Grahamstown and Makhanda

Founded In 1812 As A Frontier Garrison And The Centre Of The 1820 Settler Scheme, With More Georgian And Victorian Buildings Per Street Than Anywhere Else In The Country, A Cathedral, Rhodes University, A Camera Obscura Still Working In The Observatory Museum, And The National Arts Festival Each July The Largest Arts Festival In Africa · Makhanda, Eastern Cape

A garrison was planted here in 1812 to hold a frontier, and the frontier did not hold quietly: nine wars were fought over this country across a hundred years, and the Xhosa chiefdoms that lost them lost the land as well. The town that grew out of the garrison became the centre of the 1820 settler scheme, filled with Georgian and Victorian buildings at a density nothing else in the country matches, grew more churches per head than seemed necessary, and acquired a cathedral, a university and a camera obscura that still projects the street onto a table in the Observatory Museum. Every July the whole place is taken over by the National Arts Festival, the largest on the continent, and a quiet provincial town of seventy thousand becomes the busiest cultural address in Africa for eleven days. It was renamed Makhanda in 2018 after a Xhosa prophet who was imprisoned on Robben Island, which is still argued about locally and is worth knowing before you ask directions.

In the Eastern Cape hills 130 km north-east of Port Elizabeth, with the cathedral at the centre of a Georgian and Victorian grid, Makhanda, Eastern Cape, South Africa

A working university city rather than a site. THE OBSERVATORY MUSEUM with its camera obscura keeps daylight hours, closes on Sundays and usually one other day, and the camera NEEDS SUNSHINE TO WORK AT ALL - on a grey day you will be shown the room and not the image, which is worth knowing. The Albany History Museum, the Natural Sciences Museum and the National English Literary Museum keep daylight weekday hours with shorter Saturdays. The cathedral is open most of the day and in use. THE NATIONAL ARTS FESTIVAL runs for about eleven days spanning late June and early July, when the city is entirely full and nothing can be had without booking. Term time fills the restaurants; university holidays empty them. THE CITY HAS HAD SERIOUS WATER SUPPLY FAILURES, so ask your accommodation. It is 130 km from Port Elizabeth on good road and MALARIA-FREE.

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