We journey forth

When we left the Karoo Nat. Park we headed for Graaff-Reinet, via Murraysburg and Nieu-Bethesda and what a lovely journey that turned out to be.The scenery was just unbelievable. These Karoo "koppies" are so breathtakingly beautiful. I loosely refer to them as "koppies" but they are actually high, as in 1750, 1530 and such like. Obviously if you were to climb them that is not the high that you would do, but this is only something that needs clarification to the "blond" fraternity. The rest understands this automatically!!!
As you get closer to Murraysburg there are some huge Merino farms, of great historical value, with names like Kruidbosch, Kareebosch and Kraaifontein, All are close to the road and it feels as if you are driving right through their front gardens. Kareebosch is the farm where they H.F.Verwoerd launched the first land based oil well for Soekor in the sixties. Thank God it was unsuccesful!! So hopefully will the "Fracking" also be. There is a huge outcry at the moment in the Karoo against that initiative from Shell and the people from the Karoo need all the support they can get. So stuff the politicians and vote for the survival of our heritage.
From Murraysberg we detoured to Nieu-Bethesda. We stopped at the local pub for a G+T, where SupeRugby was on the TV, with 2 locals watching. The one with his own German type beermug and the other clearly local 'outjie" who has no TV at home. No words were spoken other than the odd bit of encouragement for the favoured team. Neither were SA teams,so I suppose it meant the preference of the day. While we were sitting outside a guy arrived that went into the pub and he was greeted by the guys inside as "Boetiegoed". Now you have to be at least 60 to remember anybody being called that. We went to visit the Owl house, which is strange experience at its best. Helen Maartens who was the "owl lady" clearly had some different ideas. Next to the Owl house there is a "fossil experience" which we also did. Now that is  a reminder of how insignificant humans are in the greater scale of things. There was just so much happening in creation before we even joined the world. Quite humbling.The young local guide, sans front teeth and very Afrikaans, was keen to share her knowledge about the fossils. Our tour was shared with a British couple with fancy state of the art Canon cameras, clicking away in continuous shoot mode at the fossils. I was not sure why, as I did'nt think that the fossils would go anywhere in a hurry after 150 million years!!
We arrived in Graaff-Reinet sort of late afternoon at the local caravan/camping site. Seems like it has seen better days, but the bathrooms are clean and the water is HOT. A few different sort of people around though. In 2 of the Rondavels there are some guys from Elsiesriver who are doing the "townships" buying gold for re sell. They go from town to town on the 'Platteland" to do this and then they resell the gold to goldsmiths. Strange life, I'd say.
Yesterday we went to spend the day in the Camdeboo National Park, which include the Valley of Desolation. It is another of those places where you just stop and reflect and again realise that there was a lot more in God's world before he created man. I am sure he sometimes regrets that. We also did the 4x4 trial in the park. Nogals a bit hairy at places, but we took lots of photos and Dick can write about that on his blog. I just hang tight, pray and get out to take photos.
Today we did the tourist thing in the town. What a historical place it is. It is the 4th oldest town in SA, after Cape Town, Stellenbosch and Swellendam. Hugely influenced by the Murray's, of religious background. Andrew Murray came here in the 18 hundreds, married a 16 year old girl and had 16 children. 11 made it to adulthood. 5 boys became religious ministers and 4 of the girls married religious ministers. Holy family!!!
We visited 3 museums, which is quite a lot for me, however it was so interesting. At Reinet house, which was the home of the Murrays for more than 80 years we were welcomed by Oscar(surname forgotten) who is clearly a character. He knows a great deal about local history and is also an author who writes a variety of books and enthusiastically told us about his  writings. We walked and photographed and had lunch and visited several old churches and ended up at the old "moederkerk" in the middle of town. It must be one of the most impressive churches on the SA platteland. It is huge. It can seat 1500 people and is in pristine condition. Clearly the community cares about it and looks after it. On the way out there was a guy, I was about to say elderly, but then remembered where we are in life, who was obviously involved with the church. I stopped to ask him if the church was still well supported, etc. He immediately informed us that he was not from Graaff- Reinet but from Aberdeen, a nearby town with a church with a very high steeple and that he was here to fix the church clock, which is perpetually in 3pm.
That one question from my side lead to a whole different load of information. Not only did the church in Aberdeen have this high steeple, it was also in need of painting and restoration and when the new "dominee" arrived 4 years ago, this guy was called to assist. The quote for the scaffolding was over R 80000 and he was tasked to come up with an affordable solution. Well, he did. He designed and built a contraption with 8 "legs" with pulleys and baskets and hydrolic lifts and they called it a Terrantula. They can now paint the steeple any time and when not in use retract the legs and hide it away. This guy is also a Springbok Bisley shottist, now shooting in the "Veteran Protea" team. He has been to 4 world championships. This guy, mr Van Rensburg, must be well into his sixties, is as lean as a machine, wears no glasses and is an "old Protea shottist". I mean, how good is that. The world is full of wonderful people, if only you were to stop and listen .
Tonight we and the "gold collectors" and one other lone traveller from Cape Town share the campsite and tomorrow we head off to Cradock and the Mountain Zebra Park.