THE mercury was hovering around three degrees as we left our cottage in the Champagne Valley and headed to Winterton to take part in the town’s new parkrun.
This year, Bill and I have set ourselves the target of completing 20 of these free, timed 5km runs or walks (always held on Saturday mornings in park-like surrounds) at 20 different South African venues, to attain our official parkrun tourist status. Our Winterton run would bring my total to 15 and Bill’s to 16 – and we were also looking forward to what we’d heard was an attractive course.
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Driving through a frosty, low-lying section of the valley, the mercury dropped alarmingly, reaching a disconcerting half degree below zero and staying round there until we arrived at the Waffle Hut, where the parkrun started and ended.
It was freezing cold when we arrived but, as usual, we received a warm welcome from the organisers and fellow runners. always, parkrun is like a big, friendly family and meeting so many wonderful parkrunners at the different venues is part of the fun of the whole tourist experience.
The temperature had not risen much by the time we set off and the frost was still thick on the ground. For a while, my hands and face were icy but I eventually warmed up enough to enjoy the route, through frosty grass, over a couple of dam walls and across a mealie field, all the time enjoying the view of the surrounding mountains.
It was a lovely route and we thoroughly enjoyed our run even though it was the coldest parkrun we’d ever done.
The post-run breakfast at the Waffle Hut was delicious and we enjoyed taking a look at some lovely craft work in the nearby shops.
Founded as an irrigation settlement in 1905, Winterton has grown into a splendid little mountain town that seems to take its tourism industry pretty seriously. It is spotlessly
clean, attractive and has all sorts of interesting eateries, craft shops and other businesses to cater for its visitors.
We absolutely love the eclectic collection of old treasures housed in the town’s delightful museum and strongly recommend it to anyone passing through.
Its most amazing exhibit is its famous antique caravan, but even more strange than this strange contraption is the story about its owner, John Weston. Born in an ox wagon near Vryheid in 1873, he spent much of his life in the Bergville area, although, according to a brochure provided by the museum, he travelled all over the world.
John began his global adventures at the age of seven when he and his family left to spend three years in Somali. They then moved to America.
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As a young man John became a serious globetrotter and a jack of all trades, working as a cook, ship’s officer, coxswain, whaler, fisherman, marine engineer, diver, explorer, big game hunter, an owner of an engineering firm in Belgium and, eventually, a pilot.
He also served with the Boer forces in the Anglo Boer War and with the British Navy’s then the fledgling Royal Air Force, in Greece, during World War One – and somewhere along the line he qualified as a civil and an electrical engineer.
In 1906, while farming in Bultfontein, he cycled 240km to Koffiefontein to propose to Lily Roux. Dressed in their wedding finery the couple then cycled 160km to Bloemfontein to tie the knot.
One of John’s passions was flying and he began to build Africa’s first aeroplane in 1907. It took him four years and an extended visit to France to refine it to a point where he could give his first flying demonstration, in Kimberley, in 1911.
It was during a visit to the USA in 1920 that he was introduced to another of his passions – caravanning. His first caravan, ‘Suid Africa’ was built in England from where he and his wife and three children enjoyed many adventures touring Europe in it.
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In 1927 they began their epic trans-Africa trip but soon found the caravan too bulky for this expedition. John and his family solved this by building the ‘Prairie Schooner’, a lighter caravan, and left Cape Agulhas on their second attempt in 1931. The 15-month trip took them through Africa, the Middle East and France to London.
In 1933 John, who had been awarded the honorary rank of Rear-Admiral by the Greek Navy during WWI, bought the three Bergville farms that became his ‘Admiralty’s Estate’.
Sadly, it was on this estate that he and his wife were robbed and murdered in 1950. His friends remembered him as a real character – a scientist, an engineer, an inventor, a philosopher and a man with “an astonishing and sometimes embarrassing gift for silence”.
The caravan at the museum is the ‘Prairie Schooner’, but it has been rebuilt into its first design and renamed ‘Suid Africa’. It bears a circular plaque with the following legend: “Around the World. Our Mansion – seven by fourteen feet; Our Field – the whole world; Our Family – mankind.”
Imagine you and your family travelling through Africa and Europe in this amazing vehicle.
A spirit of adventure still seems to surround this quirky vehicle and it spills out into the streets of the plucky little mountain town. The magical museum, with its amazing caravan, is just one of many reasons to while away some time in pretty Winterton.
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