Discover the village of Riebeek East
Go on a Frog Safari in St Francis Bay
Stretch your legs (and loose your clothes) on the Tsitsikamma’s Striptease Trail
Marvel at the Dutch Reformed Church in Cradock
Learn more about PE / GQ’s Donkin Lighthouse and Pyramid

January 2023

Learn more about the Coelacanth, the living fossil fish
Hike Port Elizabeth’s Sacramento Trail
A UFO landing site at Rosmead in the Karoo Heartland?
Spot the Queen Victoria Profile near Patensie
Be surprised at the Great Fish Point Lighthouse on Route 72

December 2022

Discover fossils at the Kitching Fossil Center in Nieu-Bethesda
Experience the marine wonders of Algoa Bay
Hiking the Assegaai Trails near Grahamstown
A sneaky drive through the Bloukrans Pass in the Tsitsikamma
Watch the Adventure Racing World Champs 2023 promo for the Kouga region

November 2022

Somerset East, Expect the Unexpected
Discover the South African Museum of Literature in Grahamstown
Remember the Blaauwkrantz Bridge disaster of 1911
Visit the Jeffreys Bay Surf Museum
Encounter Waterfall Bluff, the waterfall that drops directly into the sea

October 2022

Learn more about Colchester’s historic Mackay Bridge
Discover the chess board edging in the Mountain Zebra National Park
View rock art in the mountains around Rhodes
Marvel at the Magwa Waterfall on the Wild Coast
Explore the Van Stadens Wildflower Reserve outside Port Elizabeth

September 2022

Stop at the Slagtersnek Monument near Cookhouse
Walking up Lady Slipper Mountain outside Port Elizabeth
Discover the Phillip’s Tunnel in Hankey
The historic background of the Tsitsikamma section of the Garden Route National Park
Learn about the history of Port Alfred’s Kowie River

August 2022

Walk the Jeffreys Bay Spekboom Labyrinth
Visit St Patrick on the Hill in Hogsback
Discover Harry Potter’s grave in Cradock
Cruise the Sundays River with Addo Cruises and Sand Sledding
Muir, the oldest English speaking boys’ school in SA turns 200

July 2022

Go ghost hunting in the museums of Somerset East
Enjoy the outdoors at Norm Hudlin outside Port Elizabeth
Explore Kenton-on-Sea’s beaches and rock formations
Surf Supertubes in Jeffreys Bay
Stay at Arch Cabins Self Catering in Storms River Village

June 2022

Encounter the spirit of the wolf at the Tsitsikamma Wolf Sanctuary
Learn more about the Kouga Dam near Patensie
Discover Somerset East’s Walter Battiss Art Museum
Did you know that Nelson Mandela Bay is called 5 Biome City?
Meet Huberta the Hippo

May 2022

The history of Bathurst’s Pig and Whistle Hotel
Discover Somerset East’s Glen Avon Waterfall
Learn more about Beervlei Dam near Willowmore
Animals of the Eastern Cape – The Flightless Dung Beetle
Crossing the Storms River Mouth suspension bridge

April 2022

The history of Hankey in the Gamtoos Valley
Visit the museums of Graaff Reinet
Learn more about Darlington Dam
Animals of the Eastern Cape – The Cape Ground Squirrel
Discover Takazi Waterfall on the Wild Coast
Video – Tour the Tsitsikamma forest on a Segway

March 2022

Slide down the Rabbit Hole near Middelburg with food out of this world
Marvel at Hogsback’s Madonna and Child Waterfall
Visit Port St Francis, home to the chokka industry
Learn about the Cape Morgan Lighthouse
Crossing the Buffalo River in East London
Video – Tsitsikamma, a world of diversity

February 2022

Meet Samara Private Game Reserve tracker Klippers Pietersen
The Dutch Reformed Church in Kareedouw
Jump into the river pool at Jan se Gat outside Jbay
Download the Amazing Addo wildlife checklist
Find the cathedral mice in Grahamstown
Video – Algoa Bay Whale Heritage Site

January 2022

Discover Eersterivier, the Tsitsikamma’s beach
Explore the dune fields along the Alexandria Hiking Trail
Climb up to Hankey’s Bergvenster
Learn more about the village of Rhodes
Did you know Hofmeyr had a pink church?
10 Things to do in Coffee Bay
All the must see places on the Karoo Heartland Bucketlist
Video – Hike along to the Lower Van Stadens Dam

November 2021

Explore the Shell Museum in Jeffrey’s Bay
Marvel at the Tsitsikamma’s Big Tree
Learn more about the town of Alexandria on Route 72
Meet the Stone Folk of Nieu-Bethesda
Have you heard of the Martello Tower in Fort Beaufort?
SANParks announce the dates for this years SANParks Week
Discover the #AmazingAddo region with a Bucketlist
Video – Enjoy Nelson Mandela Bay’s brand new destination marketing video

October 2021

Discover the secret cove at Shelly Beach in Kenton
Walk the Waterfall Trail in the Tsitsikamma
Taste honey at Pabala in the Gamtoos Valley
A breakdown of all the Eastern Cape’s municipalities
Your own Addo Elephant National Park game viewing area road map
Learn more about the Wild Coast legend of Nongqawuse
Explore Makhanda and the Frontier Country with a Bucketlist
Video – The sights and sounds of the Karoo Heartland, the Eastern Cape’s big sky country.

