MISSION VILLAGES OF THE WESTERN CAPE
WUPPERTHAL
If you have a yearning to really escape from the hurly-burly of the 21st century and disappear into the fascinating wilderness which makes up a great deal of the Western Cape, then there can be few places better, with more scenic situations, than Wupperthal, hidden as it is deep in the Cedarberg mountains behind Clanwilliam. Before you set out on this wonderful journey, you should be warned that the round trip can not comfortably be travelled from Cape Town in less than two days if you are to see everything there is to see. The route described here should only be undertaken in a 4-wheel drive vehicle as the latter part is not suitable for ordinary cars.
To start with, leave Cape Town on the N7 and travel to Clanwilliam (2hrs 15mins, +-225 kms); turn off the national road into Clanwilliam and stock up for the trip ahead; please remember, there will be no more petrol or diesel for about 250 kms and the going is fairly rough, so your fuel consumption will be more than usual.
Leave Clanwilliam on the R364 towards Calvinia and you will soon find yourself heading steadily upwards over the Pakhuis Pass, leaving the fertile Oliphants' River Valley behind you. The road, although now tarred in places where the gradient is particularly steep, is rough and the terrain becomes more and more wild as you head into the mountains. About 8,5 kms out of Clanwilliam you will pass along a relatively flat stretch of very sandy road between high pinnacles of typical Cedarberg rocks and lined with dense bush. On your left hand side there is a small car park where you can pull off and take in Louis Leipoldt's grave in one of the caves. Although the grave and the rock-paintings are interesting, it is the silence which deafens you and the loneliness which abounds. Take a few minutes to absorb the silence, look out for the eagles as they hover high in the blue looking for prey, and if you look carefully you will see the occasional dassie watching you from his vantage point in the rocks.
Back on the road again you soon begin to twist and turn upwards until at 1087 metres you cross the summit of the pass and begin a steep, winding drop into the valley below. Pass the turn to Bushman's Kloof on your right and head onwards across the valley floor until you see a lonely clump of trees on the right hand side, about 19 kms from the grave. Although there is no marked spot for stopping, it is well worth pulling to the side of the road and walking into the shade of the trees where you will see, surrounded by an old and weathered fence, Englishman's Grave. There can be no lonelier spot to imagine the body of Lieutenant Graham Clowes being laid to rest after he lost his life in a skirmish with Boers in one of the Anglo-Boer wars. Far from his native land and buried in the middle of this empty valley, only the ever-soughing wind in the gums keeps him company.
Almost immediately there is a right turn onto a very minor road which leads to the Biedouw Valley and Wupperthal. For some distance the road is relatively straight and the surface reasonable until you begin the long descent into the Valley and the Heuning River, which you cross approximately 11 kms after Englishman's Grave. In August and September, the flowers in this part of the world are legendary, with whole hillsides covered in orange, purple, and white; unfortunately for the driver (who can do nothing else but keep his eyes on the road) the scenery is breath-taking. There is a turning to the left which follows the Heuning River through the valley until the road comes to an abrupt end at the Doring River. Although it used to be possible to follow this road to link up with the long road from Ceres to Calvinia, the ford was washed away some years ago and, to my knowledge, has never been repaired.
From the river the road begins to ascend quite steeply again as you leave the valley behind (in our family the Biedouw Valley has become known as the Valley of the Bidets silly!). For some distance the road climbs until it runs along the top of Taaibosberg before, almost obscured beneath a pile of unsightly rubbish, is a large green sign warning you that you are about to enter Wupperthal. On your right is a pretty old farmhouse and, looking at it, you could well believe you have been transported back nearly two hundred years. From here the Koueberg Pass begins and the road drops in a dizzying fashion down the side of the mountain to the most remote of all the Mission Villages as it straggles along the banks of the Tra-tra River.
