Traversing South Africa by road - Part 4*

*Nieu Bethesda

Above: the Owl House with its sinister overtones might completely overshadow the unique character of Nieu Bethesda were there not so much else going on in this remote Karoo town ... more of the OH later ...

Serendipity slid into the centre of things soon after we slipped into this supposedly sleepy outpost that briefly became the centre of our universe.

It had been a long day​ when we finally slid to a halt outside our chosen accommodation for the next 4 nights. It was my 4th visit to the delightful place and I'd decided on the previous visit that, should I be lucky enough to return, that return would be to the place I'd recently stayed with my daughter, Kate. I was hopefully confident that it would delight Sián and Roger and Shelley-ann (Shan) as much as it had Kate and me. It did, and after the requisite pleasantries with our host, Carla, we repaired to Boeties Pub for quick refreshments before a meal and an early night. It's what one does in Nieu Bethesda (NB). Everyone speaks to everyone else. Except there was this other couple who initially looked as if they would be good material for a chat but they didn't stay long and it didn't seem as if they'd welcome our intervention. We quickly got into the rhythm passing a short time of evening with a few locals.

​Turns out my couple were also staying at The Bethesda as we were to discover the next morning.

Above: (Clockwise from top left) Boetie's Pub's entrance is discreet - you have to know where to find it; happily inside and chatting up the locals; Sián's and Roger's suite; Sián on the veranda outside her suite.

​A gentle prelude to serendipity

After a splendid breakfast in The Bethesda we set off on the Starrs' inaugural walk around the village and soon crossed paths with the delightful couple who own Oude Pastorie, whom Shan and I had missed by a whisker on our previous visit in 2021 when we stayed in Oude Waenhuis at the other end of their garden. I'll leave it to Shan to describe the encounter ....

"[We] wandered around the village familiarising the Starrs ... . Bumped into Fulvio and Albert and chatted to them about their dogs. When asked where they were staying, Fulvio pointed to the Oude Pastorie. I exclaimed and told them we’d stayed in their Waenhuis and how much we loved it and their gorgeous garden and tortoises. I then asked if we could show the Starrs (the tortoises) and Fulvio gave us a full tour of their beautifully curated house. So much to look at. He loves history and had accumulated, amongst so many things, very pricey original Vanity Fair drawings of famous people. So many original things! Accumulated over 10 years. So knowledgeable and interesting." 

Turned out that during our 4-days stay we kept bumping into this delightful couple wherever we went but, for now I need to focus on serendipity to the power of 4.

Above: Elements of collections and the garden at Oude Pastorie.

We were planning to introduce the Starrs to lunch at the "The Brewery and Two Goats Deli" a must-visit place for beer and a casual lunch in NB. But first we repaired to the verandah at The Bethesda.

Serendipity starts to unfold

The feminine member of the couple we'd missed chatting to in Boetie's Bar the previous evening was sitting on the other side of the veranda from Sián, drinking tea. I engaged her in conversation and my KZN-radar jangled and buzzed.  By this stage Shan radar had also kicked in and she joined me in turning into inquisitor mode. In true South African fashion we slipped into "where are you from/where are you headed" mode. She said her name was Heather Fitchet and that she lived in Himeville (which is in KZN). This prompted Shan to ask if she knew an old school friend of hers who lived in the same area.

It turned out that Heather knew Shan's friend, Michelle (Pitman). It also turned out that she, Heather and her husband rented restaurant premises from Michelle. Before moving to Himeville, Heather had spent much of her life as a photographer and writer in Durban.

At some stage in this dialogue Shan and I introduced ourselves and  mentioned that I had had a similar career in my early working life.

Suddenly Heather's expression changed and she jumped up exclaiming, "Are you Banjo?", seemingly with a tear in her eye.

I couldn't deny it despite the fact that I knew that Roger was by this time eavesdropping. I equally knew he would call me Banjo from that moment on[1].  Not that I really minded and anyway I was caught up in this revelation with our new-found friend which led to fevered conversation and, in my case certainly, to a moistening of the eyeballs.

​Turns out she is Heather Fitchet, best friend forever of Camilla Kinnear whose husband, Tony, a.k.a. Spikey Norman, had died from cancer a few months earlier. Spikey and I had been close friends indeed. I'd been to South Africa twice, in the previous October and November as a result.