September 2021

The oldest cake in South Africa is found in Graaff-Reinet
More information about Storms River Bridge
St Francis Bay’s Seal Point Lighthouse
The Diaz Cross at Kwaaihoek on Route 72
Learn more about the history of Hogsback
A Wild Coast Bucket List to plan a visit to this stunning area
Video – Explore the Addo region with an #AmazingAddo destination video

August 2021

Hiking and cycling trails in the Tsitsikamma’s Plaatbos forest
Visit the Wild Coast to cross the Kei River by pont
Swing by Egg Rock outside Cradock
Enjoy the view from Sir Percy Fitzpatrick Lookout near Addo
Discover the Old Thomas River Historical Village between Stutterheim and Cathcart.
Tick off activities from the Route 72 Bucket List
Video – Kouga Baviaans region

July 2021

The legend of Hole in the Wall on the Wild Coast
Bo fly fishing in the Karoo outside Somerset East
Hiking in the Kabeljous Nature Reserve outside Jbay
A little history on the Addo Elephant National Park that turned 90 this month
Info on the labyrinth in Hogsback
A travel Bucket List of the Tsitsikamma
Video – Route 72 on the Sunshine Coast

June 2021

The history of Storms River Village
Information on the Baviaanskloof
The historic Dutch Reformed Church in Nieu-Bethesda
Learn more about the Sundays River
A guide to hiking and the waterfalls in Hogsback
An infograph on the Waters Meeting Nature Reserve outside Port Alfred
Video – Wild Coast

May 2021

The history of the Van Stadens bridges
How water gets from Gariep Dam via the Karoo Heartland to Port Elizabeth
Comprehensive visitor’s guide to Bathurst
Meet the Big 7 with Addo Tourism
Video – Discover the Tsitsikamma

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Autumn has truly settled in, the weather is cooling down and we’re getting more and more of those beautiful mid year sunsets.

Welcome to the May 2024 issue of Firefly the Travel Guy’s Encounter the Eastern Cape Travel Mailer. I hope you learn at least one new thing about the province this month.

This month we look at the following:

Visit the Mount Ingwe Anglo Boer War Museum outside Port Elizabeth
View Grahamstown through the Observatory Museum’s camera obscura
Have you visited the Moravian Mission Village of Clarkson in the Tsitsikamma?
Enjoy the view of Cradock from Oukop
Discover Rhodes Village in in the remote southern Drakensberg

If there is something that you would like to see featured in our monthly travel mailer or have any suggestions, please drop us an email at jonker@fireflyafrica.co.za

SUBSCRIBE to this Monthly Travel Mailer

The Mount Ingwe Anglo Boer War Museum outside Port Elizabeth

Aerial photo of Salem Cricket Ground by Ron Mackenzie

The Mount Ingwe Anglo Boer War Museum is located about 50km up the Elands River Valley gravel road from Rocklands outside Port Elizabeth. The museum’s collection is the result of 25 years of exploring Anglo-Boer War sites with metal detectors. Owner Lukas van der Merwe and his friends make annual trips to Anglo-Boer War concentration camp sites as well as wartime dumps and farms and the collection includes everything from bullet shells, coins and buttons to badges, horseshoes, pocket knives and many other objects. The museum also has a collection of items found on the site of the Battle of Blaauwberg (8 January 1806) as well as items found on the Driftsands dunes between Summerstrand and Schoenmakerskop in Port Elizabeth.

Lukas can be contacted on 082 072 7747 to make an appointment to visit the museum.

Firefly the Travel Guy’s visit to Mount Ingwe

Observatory Museum –

Makhanda / Grahamstown

Sand sledding with Addo Cruises and Sand Sledding in Colchester / Sundays River Mouth

The Observatory in Grahamstown is a unique multi-storeyed 19th-century Victorian shop and home which is now a museum. This house had a place in the identification of the first diamond found in South Africa, and a display on the ground floor tells this story. Its connection with the identification of the Eureka in 1867 prompted De Beers Consolidated Mines Ltd. to purchase and restore the Observatory in 1980-82 to commemorate the beginning of the diamond industry in South Africa.
A feature of the Observatory is a special exhibition focusing on Dr William G. Atherstone and the five other main participants who played a role in identifying the diamond. Dr Atherstone became the first surgeon outside Europe and America to perform an amputation using an anaesthetic in 1847.