In 1829 the area was first mooted as a mission station by two German Rhenish missionaries, Baron Theobald Von Wurmb and Johann Gottlieb Leipoldt, who had first been to Genadendal to gain information on their plan. Missionary work began at Wupperthal in 1830, although the original farm (Riedmond) was bought from Coloured owners in 1832 for 20 000 Guilders. At first only seven families were involved in the mission, most of whom came from the farms Heuningvlei, Beukeskraal, and Biedouw. Baron Von Wurmb's involvement in Wupperthal was evidently minor as he died in 1834, aged only 33, but his co-missionary, Leipoldt, who was by trade a shoemaker (and Louis Leipoldt's grandfather), and who established the now famous shoe factory at Wupperthal, apparently went from strength to strength as the mission acquired fifteen farms in the area by 1885. As the abolition of slavery in 1838 allowed more and more people to travel, the inhabitants of the area grew and the mission itself became more and more financially strong (each inhabitant of the area had to pay an annual tithe of 3 Rijksdollars), so that by 1959 the Rhenish Mission Society owned an enormous amount of land in the area; agriculture and cattle farming had proved to be most profitable, as had the fact that, in terms of Apartheid legislation, no farm could be owned or operated by non-whites, or by a company consisting of non-whites.
In 1966, when Wupperthal was finally transferred to the Moravian church, it was the last (and probably the largest) of the Rhenish Mission stations although it had effectively been run by the Moravian church since the 1930s.
So, in the heart of the barren and wild Cedarberg mountains, far from any other form of civilisation, there has been a thriving little industry for at least 150 years. The village today consists of three terraces of neat thatched cottages above a narrow and fertile valley full of gardens of fruit and vegetables; palm trees wave in the light breeze and children play in the dusty streets. When you enter the village you will find, on your right, the large church and the school, and on your left the residential area. In between lies the village store, the post office, and a small tea-room. It is charming and can quite realistically lay claim to being a place where time has stood still except, of course, for the satellite dishes which have sprouted on most of the roofs allowing the electronic sound of televisions to mar the tranquillity, and the many bakkies and cars which now seem to crowd the streets. When I first saw Wupperthal in the late 1970s, donkeys were the main form of transport and wagons still moved around the area. I personally cannot help but feel that thirty years ago, life in this idyllically almost hermetically sealed environment was better and more wholesome; today, if you look around carefully, you will notice that many of the younger people have moved away, lured by the promise of riches and excitement in the cities.
Looking from the centre of the village across the causeway over the Tra-tra River, you will see to the south the almost vertical track which leads out of Wupperthal in the direction of Eselbank. If you have a 4x4 vehicle, this is your exit; if not, retrace your steps once you have wandered around the village, and head back towards Clanwilliam up the Koueberg Pass. Please remember, although the town is only about 70 kms away it will take you all of two hours to drive there.
For the lucky ones, here is the rest of the route: follow the track out of the village, over the river, and up the almost vertical hillside. From the top of this climb there is a wonderful view back over the village and the valley, an oasis of greenery and quietly flowing water, hemmed in as it is by the brown hills and ridges of the edge of the Cedarberg. The track makes its circuitous way over riverbeds and rocks to the small settlement of Eselbank about fifteen kilometres to the south. After Eselbank the track winds slowly through the mountains for about 30 kms until it joins one of my favourite roads at Matjiesrivier. To your right is Kromrivier Farm and the road up over the Cedarberg Pass to Algeria; turn left here and drop down to Uitsig where the road crosses the Krom River, then wind upwards again over the top of the Groot River Heights and down Varkkloof between brown, conical mountains to the Groot River where there is an excellent and picturesque settlement known as Mount Cedar. There is overnight accommodation right next to the river, which runs all year round, and an excellent restaurant.
Here the Cedarberg offers great sweeping vistas of flat-topped mountains striated with lines of rock, and you can see the road stretching like a white ribbon high into the distance both to the north and south. Climb up the steep Blinkberg Pass and continue through the mountains for about 35 kms until you reach the road to your left which leads to Kaggakamma over the Katbakkies Pass. Continue straight with the gravel road, which shortly becomes tar, and you will see on either side the lush citrus farms of the Koue Bokkeveld until the road reaches a T-junction at Op die Berg. Here, at last, is a petrol station!
After this small settlement the tar road leads, almost straight as a dye, until it suddenly falls over the edge of the Gydo Pass and down into the Warm Bokkeveld and Ceres. From here onwards it is an easy and scenic drive to Cape Town. Civilisation is once again all around you, but behind lies a kind of magic that you will either love or hate, its barenness and silence will have kept you company for many hours and you will have seen sights which few of us are able to enjoy, but you will know that there are still places on this earth where there is something else to think about than tonight's TV schedule or the rough-and-tumble life which most of us are forced to lead at the mercy of the ever-present cell-phone. You will be pleased to know that things like cell-phones are of little use at all in the places where you have been there is no reception!