​At this point Heather insisted on rousing her husband, Martin, from their room in The Bethesda and a whole new dimension was added ... but more of this after our foursome has walked to and from the Two Goats Deli. Just as if to reinforce this new relationship, Martin and Heather passed us in their car as we were nearing the deli and waved furiously. They were headed on some expedition or the other for the afternoon.

Above: (clockwise from top left) the river through NB can be feast or famine, flood or trickle ... the bridge that Sian and Roger are crossing caters for the worst scenario; Roj was smitten by the pair of Harleys at the entrance to the Two Goats and, to be honest, I thought the first one catered pretty adequately for two; waiting for the beer; Cheers, home brew to hand; Alokudu.

A trip to Nieu Bethesda would be incomplete without visiting The Brewery and Two Goats Deli and each time I've been there, with Richard Levitt, Shan, Kate and now Sián and Roger has been worth the picturesque two-and-a-half kilometre round-trip walk to get there via the suspension bridge over the mini-gorge with its usually dry river bed. And be careful how many delicious cheese platters you order because they are huge and tasty and you'll probably be eating somewhere else scrumptious in the evening.

Back to the Fitchets

We'd ascertained from the Fitchets that, also by pure happenstance, we would be dining at the same tiny restaurant that evening. This was turning out to be an extremely busy day!

Where to restart. Our initial meeting with Martin had been pretty emotional as it turned out after I twigged that his full name was Martin Fitchet and that we had been in contact when I'd been researching a series of articles on his Mum, Shan's and my wine mentor, Solange Raffray[2]. Solange had been the doyenne of wine in Durban but had achieved a formidable reputation pretty much throughout South Africa in the 1980s and beyond. 
​
Now Heather and Martin would also be at Bini's and we were relishing the prospect of exploring shared memories further. Including the fact that the Fitchets ran a restaurant in Himeville, by all accounts (latterly gleaned from mutual buddies) superb. As was Bini's[3] despite the fact that one of us stole Heather's lamb shank because she was too selfless to hang on to it.

During the meal the revelations continued, revealing the fact that Martin's cousin was one Vincent Noel, a classmate and heartthrob of Shan's from her Westville Junior School days.

Shan notes, "He then sent me photos of Vincent younger than when I knew him and later when he became a jockey. Lots of wine consumed." 

So the Durban diaspora may be a bit of a cliche but what were the odds of us all coming together in a remote desert village 650 km away from Durban as the crow flies? 

Above: (top left) a picture of Bini borrowed from "Info DT International Academy", after that a fairly sedate pic taken by Sián with Shan, Moi, Heather, Martin and Roger; and then it all became so riotous you'll have to work it out for yourselves apart from the last picture of the tranquility inside Bini's front room which was unoccupied all evening because the rioters had elected to spend the evening outside.

​Sadly the Fitchets were leaving early the next morning but that didn't stop us from having a final fling before retiring that evening, courtesy of Martin, with a bottle of rum liqueur back on the verandah of The Bethesda. We bid the Fitchets fond farewells as they were leaving early the next day.

So some of us are now exhausted

But others were hot to trot to experience some of the other delights of Nieu Bethesda. They started out with the Owl House. I'd already been there 3 times so I left it to Shan to accompany Sián and Roger for their induction into the world of Outsider Art at the town's biggest global drawcard. 

The Owl House is a creation by Helen Martins that evolved over decades in the mid 20th century culminating in her death in 1976. Some of her story is recorded and some of it is conjecture. It seems her father was abusive and the installation in the corner of her Camel Yard pictured at the top of this blog can be interpreted as evidence of this. And why are the camels not facing East? It would be presumptuous of me to surmise any further than that when so many intellectuals and academics have applied their brains and researched her unhappy life. 

Above: (clockwise from top left) Camels facing "East", what can it mean?; father facing in same direction while being fawned upon in a backdrop of topless women; the dry river bed that is the only way I've seen it in 4 visits; and yet I'm picking up floating bottles from the flooded cellar at the Bethesda a few hundred metres away at the invitation of the proprietor; Sián and Roger purchased these paintings from the Bushman museum; from a reformed alcoholic who'd found new meaning in curating the exhibition.

