Karoo Captivates The Bishop
When Robert Grey, Bishop of Cape Town, set off for the northernmost reaches of the Colony, he was captivated by the Karoo. “There was no time for reading in the wagon,” writes Thelma Gutsche in The Bishop’s Lady. “The arid desert-like Karoo with its abrupt rocky kopjes, occasional mirages and stunted bushes sparsely mixed with…
Read MoreTravelling through the Karoo: The diamond rush of 1871
The description by Boyes, travelling through the Karoo to the diamond fields in 1871: The “coach”, a huge wagon, was drawn by eight horses, had three wooden benches under an awning. It could seat nine passengers and two more could “perched” at the back with the guard. There was little room for luggage, so…
Read MoreTravelling through heat, cold and dust
The Karoo was in the grips of a terrible drought in the November, 1903, when T Silver attempted to drive through the area. This decision cost him dearly. He tells of his experiences in The Veld and African Pictorial, of November, 1903. “The sun-baked Karoo lay before me, an illimitable panorama of rocky boulders, stunted…
Read MoreNot Such A Stupid Ox After All
In Trekking The Great Thirst, Lieutenant Arnold W Hudson tells of some of the difficulties facing travellers into unexplored territory in the late 1800s. He was making his way into the Kalahari and stated that in this extremely dry part of Africa bullocks were invaluable. “Indeed one can do nothing without them and in the…
Read MoreTough Trip To The Karoo
After several locust plagues and a severe drought, Maj-Gen Dundas, in 1801, sent a commission into the Karoo to investigate the situation. Among them was William Somerville who recorded the trip in his journals, which have recently been published by the Van Riebeeck Society. A train of six large bullock wagons was readied for the…
Read MoreWilliam Shaw and the ox-wagon
Many early writers describe ox wagon travel as tranquil, but Wesleyan missionary, William Shaw, did not find it so. He found it noisy, but amusing. Extracts from his letters and journals in Never a Young Man, compiled by Celia Sadler, state: “The African wagons, covered with white sail-cloth tilts, were each drawn by 12 or 14…
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