 2010 09:30:31 +0000

Nook – got to get there – got to eat there!

The little known town of Postmasburg

LuvSA — Thu, 05 Aug 2010 18:53:47 +0000

If you have heard of Postmasburg you probably have something to do with the mining industry of South Africa. This town is built on a green belt in the Kalahari between Kimberly and Upington in the Northern Cape and not on the main road. Postmasburg is an “out of the way” town. Here is a photo tour of modern day Postmasburg …

Get your Photo’s printed in Postmasburg

Freshly baked goods

Local house

Good business in the Kalahari

Don’t let the name put you off. This is the place in town to get a good meal. It’s named after the iron that is mined near Postmasburg and they serve more than chicken.

Colours of Postmasburg

Postmasburg blue

Barber shop – one of the better looking and run roadside barbers

Postmasburg style and energy conservation

Some what dusty and run down in winter I still find Postmasburg to be inspirational as the locals strive to brighten up the desert.

Namaqualand Towns

LuvSA — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 17:37:57 +0000

Visit http://www.namaqualand.net/to_do.html to find a resource listing the many wonders of the Namaqualand’s small towns and flowers which are flooding the area with colour.

In the Karoo this Winter – Photographs

LuvSA — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 07:53:34 +0000

We were ready to leave yesterday for Graaff Reinet when we saw these photo’s

Carnarvon – Small town in the news

LuvSA — Mon, 14 Jun 2010 10:08:06 +0000

Carte Blanche reported on the town Carnarvon and it’s scientific bid to leap into the future.

Nieu Bethesda

LuvSA — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 08:53:55 +0000

When mentioning my day trip plans to visit Nieu Bethesda to the surrounding Karoo town residents I was told, “Die duiwel bly daar” (the devil lives there). I discovered that the reason was the Owl House. I went to see for myself and found the legacy of an extraordinary woman – Helen Martins. Perhaps she felt trapped but she changed her world right where she was filling her home and yard with her glass and cement sculptures. I felt sadness for Helen but I was inspired by her compulsion to make art – there is not an inch of her abode that does not have her creative touch.

On my short drive through this very small town my breathe was seized by it’s church, shimmering white in the desert sun. I can remember getting out the car breathing the clean cool morning air under a crisp blue sky, hearing the bleeting of sheep and smiling to myself. On researching Nieu Bethesda I discovered it was founded for the church. A town was created so a church could be built for the farmers of the area, relieving them of a 7 hour church journey to Graaff Reinet. A natural spring provides water and so the name of Bethesda was suggested after the pool in Jerusalem by the sheep market mentioned in John 5: 2-3.

I wished I had walked the whole village. From what I saw there was more of God than the devil.

Google Map link

Cullinan

Admin — Tue, 18 May 2010 10:42:17 +0000

I was expecting some charm and a hearty meal near an old mine. I haven’t visited the town since the turn of the century and the restaurant we booked at was known to be good. It was pouring with rain, the clouds low over the rooftops, as our car emerged in town and ‘bump’ over train tracks for the third time in one minute. My eye caught the quaintness I’d been expecting but still I was so charmed by the Victorian Domestic Architecture – someone took the time to ice these houses like cupcakes out here in the middle of the bushveld.

The thrill of the town is when you hear the unmistakable chug, hiss and toot of a working steam engine. An umbrella line had formed next to the tracks waiting to board this nostalgic journey with little ones of the next generation in hand.

Sir Thomas Cullinan, our restaurant of choice was filled with families on excursions and in need of a good filling meal with Italian love mixed in (An Italian POW camp was located near Cullinan during World War II)

With all the floral sugar architecture to see in town my taste buds were not left out – if you are a lover of cheese cake – leave for Cullinan now. The pear cheesecake from the Sir Thomas Cullinan restaurant is worth the hour and a bit drive from Johannesburg.

Antique shops, mine tours, tea gardens, and a museum in one of the tasty houses were all vying for my attention. My most enjoyed moment in the town was walking after the rain had passed, under the dripping Jacaranda trees on the lane, hearing the elation of the neighbourhood birds and the halting of the steam engine – I was walking in 1903.

By the way the largest diamond in the world was found in Cullinan in 1904.

Our Cullinan trip in Google Maps

A New Year’s Day Road Trip

Founder — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 11:32:29 +0000

It has happened, 2010 has arrived and while many spent New Years Day recovering from the party the night before, a few of us less prone to partying and more to adventure hit the road for a short one day trip to see some small towns in South Africa.

This is just a brief tale of our trip, keep a look out for more detailed articles about the specific towns themselves.

Although we did not party to the break of dawn we set out well after 10am, it is a challenge to get everything together when travelling with a little one, but it is well worthwhile when your friends adore him. Anyway, we hit the R59 bound for Midvaal (yes the area halfway between our Joburg home and the Vaal) bound for Meyerton, a town I used to frequent not so long ago when I spent more time selling on the road.

You can imagine that things were still rather dead with the only places open for lunch that we could see was Steers and KFC.

Meyerton proved to be a tinsel town, literally… silver tin foil strips adorned the towns trees everywhere bringing visions of an early backyard Star Trek planet adventure. A comment made as we drove in noticing that nearly every road we passed at first was named after a general, was that it was ‘generally’ a typical South African town. A golf course sets it higher up on our scale as to the size of the town but it had the land mark PEP clothing store that any reasonably sized town in South Africa seems to have… even if the town centre is one street and only has four shops.

The highlight must have been the large steel structure Christmas tree fitted out and branded by the local lighting shop.

With the brief lunch stop in Meyerton over, the GPS directed us to a Palaeontology site in Vereeniging though sadly all we found was the Barnyard Theatre so we will need to make a return trip in the future.

After topping up on ice cream at the McDonald’s (Vereeniging rates as a city more than a town thanks to that) we headed out to Heidelberg, a small town with wonderful character. We stopped to photograph the Town Hall – where the New Years party had been the night before – and the wonderful old church opposite, both in the centre of the town.

As the rain started to fall we hit the road for our last stop, Nigel… equally as dead on new years day and with little we could find other than a small train that caught our eye, it was time to head home and get the bath, bottle and bed run done.

Even though the trip was short and in terms of activity in town uneventful, one could not help but feel that there is a great deal of uncharted territory even a stones throw out of the big cities we live in and know.

Welcome to SmallTowns.co.za

Admin — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 08:20:47 +0000

This website is about small towns in Southern Africa. We will be visiting small towns around South Africa and will post stories and pictures from our travels.

We would also love to hear about your travels and experiences of small towns.