The Bushman museum is an uplifting but deeply emotional experience with astounding art on massive canvasses curated by a committed group of people with a new meaning in their lives. Frame #3 in the collage above is also the place of fascinating fossil "pracs[4]" as part of an archaeological project that goes WAY beyond the boundaries of Nieu Bethesda, South Africa and even the entire continent. 

To me that actually encapsulates Nieu Bethesda. You could drive through it and think "this is a nicely preserved little town, nice unmade roads and a peaceful setting" while there is just SO much going on, spiritually, architecturally and culturally. Each time I've been there I've stayed a little longer[5] and there're so many new and existing experiences I want to participate in.

So is there a way out of this whirlwind?

Yes and no, but a mostly pastoral last day was just what the doctor ordered. We meandered through the woods, bumped randomly into lovely people like the owners of Oude Pastorie, ate over-indulgently well (at Die Waenhuis[6] and once again met up with Fulvio and Albert), bought books from the Dustcovers Bookshop and then allowed ourselves a restful sleep before the next and last long stretch of driving on our 4,500 km odyssey.

Above: the local cemetery and a diverse collection of graves ... 

Every town has a cemetery and some are more splendid than others. Nieu Bethesda's is up there in the splendid stakes but it has an extraordinarily eclectic collection of individual graves. Not too many prizes for guessing which would be Helen Martins' which is kind of in keeping with all the other humble resting places. There is one that sticks out, though, belonging to a man who'd been a rather questionable senior policeman in the area.

Above; NB's water distribution is interesting - there is a dry river bed but an impressive dam and there are seemingly bountiful rills distributing its life-giving properties over a pretty sophisticated network about the town; this is a fond farewell but hopefully just au revoir to this lovely place and its delightful population of humans and animals.

Beware, Carla, we WILL be back!

Late snippet

While finishing off this episode of my blog yesterday, I needed to do a fair bit of research into "Outsider Art". I'd heard the term casually dropped into an argument while in the town and wanted to ensure I grasped why the Owl House had allegedly been rated as one of the top ten installations in the world, thereby attracting American visitors to the remote town. However much I resorted to Google, it seemed a fairly obscure branch of human expression no matter how excited Helen Martins' endeavours had always made me, personally.

Then I'm lying in bed this very morning, reading the Guardian (as is my wont) and thinking about what other details I needed to attend to before putting this story to bed and, in the headlines no less, I read this intro: "Ron's Place: Birkenhead Flat of outsider art granted grade-II listing." 

I read the story immediately, and looked at the pictures. I've often been called a boringly sceptical old fart when it comes to other dimensions and extra-terrestrial happenings, and had been proud of being so, but even I had to admit this seemed kind of spooky. I even had a tiny shiver. Please do have a look at the Guardian story[7] ...

Come to think of it there were rather a lot of coincidences during our time in this eccentric corner of the Karoo. This evening will definitely include a glass of something a bit special ... cheers Heather and Martin ...

Coming next

The last of our long driving days in this NE-SW endeavour takes us to the other side of the Karoo and through a spectacular pass to drop down from the "Groot" to the "Klein"[8] sections of the vast[9] semi-desert.

[Endnotes]:

1. He has done and continues to do so ...
2. I wrote a couple of articles about Solange that can be found at
   1. ​https://www.marksadventures.co.uk/fputn/archives/04-2021
   2. ​​https://www.marksadventures.co.uk/fputn/archives/03-2021​
3. See my review at https://www.google.com/maps/contrib/110808283252109777627/place/ChIJ6fjTw_Nnhx4Re_1fPUjE2vs/@8.815567,11.4918117,3z/data=!4m6!1m5!8m4!1e1!2s110808283252109777627!3m1!1e1?hl=en-US&entry=ttu
4. What we used to call the practical dimension of scientific studies at school and at university.
5. The 3rd visit was a slight aberration because our daughter, Kate, and I were on a flying visit to accommodate as much as possible into her short vacation.
6. Note to self ... must write a review about the two excellent evenings we had at The Waenhuis.
7. ​Ron's place: https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2024/apr/05/rons-place-birkenhead-flat-of-outsider-art-granted-grade-ii-listing
8. Afrikaans for Large and Small (the latter being somewhat relative[9]) 
9. An estimate for the size of the Karoo (it's a little difficult to define) is approximately 400,000 square kilometres (or nearly 100 million acres).