campanile

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Encountering the Campanile bells

On Tuesday morning I noticed a post on Facebook where the Mandela Bay Development Agency (MBDA) announced that the Campanile bells would be coming down that morning, if the weather allowed, as part of the restoration of the Campanile building.  I was stuck in a workshop and very disappointed that I was going to miss it.  On Thursday morning one of my friends at Nelson Mandela Bay Tourism called me having just heard that the most of the bells were…

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01/05/2016
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Looking down on the Campanile

The Campanile stand 52 meters tall and to get to the top you have to climb up 204 steps which will take you to the half circle windows above the clocks.  Looking at that you would think it there wouldn't be much opportunity to look down (and not in a bad way) on the Campanile.  That is unless you are standing on top of the lighthouse on the Donkin Reserve.   The Campanile is currently closed for renovation.

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06/11/2014
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Campanile clockwork

The Campanile's carillon of 23 bells is the biggest collection of bells in one tower in South Africa.  As one climbs the 203 steps to get to the top you pass the room where the clock's mechanism is in and you can see the clockwork that allows the clocks to play its tune.

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20/09/2014
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The M4 Settlers Freeway

Some know it as the Settlers Freeway and some just call it by its number, the M4 freeway.  But whatever whoever calls it, this is what the freeway cutting between the city and Algoa Bay looks like from the top of the Campanile.

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14/09/2014
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Donkin from the Campanile

Climbing the 204 steps to the top of the Campanile one would think that you would be in one of the highest spots in the city centre (this is no chirp at the fact that PE doesn't have a lot of high rise buildings), but once you are up there you realise that the Donkin Lighthouse up on the Donkin Reserve is actually higher.  Its a lighthouse who's light was supposed to be seen out to see after all.

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08/09/2014
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Export cars on PE Harbour

Nelson Mandela Bay is a motoring mecca with General Motors situated in Port Elizabeth and VW in Uitenhage as well as numerous other motor related factories manufacturing everything from engines and catalytic converters to bolts and rubber tubing.  Both GM and VW export their cars through the Port Elizabeth Harbour and from the top of the Campanile you can see the cars lined up quayside waiting to be shipped abroad.  

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02/09/2014
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Commemorating the Settlers

I often wonder how many Port Elizabethans have climbed the Campanile as adults (not counting going up there as kids on a school outing).  I for one can put my hand up as I do it at least once or twice a year.  Last week I went up with the St Dominic Priory grade 6 classes.  The Campanile was completed in 1922 to commemorate 100 years since the landing of the British Settlers in 1820.  It was built on the landing…

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28/08/2014
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The fishbone on Market Square

You often see chicken bones lying around in public.  More than likely left overs from a KFC meal dropped while eating on the go.  But what if you suddenly encounter a fish bone?  One bigger than yourself?  Well, then you either stumbled on what is left of a whale that washed up somewhere or you are standing on Market Square in Port Elizabeth.  The Fishbone art piece by Imbono FJA Architects is an architectural element intended to visually anchor the…

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14/03/2014
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History of creativity frieze

Although most people who go to see the art pieces on Route 67 just go up to the Donkin Reserve, the route actually starts down at the Campanile.  One of the first art pieces one can see when down there is the Campanile Frieze by Mkhonto Gwazela.  The frieze celebrates the indigenous heritage of Nelson Mandela Bay and the Eastern Cape through visual images cast into a curved concrete beam.

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18/11/2013