ASK about a driving holiday in South Africa and most travel agents will suggest the Garden Route, the stretch of coastal road that begins in Cape Town and ends in Port Elizabeth. I did this on my first trip to South Africa and was deeply disappointed. Instead of the “indigenous forests, lagoons and white sandy coves” I was promised, there were advertising billboards, pebble-dashed bungalows and crowded beaches. It was like a slow drive through suburban Surrey.
This time I decided to fly to Johannesburg and drive down to Cape Town across the Karoo plateau, which covers much of the country. It’s a sparse, barren landscape dotted with sheep farms and, farther south, vineyards. But it’s big sky country, where the sun beats down on long, empty roads. The soil is a deep red and unlike the Garden Route, it feels like Africa.
Excellent motorways lead south from Jo’burg taking you in the reverse footsteps of the Voortrekkers, the white Boer farmers who trekked north to escape British-ruled Cape Town in the early 19th century. Driving across the unforgiving plains and mountain ranges, I began to understand why the Afrikaners were the hard nuts of South African history.
The first stretch from Johannesburg to Bloemfontein takes about four hours. Flat and desolate, this is the least interesting part of the journey. Bloemfontein is the birthplace of J. R. R. Tolkien — myth has it he used this landscape as the model for Mordor, the land of shadows in The Lord of the Rings. It’s also the site of the first concentration camps where the British locked up Afrikaner women and children during the Boer War.
There’s little sign of that history now, just a lot of American-style shopping malls, so we opted to stay outside at a B&B on a farm just off the N1 motorway. In a green valley with a tree-lined driveway, Bishop’s Glen was built as a mission station nearly 200 years ago, but has been farmed by the Quinn family for three generations.
Our hosts, Ted and Bits Quinn, are energetic, hospitable 60-year-olds who plied us with gin and tonic on their veranda overlooking a beautiful garden. It might have been a pleasant evening, but we made the mistake of getting into a discussion about race and politics. It was a reminder that it’s only 12 years since the end of apartheid and mindsets will take longer to change.
We set off the next morning for the Karoo and the artists’ colony of Nieu-Bethesda. Four hours’ drive from Bloemfontein, this is a good place to stop for lunch. A tiny village with a population of less than a hundred, Nieu-Bethesda is famous for the Owl House, home of the eccentric artist Helen Martins, who died in 1976.
Nieu-Bethesda is a picture- postcard village with a tiny white stucco church and a shop built in 1893 that doesn’t appear to have changed since. Our next stop was Graaff-Reinet, one of the oldest towns in South Africa. It has the wide streets and covered sidewalks of the American West, the sort of place you expect to see cowboys staggering out of saloons. We stayed at the oldest hotel in town, the Auberge Caledonia, built by a Scotsman in 1854. It has recently been restored by Johann Swiegelaar and Michael Smit into a stylish boutique hotel with white linen curtains and oak floors.
As soon as we arrived Johann insisted that we drive up to the Valley of Desolation in the nearby Karoo National Park to watch the sunset. We sat on the mountain-top looking down at a deep gorge from which strange dolomite pinnacles rise like enormous anthills against the red African sky. At nightfall we returned to eat succulent Karoo lamb marinated in garlic and rosemary in the courtyard restaurant of the hotel. Great wine, great ambience — a terrific evening.
More spectacular views and strange rock formations awaited us next day as we headed towards Prince Albert through the majestic Swartberg mountains and the shady green gorge of the Meiringspoort waterfall. Prince Albert is another picturesque one-horse town with more than its fair share of craft shops and B&Bs. From here you can explore the mountains on foot, horseback or mountain bike.
We stayed in Onse Rus, a simple but very comfortable B&B in a 150-year-old Cape Dutch house. Lisa Smith, the owner, is an energetic bundle of local history and information, makes you feel at home and whips up a fab breakfast. She told us that there is so little crime in the Karoo that she leaves her front door unlocked.
I can happily report that I never felt any insecurity on this trip once we had left Johannesburg. We were told that our greatest danger on this trip was other drivers. We did stick to one piece of advice, which was don’t drive at night because of the danger of drunken pedestrians straying into your path.
On the final day we drove from Prince Albert over the Swartberg pass towards Route 62 and Cape Town. The pass is said to be the most beautiful stretch of road in South Africa, and it doesn’t disappoint, although if you suffer from vertigo as I do it’s best not to look down. As you come over the top you can see the start of the winelands below interspersed with the ostrich farms of Oudtshoorn.
The tourist board is trying to promote Route 62 as the great undiscovered wine trail. For me that is like comparing the Languedoc with Burgundy. It has none of the lush green valleys and grand Cape Dutch homesteads of the traditional Cape winelands around Stellenbosch and Franschhoek. But there is a dusty, rough-and-ready charm to the area that’s appealing and we never saw another tourist.
Lunch was at the Joubert-Tradauw wine estate on the road out of Barrydale. It’s a relatively new vineyard run by a young couple who trained in the Napa Valley. We sat on a vine-covered terrace and tucked into a Mediterranean-style tapas plate with delicious marinated ostrich, tapenade, artichokes and goat cheese, washed down with a glass of the vineyard’s chardonnay.
From there it was just over two hours to the beaches of Cape Town. The journey had taken us three days but I think if I did it again I would allow a week. There were so many places I was tempted to explore on foot or horseback but couldn’t. Maybe next time.
Kirsty Lang presents Front Row on Radio 4.
NEED TO KNOW
Kirsty Lang flew with British Airways (0870 8509850, www.ba.com) to Johannesburg and back from Cape Town. Trailfinders (0845 0547777, www.trailfinders.co.uk) has a seven-night fly-drive package, flying into Johannesburg and out of Cape Town. from £649pp with car hire. She stayed at the Auberge Caledonia (00 27 49 892 3156, www.caledonia.co.za), where double rooms start at about £60, and Onse Rus (23 541 1380, www. onseruse.co.za), where doubles cost from £40. Joubert-Tradauw winery (28 572 1619, www.joubert-tradauw.co.za).
AFRICAN OPTIONS
by Annabelle Thorpe
With Cape Town in the same time zone as London, it is possible to have a South African short break. Original Travel (020-7978 7333, www.originaltravel.co.uk) offers a five-day trip from £1,329pp, including flights, accommodation and some activities.
Kirker Holidays (0870 1123333, www.kirkerholidays.co.uk) has a ten-night tour, Wines and Gardens of the Western Cape, visiting several vineyards and wine estates. The cost is £2,584pp, including breakfast, most meals, all excursion fees and guide.
The Kruger National Park is South Africa’s best-known safari park, but for something wilder, opt for the Sabi Sands Game Reserve, home to the same wildlife as the Kruger — rhino, lion, leopard and meerkats — but with fewer humans. A seven-night trip costs from £2,799pp including flights, full board, transfers and park fees with Okavango Tours (020-8483 3283, www.okavango.com).
The Adventure Company (0870 7941009, www.adventurecompany.co.uk) has a 14-day Kids in the Cape Holiday, including a boat trip to a seal colony and the Addo Elephant Park. From £1,599 for adults, £1,299 for children, including flights, transfers and accommodation.
