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Free State - Bloemfontein |  |
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South-central Free State Province. The Free State provincial capital - and South Africa's judicial capital - lies on the high, rather bare, often windswept grassland plains of the great central plateau, a handsome, rather quiet, rather respectable city of something more than half a million residents, many of whom are employed in government, social and community services. It's also a major road and rail hub (it boasts the country's largest railway workshops) and supports around 400 light industrial enterprises. A number of Bloemfontein's buildings are both historic and splendid. The public and suburban gardens a delight to the eye. Indeed, Bloemfontein is known as 'the city of roses' for the number and variety of these lovely flowers to be seen in parks and gardens. Visitors will find all the modern amenities, including excellent restaurants, shopping malls, theatres and plenty of hotel, guest-house and B&B accommodation.
The Free State lies within the summer rainfall region; summer months can be hot but are rarely uncomfortably so - the heat is moderated by the plateau's high altitude and by the coolness brought by cloud cover and thunderstorms in the wet season (roughly November through to March). Winter days are clear and sunny, the nights and early mornings cold, often bitterly so - temperatures fall well below zero in the harsher spells, and the countryside around is rimed with frost. Climatic indices: average summer rainfall 87 millimetres; average winter rainfall 8 millimetres; highest recorded annual rainfall 105 millimetres; average daily maximum summer temperature: around 30 degrees Centigrade; average daily maximum winter temperature 16.6 degrees Centigrade.
Bloemfontein was born in the 1840s, named by a local farmer, either in honour of his favourite cow or, more prosaically, after a nearby stream (the word means 'spring of flowers'), and bought (for just under 40 British pounds) by the British Resident in 1854 to become the miniscule capital of the newly established Orange Free State Republic. The civic leaders waited five years before holding their inaugural meeting; the republic's first raadsaal, or parliament, came together in the dung-floored village school-cum-church. But thereafter the place did grow, gaining size, status and prosperity from its closeness to the great diamond fields that, from the 1870s, were being mined around nearby Kimberley, from the gold of the Witwatersrand to the north (discovered in the 1880s) and from the road and railway that had snaked their way up from the coastal ports far to the south. Some fine buildings made their appearance during this period, among them the Anglican cathedral and a new raadsaal (the fourth and last to be built), a dignified edifice that reflected the classical revival in architecture. By the end of the century a visitor was able to record that 'the town is one of the neatest and, in a modest way, best appointed capitals in the world. Gardens are planted with trees that are now so tall as to make the whole place seem to swim in green'. The city, however, received its most powerful impetus with the discovery and exploitation, in the 1950s, of the giant Free State goldfields 160 or so kilometres to the north and, a decade later, with the launch of the giant Orange River hydroelectric and irrigation project.
Bloemfontein airport is 14 kilometres from city centre; daily flights connect the city with major South African centres. There is no shuttle bus service between airport and city. Johannesburg and Pretoria are a little over 400 kilometres on the N1 highway to the north, Cape Town 1,007 kilometres to the south. Taxis, of both the metred and minibus ('black taxi') kind, are plentiful; ranks of the former can be found outside the railway and bus stations. Car-rental facilities are available. There is also a fairly comprehensive bus service.
Historic Buildings Oldest of these is the First Raadsaal (parliament), a tiny, thatched structure that occupies a proud niche in St George's Street. Its much, much grander descendant, the Fourth Raadsaal and last seat of the old Orange Free State Republican Government, is a splendid, marbled-floored, neo-classical building whose spacious main chamber, loftily domed, is rooflit by coloured glass. The building was completed in 1893. Imposing, too, is the Old Presidency (see Museums below). Well worth a visit is the Anglican Cathedral, originally (in the 1850s) a rather modest building but one which took on new dimensions and a new glory with the arrival, half a century later, of the celebrated architect Sir Herbert Baker (who went on to design, among much else, Pretoria's Union Building). Other notable edifices include the City Hall, the double-spired Dutch Reformed Church and the Roman-style Appeal Court of South Africa. Museums and Galleries Bloemfontein is well served by these. Among the more prominent are the National Museum, which features fossil, archaeological (including the fascinating Florisbad Man), local history and cultural exhibits. The Old Presidency, one-time home to the Orange Free State republican leaders, now serves as a museum containing presidential trappings that take one back to another age, another world. Other notable expos are the Queen's Fort military museum (Free State militaria from about 1820 onwards), the Rugby Museum (one of the most extensive of its kind), the Agricultural Museum, and the National Afrikaans Literary Museum, which houses a series of rooms each devoted to Afrikanerdom's literary celebrities, among them the mystic writer-scientist-philosopher Eugene Marais, poet Breyten Breytenbach, novelist Andre Brink and the Afrikaans-speaking coloured poet Adam Small. A real gem is the Freshford