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Meandering
through the Karoo
Renier van Aswegen
It is warm,
sunny day in the dry Camdeboo
region of the Great Karoo We spent the night in the tiny hamlet of
Nieu-Bethesda,
about halfway between Middelburg and Graaff-Reinet.
This morning I went for a walk through the village before breakfast. There
was not much to see but it was wonderful to hear only silence and birdsong.
I admired the beautiful white plastered Dutch Reformed
Church with its tall tower and then watched as the locals went
about their business.
A few people were talking loudly to each other while a guy on a tractor
slowly purred down the main road (which is wide enough for turning around
an ox wagon but with no traffic) and two guys chased donkeys down a side
street. In one open yard in the middle of the village a cow was protesting
loudly almost as if she knew she was about to be slaughtered. In spite
of the dry surroundings, the early morning water
supply was being run down a narrow cement furrow running down the
length of the main road, from which the few dozen residents channel it
into smaller furrows in their gardens using small metal gates that are
lifted or put back into place depending on which streets have water rights
that day.
We Visited the Owl
House, which is a fantastic place full of weird statues and
figures made out of wire and cement and adorned with multi-coloured broken
bits of glass. The majority of the figures have biblical and/or Middle
Eastern connotations and there are numerous owls and camels.
The place was created by its former owner, Helen
Martin, who was in her fifties when she decided to brighten up
her life and house during the 1950s. She was living alone in this small,
remote village after having cared for her ailing and aged parents, who
both died during the 1940s. The Owl House stands as a striking
memorial to a very sad story: Helen Martin eventually killed herself
by drinking caustic soda when she started to lose her eyesight when she
was in her late 70s.
Tonight we are aiming to sleep in Prince Albert,
another small Karoo town about 440km west
of Nieu-Bethesda. Tomorrow we will do the last stretch to Cape Town.
