Mossel Bay

Chas Everitt for sales, rentals and holiday accommodation from Vleesbaai to Groot Brakrivier.

Mossel Bay is located in the heart of the Garden Route area in South Africa. It is also commonly known as the halfway mark between Cape Town and Port Elizabeth, about 400km to either side on the N2. One can almost say it is right on the border of the “forestry” side and the more fynbos or Karoo side. The diversity in these two aspects of the Garden Route is what makes this area so unique and a paradise for residents and visitors throughout the year.

Mossel Bay can be easily accessed by air as well. George Airport is about a 25 minute drive away from where there are connecting flights to all major centres in South Africa. There is also Mossel Bay Airfield for private, non-scheduled flights.

Properties

Properties in the Mossel Bay area range from the multimillion rand mansion to the average family home, townhouse and apartment. The old stonewalled houses in the centre of town are being revamped while retaining their historic look, and areas such as Dana Bay are new and modern. Mossel Bay boasts with two of the country’s finest golf estates, Mossel Bay Golf Estate and Pinnacle Point Beach and Golf Resort, ideal for the discerning buyer.

Weekend and holiday visitors keep the apartment and townhouse market very active.

The competitively priced properties and overall property market allow for good opportunities, and sales have remained remarkably stable over the past 10 years.

Weather

320 Sunny days per year. Rain falls mostly at night and mostly during summer. Frost is rare and snow has never been recorded in Mossel Bay, although it is sometimes seen on the peaks of the Outeniqua Mountains, 60 km to the north.

The CBD of Mossel Bay is surrounded by a number of smaller villages:

• VLEES BAY / BOGGOMS BAY - Traditional fishermen’s cottages and two environmentally-sensitive property developments

• DANA BAY - A residential area within a conservancy, Dana Bay boasts 116 species of birds and is known for its 16 km-long sandy beach.

• HERBERTSDALE - Inland and nestled in the foothills of the Outeniqua Mountains, Herbertsdale is a historic village. The picturesque Langfontein Valley (on the road out of town towards Cloete’s Pass) is known for its witblits.

• FRIEMERSHEIM - Originally a mission station and the site of the slave quarters for Great Brak River. The old slave buildings can still be seen near the entrance to the village.

• RUITERBOSCH - A beautiful valley just off the Robinson Pass between Mossel Bay and Oudtshoorn - scenic drives, hiking trails and 4x4 routes and is a must-see for bird lovers and anyone interested in the mountain fynbos.

• MOSSEL BAY’S CBD - The town of Mossel Bay itself is broadly divided into two major areas - the Old Town, which is centred around the harbour and the Dias Museum Complex - and the Newer District of Diaz Beach and Voorbaai. Both areas boast hotels and guest houses, excellent shopping and access to Mossel Bay’s famous white-sand beaches. Many high-lying areas offer excellent whale- and dolphin watching (particularly between May and September, when the migratory species visit the Bay).

• TARKA - One of the oldest suburbs (it dates back to 1898), famous for its stone houses that were built of local rock which was quarried in a unique way: boulders were buried under bonfires during the day and then exposed to the cool night air to crack. The resulting stones were then dressed and made ready for the masons.

• KWA NONQABA - One of the largest residential areas of Mossel Bay, Kwa Nonqaba is known for its Township Homestay and the ever-popular non-alcoholic shebeen, the Emgolweni Kamama’s Café.

• HARTENBOS – Above all a holiday village where the endless sandy beach is an irresistible magnet for South African families. This is the home of the ATKV Resort (Afrikaanse Taal en Kultuur Vereniging) - one of the largest self-catering resorts in the country - and its museum

explores the Great Trek of 1838.

• KLEIN BRAKRIVIER (with Reebok and Tergniet) - Popular with lovers of water sports and anglers - it offers excellent fishing spots on the river and the 4 km-long beach.

• GROOT BRAKRIVIER - A holiday spot on the shores of the Great Brak River Lagoon. Known for its fishing, boating and beaches, the village boasts a number of marked walking trails, and a local history museum.

Activities:

Due to the location, Mossel Bay is paradise for the nature lover and outdoor junkie. Two superb golf courses, trail running, mountain bike trails, surfing, fishing, tennis, squash, paddling, sailing, hiking; and add to these are clubs for every possible interest and hobby.

History:

The dynamic Bartolomeu Dias Museum Complex encompasses a wealth of places of historical interest. Here you’ll find a Maritime Museum (housing a life-size replica of the Caravel in which Bartholomew Dias first rounded the Cape all those years ago); a Cultural Museum, a Shell Museum and Aquarium; an ethno-botanical garden with its Braille Trail and the famous Post Office Tree in which Dias hid a letter to his compatriot Joao da Silva (and, incredibly, da Silva found it!).

After voyaging round the Bulge of Africa and southwards past modern-day Angola and Namibia, Dias and his men reached further south than any European explorers before them. But at a point off the west coast of South Africa (probably near the Orange River Mouth), Dias decided to escape relentless southerly winds by turning south by west, and sailing out into the open ocean. After running dangerously southwards for thirteen days, Dias decided to sail eastwards again, hoping to find the coast of Africa – but in fact (and without knowing it), he’d rounded the Cape, as he had wanted to do. Finally turning northwards, the ships made landfall on St. Blaise’s day – the 3rd of February 1488 – at Mossel Bay, which Dias named Aguada de São Bras (St. Blaise’s Watering Place).

The Famous Post Office Tree

In 1501, another Portuguese navigator, Pedro d’Ataide, sought shelter in Mossel Bay after losing much of his fleet in a storm. He left an account of the disaster hidden in an old shoe which he suspended from a milkwood tree (Sideroxylon inerme) near the spring from which Dias had drawn his water. The report was found by the explorer to whom it was addressed -João da Nova and the tree served as a kind post office for decades thereafter. (More recently, a boot-shaped post box has been erected under the now famous Post Office Tree, and letters posted there are franked with a commemorative stamp. This has ensured that the tree has remained one of the town’s biggest tourist attractions.)

João da Nova erected a small shrine near the Post Office Tree, and although no traces of it remain, it is considered the first place of Christian worship in South Africa.

Archaeology

Geneticists have known for some time that all humans alive today stem from a core population of less than about a thousand individuals who lived in Africa between 150 000 and 200 000 years ago. The archaeology of Mossel Bay has shown that at least a portion of that population lived in this area. Ongoing research by the SACP4 (South African Coastal Palaeoclimate, Palaeoenvironment, Palaeoecology, and Palaeoanthropology) Project in Mossel Bay’s Pinnacle Point Caves has revealed the earliest evidence for modern human behaviour, such as systematic harvesting of seafood. This includes the earliest evidence for a complex stone tool technology in which tiny, beautiful and precisely-made stone blades were embedded into other materials (probably wood or bone) to create advanced tools that improved our hunting ability.

Later discoveries showed that this is also where humankind first learned to treat silcrete with heat in a controlled way – and so transform a rather poor quality raw stone into a top quality material from which to make our tools; and that this is where we first worked with the pigment

ochre (the earliest form of paint) – which indicates that this is where symbolic behaviour – culture – began.