House Museum (Victorian period furnishings). So too is the Oliewenhuis art gallery, a Cape Dutch-style mansion set in spacious and beautiful grounds, inside all is light and airy, and some fine paintings and scultpures are on view, including canvasses by the much underrated Thomas Baines and by Bertha Everard, one of a most remarkable family of women artists. National Women's Memorial A massive (37-metre) sandstone obelisk that occupies a commanding position on Monument Road, created in memory of the 26,000 Afrikaner women and children who perished in the concentration camps set up by the British during the Anglo-Boer war of 1899-1902. Panels, by the noted sculptor Anton van Wouw, movingly portray the suffering of the white internees; more recent ones commemorate the black people who died in the camps (the official count was 14,000; recent research has produced a figure of 30,000). The monument has a museum annex whose walls are adorned with brilliantly illustrated tiles depicting war scenes. Interred at the base of the obelisk are the remains of Emily Hobhouse, the admirable British pacifist who campaigned so long and so hard on behalf of the Boer families; British military commander Lord Kitchener called her 'that bloody woman' and banned her from the camps; the Boers of the Free State revered her. Naval Hill Bloemfontein's most prominent natural feature, the Hill received its name after British soldiers hauled naval guns up to the crest during the Anglo-Boer war. The summit later became the site of the Lamont Hussey observatory, which specialised in the discovery and documentation of binary stars (more than 7,000 of them), and later still - after the observatory's closure in 1972 - as a cultural centre and theatre. The latter is less grand but perhaps more lively than the modern, marble-gilt-and-glass Sand du Plessis civic theatre complex in Markgraaff Street. Much of the area has been set aside as the Franklin Nature Reserve (see Parks and Gardens, further on). Waterfront Cape Town set the pace with its splendid Victoria & Alfred harbour redevelopment; Durban is trying to follow suit, and so is inland Johannesburg with its Randburg lakeside complex. Bloemfontein has climbed into the act with its own Loch Logan waterfront-type project. Well worth a visit.
Bloemfontein National Botanical Garden This rather lovely area, distinguished by its dolomite outcrops, cultivated patches and expanses of natural vegetation, offers tranquility and considerable botanical interest. Special features include herbarium, nursery (a nice range of bulbs are on sale here), summer house, orange-blossom arbour, tearoom, and a fossilised (or petrified) tree estimated to be anything up to 300 million years old. Worth at least a morning during your stay, especially in summer. Franklin Nature Reserve, which surrounds Naval Hill (see above), is home to one or two giraffe, to zebra and to antelope of various kinds, among them springbok, eland and red hartebeest. A pleasant place for a ramble. King's Park and Neighbours Largest of Bloemfontein's open areas, with a number of different components. Most attractive of these is perhaps the rose garden, a stunning spread of more than 4,000 floribundas, miniatures, hybrid teas and many, many other varieties. The beds were inaugurated by the Prince of Wales (later, for a brief period before his abdication, King Edward Vlll) on his 1925 tour of the country. The rose festival is usually held in November. Among other features are the trees (more than 100,000 were planted about a century ago and they're now in their full, mature glory); the Loch Logan Waterfront development (see above) and its rose pergola; and a zoo, which holds some of Africa's big cats, a comprehensive collection of primates (the biggest captive community in South Africa) and much else. Orchid House Sited in Hamilton park at the bottom of Naval Hill, the domed conservatory contains around 3,000 of these lovely flowers in an imaginatively designed landscape of pools, cascades, footbridges and weathered rock. Computer-controlled temperature and watering keep the orchids in prime condition.
Soetdoring Nature Reserve On the banks of the Modder River about 50 kilometres northeast of Bloemfontein, the reserve extends across the grasslands that surround the Krugersdrif dam. Wildlife comprises zebra, wildebeest, gemsbok, eland and many other types of antelope; a special section, the predator park, is home to lions and wild dogs; and the dam attracts a lively community of waterfowl. In fact, a surprising 250 bird species have been recorded within the reserve, among them secretary bird and martial eagle. Maria Moroka Park Near Thaba Nchu to the east of Bloemfontein. The park extends over much of Thaba Nchu ('black mountain') and includes the large Groothoek dam. The region is scenically most attractive; the sweet grasses of the plains, set against a majestic highland backdrop, sustain springbok and eland, hartebeest and zebra. Among the 150 species of bird is the rare blue korhaan. The park is popular among hikers and mountain bikers. Golden Gate Highlands National Park, even farther to the east, close to the northern Lesotho border. The park is noted for its massive, strangely sculpted rock formations. Vaal River Down the N1 highway to the south you'll find South Africa's second biggest watercourse and largest dam (the Gariep, formerly the Hendrik Verwoerd). The latter serves as a prime recreation area as well as a major source of irrigation and hydroelectric power. Its fringing nature reserves have much to offer the game-viewer and bid-watcher. See Transgariep Route.
Winburg, Welkom and Kroonstad lie to the north-east; Kimberley is due west along the N8 highway. |
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BLOEMFONTEIN Western Cape
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