The museum contains a Camera Obscura (1882), the only historic one built in the Southern Hemisphere. The Observatory was designed by watchmaker and jeweller, Henry Carter Galpin, who lived in Grahamstown from 1850 until his death in 1886. The word ‘Camera Obscura’ refers to a small round building with a rotating angled mirror at the apex of the roof projecting an image of the landscape onto a horizontal surface inside. The impressive Camera Obscura, known as ‘the eye in the sky’, can navigate the entire town, providing a bird’s eye view from North to South and East to West. The camera can show, in live-time, the mirror image transfer of the town.”

A Moravian Mission Village in the Tsitsikamma

The village of Clarkson in the Tsitsikamma is a former mission station of the Moravian Mission Society. It was founded in 1839 by Bishop H.P. Hallbeck with five coloured families from Enon and a Fingo chief with his entourage of farmers. William Wilberforce received 200 pounds from his friend Thomas Clarkson to set up the new mission station that was named after Clarkson. Clarkson spent his adult life working to abolish the Transatlantic Slave Trade and slavery itself. Rev Halter of Enon laid out the station with Church Street as the only street with the Coloured people on one side and the Fingos on the other side of the street. In December 1840 the first church building was consecrated.

Rev Küster was in charge from 1839 to 1859. The missionaries initially also worked as teachers at the station and often offered their services to the surrounding farmers as well. This meant that the farmers’ children were baptised by them and given medical help. Good wheat harvests, indigenous wood and the use of the water mill by the white farmers of the surrounding area generated enough money so that a school could be built in 1864. During both world wars, the German leaders of the mission station were interned. After the Second World War, problems with poor church attendance, livestock theft, alcohol abuse and liquor smuggling started to increase. In 1970 the Moravians withdrew from the control of the village and in 1996 the ownership was transferred to the community. The Fingos who had to move to the Ciskei in 1976 due to Group Areas Act, returned to Clarkson and the surrounding farms in 1994.

Oukop Hill lookout in Cradock

For the best panoramic view of the town of Cradock, you have to take a drive or walk up Oukop.

The view from the top over the Great Fish River and Cradock is superb. About 20 meters from the road around the summit of the hill you can see various etchings in the ironstone, carved by British soldiers during the Anglo-Boer War. This hill was used as a lookout post during the Anglo-Boer war and some of the troops killed time by carving these etchings. The best known of the soldiers’ etchings can be found on the western face of a 3m high plinth of ironstone. The words read “What avail a man if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul”.

A leisurely trip there, a stroll around the hill enjoying the panoramic views and stopping to view the etchings will take about an hour and a half. The beacon on the summit is only about 3 km from the Town Hall. The land belongs to the municipality, is open to the public 24 hours a day every day of the year and entry is free of any charge or permit.

Directions to find the etchings

Rhodes Village

Rhodes Village can be found in the remote southern Drakensberg of the Eastern Cape

alongside the trout-rich Bell River, near Ben Macdhui (at 3,001 m the highest mountain in the Cape region). Named after Cecil John Rhodes, the town was founded in 1891 when the farm Tintern, owned by J A Vorster, was advertised for sale in 274 erven or lots. In September 1894, the erf-holders and residents met to petition the government to proclaim Rhodes as a village under the Village Management Act of 1881. Rhodes was proclaimed a township with municipal rights in 1897.

One of the first leading lights of the early days of Rhodes was a Scottish cleric who became a dominee (minister) in the Dutch Reformed Church (NGK), Richard Ross.

Fluent in both English and Afrikaans, Ross would alternate between the two languages each Sunday while conducting services. During the South African War (also known as the Second Anglo-Boer War), Ross was interned by the British at their concentration camp in Aliwal North. After the war, he vowed to preach only in Afrikaans. The NGK congregation of Rossville was established in 1892 and named for the Rev Ross.

Rhodes Conservation Area was proclaimed through gazetted By-Laws in 1997 under the auspices of the National Monuments Act.

Rhodes Village is a tranquil place of karoohuisies and Victoria-era cottages amidst tall trees (all introduced, as the village is above the tree line). The gentle cooing of turtledoves and the bleating of sheep hardly disturb the quiet dirt streets with their grassy verges, bounded by water furrows lined with dressed stones or river rocks.

Across the pastures, the northern boundary is marked by the Bell River, where the wild trout are. To the south lies the commonage, a peaceful tract of montane grassland with many endemic alpine and sub-alpine plants and flowers. Here you will find the vulture restaurant, frequented by the threatened Cape griffon (Gyps coprotheres) and the bearded vulture (Gypaetus barbatus).

Rhodes has lots to do for nature lovers seeking the thrill of adventure with everything from wild trout fly fishing to alpine skiing, birding, quad biking, flower viewing, horse riding, greywing hunting, hiking, mountain biking and many other “mountain magic” activities and challenges.

The tranquil village ambience makes for an ideal getaway for city dwellers seeking a break from the stresses of big city life.

Rhodes Info